On Thursday morning of 19th November a coach party of Seaham U3A members set off on an overnight excursion to Derbyshire. First stop was a visit to Royal Crown Derby Potteries where the members had lunch and then moved on to the Denby Outlet, where the members enjoyed wandering around the factory outlet, snapping up bargains and also taking in a cookery demonstration.  We had a great bus driver called Billy who kept us all amused whilst on the coach.  We arrived at our hotel, the Hilton East Midlands Hotel at 4pm. Every-one got checked in and we all met downstairs later for our dinner. The hotel, staff and food were excellent and we could not praise the hotel enough as they were so friendly and nothing was a bother to them.  Friday morning after having a superb breakfast we set off for Chatsworth. It was magnificient, we were lucky as the morning started off with bright sunshine although it was bitterly cold.  Once we arrived at Chatsworth everyone mingled around the many Christmas Stalls of the Christmas Market and at 3.15p.m we entered Chatsworth for our tour of the grand house and take in the wonderful Christmas decorations and magical atmosphere.

On behalf of all of our U3A members I would like to thank Gordon Ayre for his wonderful organisation of the whole trip. He had worked extremely hard and everyone had nothing but praise for this great overnight away.

Thanks Gordon, looking forward to what you have in store for 2016.

Gwynneth J