Visit of the Rotary Club of Utrecht, The Netherlands

Visit of Utrecht Rotary Club 

We were delighted to welcome six members of the Rotary Club of Utrecht to our club and to Oxford on the occasion of our centenary dinner in Harris Manchester College on Saturday 9 April: Martijn Meeske (President), Charon Duermeijer, Ans Nakone, Gijsbert Wolleswinkel, Tirza Lowensteijn, and Bas Nugteren. The Utrecht club noticed a year ago the very similar ages of our clubs – their centenary is coming up next year – and they contacted us thinking we would have more than years in common: the context of a university city and professional activities etc. And so it proved. We are now looking at ways in to developing the connection between our clubs. There is talk of joint projects and certainly a return visit for the Utrecht anniversary.

The Dutch party arrived on Friday afternoon and left on Sunday and so we did not have much time at our disposal. After meeting at Rewley House on Saturday morning, first stop was the Ashmolean Museum. This was followed by ‘lunch’ in the St Aldate’s Tavern. This was where things began to go wrong. Our entry to the pub happened to co-incide with that of a large group of Sunderland football supporters who were preparing for an important game against Oxford United with ‘play-off’ significance. The pub staff were both short because of covid and stretched because of football. In the end lunch consisted of a bag of crisps and a free round courtesy of the pub. Of course our Dutch visitors know all about football imperatives (although perhaps not expecting to encounter them in Oxford) and all was taken in good part.

Now on more predictable ground and went down to the river via Christ Church Meadows and the new thatched tourist gift shop. Our visitors were better informed about rowing than us: one had only recently decided to step back from the sport and Bas’s son was the first reserve for the Dutch eight at the Olympics. We continued our way round to the High Street via the Botanic Garden and were then able to fill in the missing hole from lunch with cream tea in the Grand Café. Its claim to be the oldest coffee house in England (according to Pepys diary 1650) was greeted with some surprise; surely Utrecht has much older examples. By now it was already late and having looked at the Bodleian from outside, our guests went off to prepare for the evening’s festivities.

At the dinner we were surprised by a wonderful gift from Utrecht: a giant candle in the form of the Utrecht Dom Tower, the tallest church tower in the Netherlands, and the symbol of Utrecht. We shall now light the candle at each of our ‘home’ meetings.