Finchale Abbey
News
Special
points of interest:
·
Welcome to our first issue of Finchale News
·
Welcome to our New residents
·
New Gate for entry to residential park
·
Council News
·
Save a date for our summer barbeque!
Welcome to the first edition of Finchale Abbey News
Welcome to our first newsletter. By popular
demand we’ve decided to bring out a newsletter to keep you up to date
with what’s happening around the village. We hope you will find it useful
and informative and we look forward to receiving your feedback about what you
would like to see in the next issue. (Or even if you would like to see another
issue!!)
If the mood takes you and you’d like
to write a short piece for the next issue you’d be most welcome This is an opportunity for all of us to celebrate how
lucky we are to live in such an idyllic and historic location.
We’ll try to add a short piece of history about Finchale in each of
our newsletters (if there’s enough space!) to develop all of our
knowledge about this fascinating place and hopefully make our newsletter a good
read. So sit back, relax enjoy your read and don’t forget to let us know
what you think too!
Welcome to our New
Residents!
A big welcome to all of our new residents
who have joined us since the start of our redevelopment. Especially Mr. and
Mrs. Hugill who joined us in March. The park is going from strength to strength
and as stage three of the development is now nearing completion. We look
forward to welcoming even more residents over the coming months, including Mrs.
Kennedy and Mr. and Mrs. Duncan who are due to join us in April.
As more people come onto the park it can be
a little difficult to keep up with all of the new faces so we’d like to
take this opportunity to invite you all to our summer barbeque where
we’ll hopefully get to know everyone a little better. We know it’s
early but we thought we’d let you all know to keep the evening of June
7th Free!
To be a little
different this year we’ll be having a race night to raise money for
Kidney Research.
More details to
follow.
Going for Gold!
As you are all probably aware we were awarded a Silver
David Bellamy Conservation award for 2006 we expect to be awarded another
Silver award this year but we are going for Gold in 2008 and we need all of our
residents to help.
How can you help?
Reduce, Reuse, Recycle...We are currently
in discussions to get kerb-side green recycle boxes for all residents.
These boxes will be emptied fortnightly from outside of your homes and will
take away paper, cans and glass. Although this facility is not currently
available there are facilities to collect recyclable materials near the main
bins on the park. We can’t
currently collect cardboard or plastic but this can be recycled at the refuse
centre in
Water. While you may not think it because of the amount of rain
we seem to get, water is a precious resource. Please consider it’s use carefully and we are
looking into plans for placing water butts around the park to be used when
watering gardens. Please let us know if you’d be interested in a water butt.
Anyone for compost? Ideas would be
welcome about location of communal compost bins? Would you use them?
Lights. Please try to use energy efficient lighting around your
homes and remember to turn off the lights when you’re not in the room!
Bus Service. Why not ditch the car for the day and take a trip using
our bus service, see note below.
Dog owners please continue to
clean up after your dogs, we’re doing well at the moment but there
is still room for some improvement!
Litter. Please
set an example to others by not dropping litter and if you do see any pick it
up! Every little helps.
‘’The future starts again at Finchale Be part
of it.’ David Bellamy 
Bus Service Going Strong.
After trying unsuccessfully to arrange a bus
service with the local bus company we managed to come to an arrangement with
Jovial Taxi’s from Newton Hall to provide a regular service from the
park. The bus meets next to the farm buildings at the following times:-
Tuesday
10.30 Return 2.00 Durham
City £2 adult £1 child
Thursday
10.30 Return 12.30 Arnison
Shopping Centre £1 adult 50p child
Saturday 6.00 Return 8.00 To the Jovial Monk Pub in Newton Hall.
£1 adult 50p child
(He will discuss different return times on
Saturday nights and return when you’re ready so don’t feel you have
to rush you’re meal...or you’re pint!)
Should you require a
taxi service at another time they are
happy to accommodate just phone 07716661662 (all prices quoted are each way.)
We are still in a
trial period with this service so please support it and use it when you can, we
hope to provide a more comprehensive service over the summer months.
New
Entrance Gate
We have now placed an order for a pair of
wrought Iron electric gates which will be placed at the entrance of the
residential area, formerly the location of ‘the white wall’. These
gates will have coded keypad access to prevent non residents from gaining
access to the residential area. The gates should hopefully only be needed
during busy periods and we will be able to leave them open overnight and at
other times but we see this as the only method of keeping non-residents at bay.
We anticipate that codes will be changed every few months but we also hope to
be able to offer the option of a remote control (for those of you who
don’t like getting their arm cold!) We anticipate these remotes will be
in the region of £35 but we’ll give you more information when we get it.
There is no public right
of way through the park and no permission will be given. Anyone who enters the
park that you do not think are family
members or residents should be stopped and asked to leave. Hopefully the
new gate should stop our current problem with trespassers. The gates are custom
made and should be with us in four to six weeks but please bear with us in the
mean time we’re doing our best to stop them!
Lodge Suppliers
Our current Lodge suppliers NJS of
Beverley are doing a sterling job and we are more than happy with their product
and the after sales service they provide. We are however looking at allowing
another lodge producer onto the park in order to meet the large demand for
homes that we 
are currently experiencing. Ting Dene, who are the largest producers in the
market, will be bringing a show home on to the park soon to give prospective
residents more choice when designing their new homes. All Ting Dene lodges will
have the same exterior made of Extrudawood to keep continuity throughout the
park.
Council News
The council have still not given us
permission to use the five plots at the top of stage two (we are still very
hopeful though!) and this is unfortunately holding up the post delivery. They
are unable to officially allocate numbers to plots until the final number is
known. As soon as this problem is sorted out
we will get the postal delivery sorted too until then please bear with
us and collect post from the shop.
The lady from the
council has been again to take in to account stage three plots and officially
take numbers in relation to council tax, postal delivery and voting rights. All
on the park from lodges and caravans will have a number and post should be
delivered directly. In preparation for this please have a postbox attached to
the handrail of your decking or exterior fence to allow the postman easy
access. Please try to make this a subtle postbox preferably black so we keep
continuity throughout the park.
A short History of Finchale Abbey Part 1
The
It was here that St. Godric settled in
the 12th century, building a hermitage on a site which was to become his home
for many years. After Godric's death in 1170 at the age of 105, the Durham
Monks set about building a shrine to the saint, the results of which can still
be seen today in the substantial surviving priory buildings. St Godric's tomb
still lies beneath the priory church and is marked by a simple stone cross.
Today however, the tomb lies empty, his remains having mysteriously vanished many
centuries ago since when there has been much speculation about his final
resting place.
Do his bones lie in some far off
place, taken for safety by the monks at the time of the reformation or does he still
lie hidden somewhere in some secret place at Finchale, undisturbed by time and
still keeping a watchful eye over his old home and its modern day visitors?
For
your information an overview of plots sold to date and current residents on the
development.
Please send us your comments on
our newsletter we’d love to hear from you!
E-mail
or phone (0191) 3866528
For
more information on the Park, our new development and availability of
residential plots
please call Ann or Bill on 0191 3866528 or E-mail: godricawatson@hotmail.com