THERE’S A WHOLE HEAP OF FUN FOR EVERYONE... BEHIND THE GREEN DOOR!
Outdoor activities back in business
CYCLING and canoeing are just part of an outdoor pursuit group’s plans after resuming activities.
Green Door, based at Westport Lake, offers various types of bike for hire, including several designed for people who need extra support.
Visitors can try out hand cycles, quadrocycles, and there are even some models that are able to accommodate a wheelchair.
And for anyone who fancies something more cerebral, it has resumed regular history talks with Sentinel columnist Mervyn Edwards.
During lockdown, the group found it difficult to operate within social distancing regulations, but organisers say they are delighted to see visitors returning for a jaunt round the lake.
Julian Perks, who works for Green Door, said: “We reopened for cycles in early April this year, and there’s high demand so it’s been popular.
“We’re starting to develop our activities with support from the local council. We’ve recently started opening on a Monday for cycling which is a new venture we’ve not done before, and that’s proved really popular.
“We’re not able to do a lot of the stuff this year because of capacity, but we do have history walks which are run for us by Mervyn Edwards.
“We’ve also been filming for virtual walks. We’ve had some funding from the lottery. So we were still able to keep in contact with people who weren’t able to come out.”
The new activities, such as the virtual walks help people who can’t make it to the location to enjoy a taste of Potteries history.
“We opened last summer for four months in late July until mid-november,” said Julian.
“Then, obviously, we were away from the office, staff were furloughed, we had five months away.
“It’s been a challenge to actually operate because we need to have close contact with people so we had to be quite specific with risk assessments that had covid-secure procedures in place.
“We had to demonstrate that we were doing things properly. It’s been busy because off the weather, we’ve been lucky we’ve not been affected too much by the way.
“A lot of out service users have supported needs. Our activities are all adapted so they can be as inclusive as possible. As people start to do more things it’s proved popular.”