Dream-A-Way success at Devon County Show

Dream-A-Way, the Exeter-based charity that provides holidays and outings for people with disabilities across Devon and Cornwall, is celebrating a big success as the Official Show Charity at the Devon County show at Westpoint last week. This is also the charity’s 20th birthday year so the Trustees were delighted to be chosen as charity of the year and then to receive a royal visit in addition was a huge Bonus.

The Dream-A-Way stand was the first to be visited by HRH the Duchess of Cornwall after she had officially opened the County Show. She was introduced to Dream-A-Way Chairman Jeff Merrett MBE and Trustee Gill Freeman. The Duchess then met two families who had previously been beneficiaries of holidays, and now support the charity by helping with fundraising.  The Biddulph family are from Torquay and their daughters Nicole and Lauren presented the Duchess with a bouquet, as did twins, Harriet and Grace of the Dunn family from Clyst St Mary, Exeter. The Duchess appeared very pleased to meet the children, and also spoke to some of the Dream-A-Way committee members before continuing her tour of the showground.

The charity was supported by around 100 volunteers over the three days, who carried out a number of bucket collections. There was a tombola on the stand and the charity also benefitted from the Shoot Out Club World Record Skittles attempt held in the Ales from Devon marquee and from donations from a number of other organisations. By the end of the Saturday a total of £6,931 had been raised, but Chairman Jeff Merrett was confident that the final total would be in the region of £8,500. Looking back over the three days of the Devon County show he said “It was a huge amount of work but well worth it. We had so much support from Ollie Allen and her team to guide us through everything. Local companies supported the tombola by providing us with over 2000 prizes. I am indebted to each of our willing volunteers, aged between 15  and 86 years, each of whom freely gave up their time to ensure that our superb pavilion became a great place to meet and to find out about the work of Dream-A-Way. The obvious highlight was to meet the Duchess and be able to present her to two wonderful families. She was very interested in the work of Dream-A-Way and made us all feel proud of the work we all do. Devon County Show 2013 was without doubt the best 3 days in the 20 year history of Dream-A-Way and I would like to thank everyone that supported us in any way”

Now Dream-A-Way are looking forward to many more exciting events throughout this their birthday year.

Full details of forthcoming events, together with a gallery of pictures from the Devon County Show can be found at www.dream-a-way.org

Pictures (Courtesy of Devon County Show): HRH Duchess of Cornwall at the Dream-A-way stand meeting the Biddulph and Dunn Families together with the Charity’s Chairman Jeff Merrett MBE, and Client and supporter Phil day from Ebford.