Howard Hemmings: Gardeners on tour

You are part of two different groups. Tell us about them?

The main group I am involved in is the Hall Green and District Amateur Gardeners Society, and they are the group that I primarily organise and go on trips with. The other group is the Shirley U3A which has around 70 members and we run a couple of trips with that group every year too.

When did you first start organising trips?

I’ve been with the Amateur Gardeners for several years and I have been helping to organise trips since around 2010. Somebody else was doing them initially, but being the treasurer and dealing with the money meant that I was often dealing with the trips too so one thing led to another and I picked up more responsibilities.

What sorts of trips do you go on?

Because we are a gardening society we like to go to gardens across the country. The most popular ones we go to are the Royal Horticultural Society (RHS), and there are five around the country, so we try to vary which we go to.

Some of the gardens we visit are further away so we will go over a few days and stop off to visit somewhere on the way there and on the way home and then spend a day at the garden. We also like going to flower shows, particularly the RHS shows and the shows at the Three Counties Showground, so the Malvern Autumn Show and the RHS Malvern Spring Festival.

With the U3A we go on one trip via coach and then another more local where we might get public transport. We recently went to Stratford-upon-Avon and had a trip around the Shakespeare Theatre there. It’s always interesting and you get a group of people who often don’t get to go anywhere, so I think they really appreciate it.

What do you look for when booking?

When booking somewhere it’s useful if there are some shops nearby or places to eat. We have a fair few elderly people who do tend to get more tired when they are walking around, so they like to have a nice café to sit in or some shops to meander around. If we can incorporate that it’s always helpful and that’s why we like the Malvern Show too because there are lots of activities and talks to listen to and different stalls to visit.

Are there any challenges when it comes to organising trips?

The main challenge is the price of coaches. We base our trips on filling at least 30 seats on a 49-seater coach and if we get more than that then it is a bonus.

Generally, for our trips we are taking 35 to 40 and for the RHS gardens we sometimes fill the whole coach.

What visits have you got coming up?

We’re going up to RHS Harlow Carr in Harrogate and we’ll be doing that as a day trip in the summer. We are also planning on visiting Kew Gardens in London as well.

We have already begun planning our Christmas meal for this year. We go at the end of November and have been doing that annually for around six years now and everyone really enjoys spending that time together.

What is it about the role that you enjoy?

I enjoy doing what I do and as treasurer you feel more responsible, especially when you’re organising these trips. People come up and thank me which is a nice little accolade.

I think one of the most worrying things is making sure everyone gets back on the coach at the end of the day. I haven’t left anyone behind so far so I must be doing something right.