Elegant Equine

Round & About

Berkshire

The Royal Horse Show celebrates 75 years at Windsor Castle, writes Rachel Wakefield

Windsor Castle will once again open its gates to the public for the Royal Windsor Horse Show, from Wednesday, 9th until Sunday, 13th May, for a spectacular 75th year.

With all eyes on Windsor ahead of the highly anticipated Royal wedding the following week, more than 55,000 spectators are expected to attend for top-class sporting action, entertainment and shopping across the five days.

This event is respected as a world-class equestrian competition. Last year, there was more than 3,000 entries; and, because of its upgrade to 5-star status, attracts the sports’ most prominent competitors. It is also the only show in the UK to host four of the eight The International Federation for Equestrian Sports (FEI) disciplines: show jumping; dressage, carriage driving and endurance.

The CSI5* Show Jumping category will return to the Castle Arena from Friday, 11th until Sunday, 13th May. It also includes a Saturday evening performance, with the climax of the action, being the Rolex Grand Prix taking place on the final day. Current World No.1 and reigning champion, Kent Farrington will be returning from injury to defend his title. Speaking after his victory in 2017, Kent said: “The Royal Windsor Horse Show, is one of my favourite shows. There’s a combination of, amazing setting, an unbelievable crowd, top course designing and great footing.”

The CDI4* Al Shira’aa Dressage Grand Prix and Freestyle to Music category will take place on the evenings of Thursday, 10th and Friday, 11th May respectively. Riders will have the unique opportunity to be judged by Susan Hoevenaars, one of the judges at the upcoming FEI World Equestrian Games™ 2018, an unmissable chance for hopefuls heading there this September.

The CAIO4* Land Rover International Driving Grand Prix, a FEI World Cup™ qualifier adds to the roster of top international competition.Competitive Endurance action will take to Windsor Great Park on Friday, 11th May, as the CEI2* Royal Windsor Endurance supported by The Kingdom of Bahrain sets off about 120km of the countryside of Windsor and Ascot for the ultimate test of stamina for both horse and rider.

More than 120 showing classes will join the four FEI disciplines in the action-packed schedule with many of HM The Queen’s horses regularly in the starting line-ups. Competitors will strive to follow in the footsteps of HM The Queen’s Barbers Shop to be crowned Royal Windsor Supreme Showing Champion on the final day.

Visit www.rwhs.co.uk or call 01753 860633

Great expectations

Round & About

Berkshire

Youngsters – of all ages, from tots to teens – can enjoy a taste of wildlife and the countryside thanks to volunteers helping with events in Windsor Great Park, writes Peter Anderson

There are lots of super-natural events in Windsor Great Park’s educational centre.

Windsor Great Park Environmental Centre is an exciting five-year partnership project between the Berks, Bucks and Oxon Wildlife Trust and The Crown Estate. From the Nature Tots to the Young and Teen Ranger meetings, there are monthly sessions where children can get real hands-on experience of life in the countryside, and the flora and fauna you can find here, with guidance from skilled supervisors.

Nature Tots is a parent-and-toddler group with a difference. You can head along with your pre-school little one and introduce them to the great outdoors. The 90-minute sessions spend about the first 15 minutes outside before coming indoors and there are a wide-range of activities to spark their curiosity and have fun in natural surroundings. Each session will include seasonal nature discovery, games, crafts and lots of fun! Story-time and drinks also included. Children must be accompanied by a supervising adult, and younger brothers and sisters are welcome.

Young Rangers is a monthly wildlife group which meets in the early evening for children aged between eight and 12. Here they can become nature detectives and find all about the birds, bats, deer, mini-beasts and more, which live in the park and forest. Activities include pond-dipping, bug hunts, animal tracking, shelter building and bushcraft. Drinks will also be provided during the sessions, and they will require a signed consent form from an adult. There are two sessions per month, but the second one is a repeat to allow for any children who cannot make the first session.

Teen Rangers is a monthly group of budding naturalists aged between 12 and 16 who meet in the early evening. Here you can spend time in the forest discovering who and what lives there, but it may not be them you spot first! You may need to use your tracking skills, but you will have skilled volunteers and trainers from BBOWT to help you with that, as well as shelter-building and bushcraft, as you learn all about the flora and fauna in this marvellous location.

For further information on dates, times and suggested donations, please visit www.bbowt.org.uk. The website also has information on other events organised by the trust and how you can donate to help the valuable work BBOWT does to protect and preserve natural surroundings around the three counties.

Have you tried a TFKC?

Round & About

Berkshire

Malaysian, Portuguese and a sprinkling of London sophistication is what inspires the cusine created by husband and wife team Test Kitchen Food, writes Rachel Wakefield

The Test Kitchen van has been seducing late night drinkers, near the Windsor and Eton Brewery, for more than a year now. It’s also been turning heads every Saturday morning near the Loading Bay Cafe, with its tasty, cooked-to-order food.

