The Reunion

Old friends and new in the lecture theatre.

We very nearly missed going to the 40th birthday reunion at the Wildfowl and Wetland Trust's Arundel Centre. In order to be there we needed someone to look after our son Dan who has Angelman syndrome. Luckily, two of our regular carers were prepared to drive the six hour round trip just so we could come along.

As if that wasn't complicated enough, Dan also has Type 1 Diabetes and he chose our first night away to have a hypo. This meant calling an ambulance to our holiday flat at 2 am. After the paramedics left, the rest of the night was spent checking Dan's blood sugar between bouts of vomiting. We very nearly went home on Saturday.

I'm so glad we stayed; the reunion was a total success.

Hanna and I never really got the chance to be properly received by our hosts because we bumped into old friends straight away. Brenda, who worked in the Portakabin before the building went up, was telling another guest how special those days were. "It wasn't the same after the building was finished" she said. I don't think she realised that she was talking to Neil Holland, the architect who designed it.

Soon we were into the gallery where we were delighted to see that at least half of the guests were from our era. It was such a delight after three decades to recognise faces and allow those lost memories to flood back. There was laughter and tears.

After being plied with drinks, were were ushered into what used to be "my" lecture theatre (Jos, my successor, said it was "her's") for a presentation by Dave Fairlamb who is the manager at Arundel these days. Instead of dwelling on the past, Dave told us all about the Trust's future plans, which I thought was just the right thing to do. Then Martin Spray, the Chief Executive of the Trust, talked about the legacy that Peter Scott left us and how the Trust is still building on that.

The rest of the evening was spent in informal chat and we were supposed to eat a huge buffet but I don't think we did it justice; I, for one, was so busy talking that I didn't notice the food until it was being put away.

It was Pip Peglar who made me stand up and say a few words about the old days and it was also Pip who said that in our speeches we hadn't mentioned our first curator, Andrew Dawnay who was so important in making Arundel such a special place to work. We all took inspiration from him, and carried his attitude forward with us in our various careers. Our legacy was not just from Peter Scott, but from Andrew too.

Jos stood up to give a vote of thanks and expressed what we all felt. What a wonderful evening.

Does it matter that most people know about David Attenborough, but not about Peter Scott? It's a pity because Peter's story is such a good one to tell, and perhaps because he told it so well and so often himself! But, in the end, it's what we leave behind that matters, not our name. I think Peter formed our world-view and influenced every naturalist, artist and broadcaster that came afterwards and that's just amazing.

Hanna and I took turns to visit the Trust on Sunday. I had to blag my way in because I forgot to bring any money, but what a great time we both had. We think the sand martin hide is a delight and the reedbed walk turned out to be everything that Dave Fairlamb said it would be. We won't stay away for so long this time.