Welcome

Welcome to the website of the Rotary Club of Folkestone.

Apologies
Many apologies if you have been inconvenienced by the temporary disappearance of this website. We have been experiencing technical difficulties and are grateful for the efforts of Stephen Alleyne in helping us to restore normal service. We hope to have the site updated soon to reflect the new Rotary year which began on July 1st with John Greig taking over the role of Club President from Peter Lapham.

Well Done Ray!
Congratulations to Rotarian Ray Johnson who completed his tenth London Marathon on April 25th. He writes:
I am pleased to confirm that I have managed to successfully complete my 10th London Marathon in a row by running once again nonstop. My time was 4 hours, 6 minute and 15 seconds! It was particularly hard going from mile 22 onwards this time around but unlike previous years thankfully I did not hit the wall or suffer any stiff legs! I was rather disappointed however that a Lucozade bottle over took me!
You may be aware it was fairly mild to begin with after a quick down pour but it soon got hot, especially running amongst 37,000 participants. The crowds were most encouraging and as always kept me going. My best time was in 2002 at 3 hours, 23 minutes.
I am most grateful to all that have supported me with sponsorship for The Kent Association for The Blind, in particular the Roger De Haan Charitable Trust and Hythe Imperial. To date I have raised around £2,700, and it is still possible to sponsor me by visiting my website www.justgiving.com/rayjohnson.
Since participating within the London Marathon, I have succeeded in raising just over £36,000.
I am now looking forward to my 11th London Marathon for which I have already entered!
A tremendous effort - well done!

Interact Club
News of the recently formed Folkestone Interact Club, based at the Folkestone School for Girls, was relayed to the Club at the recent Dinner meeting, when President Carly Booker and Secretary Madelaine Whybrow gave an impressive presentation on how they had set up the club in 2009. They expressed their gratitude to Rotarians Frank Sturrock and Noel Tatt for the support and guidance they gave. At the moment, membership consists of girls from their school only but they would welcome students from other schools applying to join the fledgling club!

New Member
The latest new member of the Club, Tom Miller, was inducted at the Lunch Meeting on March 15th. He is pictured here receiving his pack of Rotary "goodies" from President Peter Lapham, with sponsor David Roseveare in the background.

Haiti Earthquake

There has been a very good response to our Haiti appeal locally, with many schools busy collecting cash or supplies for the unfortunate Haitians. For example, the Harvey Grammar School has already passed on the £1000 it raised in three days to purchase two Shelter Boxes, and the children of Miss Orviss' class at Highview School have collected 2 large boxes of supplies for the victims of the Haiti Earthquake, which they presented to Folkestone Rotary Club on 29th January 2010 in support of the Club's Haiti appeal. On behalf of President Peter Lapham, International Committee Chairman Mike Simmonds also collected letters written by the children to give comfort to the Haitian people in their time of need. Mike told them that the Club was extremely grateful for their hard work in collecting these donations and explained that he will make sure that the people of Haiti benefit from this wonderful effort by the children.


The links on the left show just some of the charitable activities of the club - but there is also a strong "fellowship" element too! For the new year (the Rotary year runs from July to June), our evening meetings will be guest days when prospective members and their partners can come along to see what we do. Information about the Rotary International movement is available from the About Rotary link above and if you are interested in finding out more please contact the Club via this e-mail link: webmaster@folkestonerotary.org.