Trip to the Ukraine Border 14th

July 2022

First and foremost a huge thank you to the Micheldever parish community, nearby villages and Hatch Warren for the generous response to my plea for humanitarian aid for Ukraine. In particular I would like to thank Phil Smith and Craig Eales for donating the proceeds of the Micheldever Wine Circle raffle at their summer party towards our fuel costs.

On July 14th we boarded the 5.20am Eurotunnel shuttle with 2 large vans loaded with 3 tons of essential aid, including medical supplies, baby food and clothes, toiletries, pet food, generators and high carb / high protein foods. Once in Calais, we headed towards our overnight stop in Zwickau, Germany which was a very hot 556 miles ahead of us, but sadly only a short leg into the trip the second van decided to break down not far from Eindhoven, not a great start. The recovery services were called and reluctantly we had to leave them to it as we pushed forward into our overnight stop. We put our heads down in a local hall of residence kindly organised by the local university. Friday 5am we left Zwickau and headed towards our drop off point at Medyka, Poland, a border crossing into Ukraine. Again another very hot day, but the traffic was kind to us and we made good time. On arrival at Medyka we were met by two amazing aid workers Adam (from Kentucky USA), and Alex (from Manchester).

Soon our van was unloaded and these guys were already organising the onward journey. We had a quick look around the border crossing and the many aid agencies working there, everything seemed so very well organised. The look on the faces of the steady stream of refugees crossing the border with nothing more than a suitcase and some people with their pets, really put a lump in my throat. I had a nice home to come back to; these people didn’t know what lay ahead of them. In the meantime, our colleagues in the second van were struggling to get back on the road. After 717 miles we stayed at Krakow for the night where we were to meet up with a Ukrainian woman and her son who would be following us back to the UK, and their sponsor family in Hertford. Saturday morning was a later start departing about 8am and heading towards Krefeld in Germany, conscious that we had our new Ukrainian friends following in their car. With the second van now fixed (sort of!), we decided to meet up at Krefeld where it had been arranged for us to stay the night at the local fire station. The German firefighters were very welcoming, even insisting on refuelling our vans with their diesel. 9pm it was decided to swap the load from the poorly van, into our van where the other two drivers would drive the same route just 48 hours behind schedule.

Sunday morning we were up at 4am and now nursing the ailing van, we took a steady drive back to Calais where I would now leave my co-driver in the van for the final leg, and I would drive the Ukrainian car back to Hertford. My two new Ukrainian friends struggled with the concept of sitting in a car that was inside a train but were glad of not having to drive on the left on arrival back in Folkestone. The second van somehow managed to get back 24 hours later. This and numerous other trips have been organised by Debs Bonfield of Hertfood, a foodbank in Hertford that stepped up to the challenge of getting aid into Ukraine when the war started, and have a fantastic distribution network within Ukraine. You can follow their work on Facebook, just search ‘Hertfood’.

Jason Judd

Wonston Community Café

Our June café was held on yet another sunny day, and most of our visitors enjoyed sitting outside next to the roses in the glorious sunshine. Sales of coffee and cake were brisk, especially when the ladies cycling club and the aqua ladies arrived!

£290 was raised for our charity, the Royal Agricultural Benevolent Institution. Some new local visitors attended just to support this worthy charity. Aly Wright, a local