2020. It truly had been a year like no other- cliché as this now is!
Forest Foragers had three One Day Courses planned for November, and after having virtually no interest in one of the dates, we cancelled it and thankfully persuaded all our clients to come on to the two remaining days.
We normally have a maximum of 14 participants on each course, but due to Covid 19, we had reduced that number to 10, so as to conform with ‘Social Distancing’. Of course, with National Lockdown 2 we were forced to cancel those two remaining courses.
We also had 2 Afternoon Forays planned, as these are always popular with former clients as a top up. However along came lockdown two and we waited with bated breath to see what would follow.
This turned out to be London (where we live) and Essex (where we run the courses) both being in Tier Two therefore no ‘Indoor Mingling’ and the ‘Rule of Six’ outdoors.
It had been a logistical nightmare for me since the announcement about the Covid tiers, trying to accommodate the people who wanted to come on the forays. It had to be first come first served, but not everyone checks their email that regularly, and I don’t have telephone numbers for all our clients.
So, to conform with Covid 19 regulations we had to put a limit of 4 clients for each Afternoon Foray (as Peter and Clifford lead the group) – making it a group of six. As we had several people who wished to attend this year, getting the right folk on the right foray was difficult, and of course, sadly we had to disappoint some clients. However, we did manage to run two forays at the beginning of December on a consecutive Saturday and Sunday. (See Peter’s blog).
Happily, the eight people who were able to go were not disappointed and had (as I understand it) a plentiful supply of good edible mushrooms to take home. Even Clifford had been doubtful about what would turn up, as we were really pushing it in terms of the dates and the weather. Luckily, they pulled it off and I had amethyst deceivers on toast for breakfast the morning after the second foray, and the clients emailed us to say how they had cooked up their mushrooms.
We are thinking that it would be a good idea to run some Taster Days this year due the volume of enquires we have had since November.
Marlyn (in charge of Booking & Catering arrangements).