It’s easy to understand why – just talking to owner, Milly O’Connor about what she serves is beyond distracting. Take for example, the popular Super Bon Bon: marinated pork loin, in paprika, garlic and thyme, grilled and served with melted cheese, fried mushrooms and a garlic aioli sauce, in a ciabatta roll. Or, the TKFC: deboned chicken thighs, marinated in mirin sauce, soy sauce, garlic and ginger, then covered in sweet potato flour, deep fried and finished with a maple syrup and soy glaze, with a spiracha dip. In my mouth!

Milly and her husband John, who is the chef, met through a mutual love of food. She was managing the Kensington restaurant and nightclub, Dirty Bones, he was a cook at Fulham’s Malthouse. They both have interesting foodie heritages, he’s from Portugal and her mother is Malaysian.

“I was nine months pregnant when we bought the food truck,” recalls Milly. We had just moved back to my home town of Windsor, as we had made a decision to bring up our son Salvador here. “We had this idea to bring the London, foodie sophistication in the neighbourhood.”

It has not taken John long to establish good relationships, with his main supplier being the Royal Windsor Farm Shop. “Our menu is based on good, local, seasonal produce and Tony, the butcher always delivers from there,” says Milly.

“We called the business Test Kitchen Food, because we wanted to be flexible in the food we offered. Not sticking to one style of cuisine.”

The adventurous pair will be curating a foodie event on Friday, 25th May, called Hawkers Bazaar. This event is inspired by the vibrant night markets and hawker centres of Malaysia. It will take place at the Loading Bay Cafe, Vansittart Estate, Windsor SL4 1SE. It will be a showcase of local talent including an experimental cocktail truck, an exotic ice cream roll trader, lots of authentic hawker style food plus local musicians performing late into the night. Tickets available to book online, visit: www.eventbrite.co.uk

To keep up-to-date with what’s cooking in the kitchen, take a look on the Facebook page @testkitchenfood.

Free Spirit

Round & About

Berkshire

Her Majesty chose The Free Spirit Horse Memorial Project as a partner for this year’s Royal Windsor Horse Show, writes Rachel Wakefield

The Free Spirit Horse Memorial Project, is a charity which acknowledges the horse’s unfaltering service to mankind throughout history, through war, sport, industry, therapy and recreation. This charity has been announced as the official partner of Royal Windsor Horse Show, taking place from Wednesday, 9th to Sunday, 13th May, in the private grounds of Windsor Castle.

The project has been created to raise funds for a memorial, named The Free Spirit Horse Memorial, which will be located at the National Memorial Arboretum in Staffordshire and will be unveiled, this year, to coincide with the centenary anniversary of the end of the First World War.

The memorial will be accessible to able bodied and disabled people, providing a tactile as well as a visual experience, with seating for reflection and contemplation, information plaques in braille for those who are visually impaired, Makaton symbols and dyslexia approved font to aid communication. This accessibility was of paramount importance to the project organisers as it mirrors the horse, who does not judge but treats and respects each person as an individual, bringing together all members of the community without prejudice.

As part of its charitable aims, the Free Spirit project also provides education around the role of the horse through art, music and history to ensure that the significance of the horse is taught to future generations.

The project has released a charity single to help raise funds which is downloadable through Spotify and I-Tunes. The song brings together young people from a variety of backgrounds and is an expression of their thoughts and feelings in regards to the horse now, and in the future.

Ambassador of the project, Sarah Clegg says the song is: “Sensitively written and beautifully performed, the Free Spirit Song represents the very best of young creativity in honouring the horse.”

Horse Show director, Simon Brooks-Ward says: “We are delighted to be supporting The Free Spirit Horse Memorial Project. Royal Windsor Horse Show is an annual celebration of top equestrian sport and entertainment, so this partnership is a natural fit, commemorating the role of horses in society, past and present.”

Further information on events that pay tribute to this honourable and emotive creatureå can be found at www.freespiritmemorial.co.uk

Digging deep

Round & About

Berkshire

Peter Anderson chats to history buff and television star Sir Tony Robinson.

Q. What sparked your interest in history; was it Baldric as Blackadder went through the centuries?!
“It goes back to when I was a child and my dad told me of his time in World War II. He was posted to Scotland, met up with some Canadian soldiers and spent the war touring in a Canadian dance band. That made me think of him as a child learning what his father had done, and his father before him – the continuum of history.”

Q. Of all the stories of folklore, why do you think King Arthur has lasted so well?
“The Dark Ages are shrouded in mystery, but the stories of King Arthur held a romantic appeal. They were also seized upon by the Norman Kings keen to use their lineage from King Arthur to legitimise their claim to the throne. They sought to publicise all the stories that came out regarding King Arthur’s time.”

