It has been a while since the club has had a social trip, for obvious reasons. As the current club social secretary, I’ve had my feet up since I was ‘appointed’ (everyone else stepped back quicker than I did!) – but my luck was bound to run out at some time!

• Our walks continued throughout the pandemic, always within the guidelines, and often just in twos.
• We started face to face regular meetings a while ago, and
• we had our summer lunch at the Oakdale Golf Club in August as a first ‘mass’ club lunch – a very nice occasion it was too!

But the trip to Tennants Auction centre at Leyburn last week was the first real trip, even if we drove ourselves there rather than hiring a coach as in days gone by. This event was planned for April 2020, by Bill Harrison, but it was worth the wait. It was a glorious warm and sunny day, showing off the Dales, and the Tennants facilities, at their best.

Twenty two of us were greeted in a surprisingly plush centre, and made comfortable with a good cup of coffee and a warm piece of shortbread (I think they must be very experienced in welcoming guests of a certain age!)

We had a very professional introductory talk and slide show from one of the current generation of the Tennants family, their company having developed from simple house and farm sale auctions over four generations through to the current multimillion pound international operation.

The building also had a very nice café, open to all, and I made a mental note to drop in if I was passing. They also use the building as an excellent  location for weddings and other events.

After a lovely lunch, and already convinced of the value of the trip, we were conducted round the many sale-rooms, with separate collections including electrical items (much knob-twisting and ooh-aah-ing from our engineer members), furniture (some huge tables with a dozen chairs round them – very suitable for a Country House, but not really appropriate for my semi!), jewellery, porcelain etc. etc.

We were shown some bottles of ancient and valuable single malt whiskies, but disappointingly the request for tasting glasses was met with a negative response!

There was a vast range, both in type of items and in the quality/obvious cost of items. Interesting items were everywhere, and it was just as well that we weren’t able to bid there and then for the items on view, or it would have been a very costly trip.

I’m pretty certain that all present enjoyed their day, and we’ve kicked off the post-Covid social program in some style.