07 August 2020

#CoronaChronicles: Week 20

Another exciting weekend is upon us as we prepare to welcome back visitors to Redwings Aylsham this Saturday!

After two sell-out weekends at Redwings Caldecott, we’re delighted to say that all the tickets for Redwings Aylsham’s reopening weekend have also sold out! Thank you everyone for your fantastic support.

If you’ve missed out on visiting this weekend, there are still plenty of time slots available for future dates. To book your tickets, which are free (although donations welcome), please click on the below links:

Tickets for Redwings Aylsham

Tickets for Redwings Caldecott

This weekend also marks the reopening of our gift shops at the two centres. Our cafes will also be providing a takeaway service of drinks and snacks for the first time. So you know what to expect during your visit, we’ve created two special videos, showing you the safety measures we’ve put in place at each of our centres. Take a look below!

Here's a first glimpse at Redwings Aylsham's new measures:

And here's what you can expect at Redwings Caldecott:

Thank you to all the staff who have worked incredibly hard over the last few weeks to ensure our centres were safe to reopen, including our Health & Safety and Maintenance teams who organised new signage, built bespoke screens and made sure our sites were in tip top condition to welcome visitors again.

The donkeys at Redwings Aylsham were keen to lend the Maintenance team a helping hoof when they replenished their paddock fencing earlier this week!

Donkeys at Redwings Aylsham overseeing the Maintenance team

The wildlife ponds at Redwings Aylsham are also looking especially beautiful right now so we hope you take the opportunity to stretch your legs and take in these gorgeous sights this weekend.

Wildlife ponds at Redwings Aylsham in bloom

However, while the world may slowly be moving back to a semblance of normality, it will be a long time before we return to our normal operations and, despite the reopening of two of our visitor centres, we are still facing a significant loss in income.

Thank you to everyone who has contributed to our coronavirus appeal so far. If you have yet to donate and would like to, please click here to find out mor e. There are also many other lovely ways you can support us, such as sponsoring one of our Adoption Star horses or donkeys or purchasing items from our online gift shop.

And, one last big reveal – this will be the last #CoronaChronicles!

My name is Steph Callen and I’m the Press Manager here at Redwings. For the last 20 weeks, I’ve been writing this blog from my kitchen table, kept company by two new work colleagues – my cats!

Steph Callen Press Manager at Redwings

As lockdown measures started being introduced and our visitor centres closed, I started this blog as a way to help keep you all informed as to what was going on behind closed doors, to show you the hard work our teams were putting in to making sure they and our rescued residents stayed safe, and to highlight the amazing difference your kind donations were making. Little did I know that I’d still be writing to you almost five months later!

Like many of Redwings’ administrative staff, I’m now starting to return to the office at Redwings HQ having worked from home since the start of the lockdown, and, just like you, I can’t wait to see my four-legged equine friends!

Thank you to all our frontline teams, including our vets, nurses, equine carers and field officers, who have sent me so many uplifting stories and images over these past months which I’ve had the privilege to share with you. I can say wholeheartedly that each one cares deeply about every horse and donkey that comes through our Sanctuary gates - more now than ever - and your kind comments every week have been a lovely boost in a very unsettling time.

If you’d like a recap on Redwings’ journey through the coronavirus outbreak, you can read every edition of the #CoronaChronicles on our website. If we find ourselves in a second lockdown, I may reappear from time to time, but for now thank you for reading and I wish everyone a safe, happy and healthy rest of the year.