Q. What’s the significance of Round Tables?
“The Round Tables were a common item at tournaments as everyone could be equal in standing and speak. There is an example at York where guests sat in niches around the table and stepped forward to speak. But the best thing to compare is the corporate boxes around modern-day sports grounds like Wembley, where a lot of networking can be conducted alongside the sport or entertainment.”

Q. Did your time with the experts on Time Team,
including Jonathan, prepare you for this next event?
“Jonathan impressed me when he appeared on Time Team, and we have been friends ever since. He is an archaeologist, but specialises in standing archaeology, a lot of the work in Time Team was looking at holes in the ground and assessing what had been there; his expertise is looking at buildings still standing. He can look at a building and then guide you through clues he has spotted to all the various phases of construction within it. It is a remarkable skill.”

Q. Do you have a favourite period of history and would you fancy travelling back to it?
“I think Ellen Degeneres was right when she said now is the best time. There are so many things we take for granted now that were not available. However, from a point of intellectual curiosity I would love to go back to the time of King Alfred I. I find it so intriguing that someone could go from a small kingdom in the South West of England and in the space of a couple of years take on the invading Vikings, beat them and have the leader of the Vikings paraded through the streets wearing white and converting to Christianity. I would so love to find out how he achieved it.”

Q. Is there anything from history you’d still like to do a programme or talk on?
“So many! But the main one would be a programme that shows wars were not won so much by fighting on the battlefield but by organisation, the ability to move troops and equipment quickly, to supply them. I was lucky enough to film out in the middle of the Sahara Desert, in the middle of nowhere, the shifting sands had cleared to reveal a metalled road thrown up quickly by the Germans in World War II to move equipment. Now taken back and covered by the desert sands…”

Q. Who would be your perfect dinner party guests?
“King Alfred, Archbishop Asser, Oliver Cromwell, Sir Francis Walsingham, William and Robert Cecil. We are a little light on the ladies, so I think Eleanor of Aquitaine; rumour has it she was the one who was running the country.”

Q. Is there anything we could learn today from the Age of Chivalry?
“Definitely: the Chivalric Code held people together in times of crisis. It was a code of politeness, being honourable, with honesty and courtesy.”

You bet

Liz Nicholls

Berkshire

We catch up with singer-songwriter Olly Murs, about life and music after The X Factor

Q: Your new album – 24 Hrs – is your fourth consecutive number 1. How does that feel?!
“Amazing! I’m very proud – I never expected in my wildest dreams I would’ve got this far… so, absolutely delighted.”

Q. Who were your early musical influences?
“I grew up listening to soul and ska as well as Brit Pop. So Stevie Wonder, Michael Jackson, Prince, James Brown, Bowie, The Specials, Madness… I also looked up to people like [Michael] Bublé, Robbie Williams and Justin Timberlake for their musical careers and their longevity.

Q. Is there a song that never fails to cheer you up?
“Go-to cheerful tunes… too many to mention! But Chic’s Good Times never fails to cheer me up.”

Q. What about your favourite film? And book?
The Goonies – classic! But I’m a massive Star Wars fan so I’d say any Star Wars film. I don’t have a favourite book – but I love a good biography. Sir Alex Ferguson’s was brilliant.”

Q: You’re the most successful male artist ever to come from the X Factor – what do you reckon has been the secret of your success?
“I dunno, I’d like to think I’ve done some great songs. My previous albums are happy and people enjoy listening to them. This album is still happy, still got lots of that vibe on it, but it’s probably the most heartbreaking, most honest I’ve done. It’s just luck, you know, that people like me and people have bought my albums and I’m very lucky they do!”

Q: You’re undertaking a massive UK headline arena tour this month and a huge run of outdoor shows – how do they vary?
“It’s fun being outside; I’ve done racecourse gigs but not this sort of size. It gives me the chance to go to different places in the UK I haven’t been to before, do something slightly different. I can’t wait – I mean, I can go to the racecourse during the day, have a little flutter on a couple of the races and then do a gig in the evening. Perfect. You’ve got out there and put a few bets on – the only problem for me at the races is not drinking too much! A couple of sly beers, maybe…”

Q: Have you got a pre-stage ritual?
“Me and the band have a little huddle before the show and we sing a song we’ve got as a team and we’ve been doing for the last six or seven years. I’m sure we’ll be sinking a few shots before the show as well just to get into the racecourse spirit!”

Q: How do you choose your set list?
“It’s going to be difficult, you know, five albums. But you’ve just got to play the hits and the songs people know. That’s what I’ll do with the set – make it as entertaining as possible. I’ll throw in a few covers as well, have a bit of a laugh with the fans and it’ll be a really fun day out. I promise any fan that comes along, it’ll be a right laugh from the start of the day to the end of it and I promise to make sure everyone goes home happy having had a good time!”