Longparish, Hampshire

What's New

This is where we try to keep you up to date with news of what's happening and new stuff on the web site.

Village Hall

The hall is fully accessible with a new ramp at the front, disabled loo and a hearing loop.  The heating quickly warms the hall up to a comfortable temperature and the lighting and new colour scheme provide an atmosphere which is relaxing and welcoming. If you haven't seen it yet and would like to look around please contact John on 720018 or Maggie on 720459.

To hire our lovely hall please email villagehall@longparish.org.uk or phone Jacqui on 720560.

There is more information about the refurbishment on the Village Hall pages.

LCA Tuesday Talks are back - next one Tuesday 10 December

The next talk is:

10 December - A Visit to Mityana Jacqui Healey, Jen Sanders and Jane Young will be talking about their trip to Mityana.

After Christmas the season continues with

14 January -  Beautiful Brazil -  Christine and Patrick Beresford will talk about some aspects of the culture and wildlife (and maybe football) of this beautiful and vast country.

11 February: Extreme Exercise - Jeremy Barber and John Ellicock on preparing for, and their experiences of, some extreme events including the 125 mile Devizes to Westminster canoe race and a 50 mile foot race in the Lake District

11 March: “One Man, One Boat, 4000 Miles!”  Richard Mayon-White will talk about the highs and lows of sailing across the Atlantic in his 21 foot yacht.  Scroll down for a link to his blog.

All the talks are in the village hall. Doors and bar open at 7 and the talks start at 7.30. Entry is free but donations are gratefully accepted. This season they will support the village hall.

LCA Coffee Shop - next one Friday 13 December

The LCA Coffee Shop in the village hall meeting room is open from 9 am -12 noon every second Friday of the month.  Drop in with your friends, children, parents. Everyone is welcome.

The next one is on Friday 13 December.

For £1 you can enjoy a cup of tea or delicious ground coffee and biscuits.  Fairtrade orange juice is available for children.

Christmas Knees Up - Friday 13 December - 7.30 at the Village Hall

Bring-your-own supper and drinks and join the Longparish Choir and Players for a fun evening of Christmas words and music.

Some of the best Christmas No 1s plus some traditional seasonal songs.

Christmas Raffle with great festive prizes.

Tickets £3.50 per person from the Shop or from Anna Bennett  720250 or Cathy Yelf  720790.

St Nicholas Christmas Fair - Saturday 7 December

Thanks very much to everyone who supported the fair, whether by giving, helping or coming and spending.  Proceeds will be divided between St Nicholas Church and Mityana in Uganda.

AUTUMN CLEAN UP OF VILLAGE SATURDAY 30th NOVEMBER

Thank you very much to the many people (over 30 adults and lots of children) who helped at our village clean up on Saturday.

A huge amount of work was done including

• stream clearing.  As a result of our work egrets and herons are back. As well as vegetation items cleared included a large bent metal sign which was impeding the flow under the bridge
• litter picking right through the village
• scrubbing benches
• cutting back vegetation on the spinal path
• clearing leaves and branches in the cemetery and having a bonfire
• digging out the ditch in the village hall car park and clearing branches dumped there
• cleaning the Plough bus shelter and pruning the laurel which was damaging it
• clearing leaves from the village hall drains and from footpaths and the roadway near the school

Thanks especially to the two Micks for bringing tractors kindly provided by Vitacress and Lower Mill and to Brown Skips for the skip. You can see an album of pictures here.

Two Plays Two Courses - Friday 22 and Saturday 23 November

The double bill by Longparish Players went down very well with packed houses both days. You can see photos and videos on the Players Pages.

Would you like to join the Players?

We would love to hear from anyone who is interested in participating in any way. There is so much to do. We need help with production, set design and construction, lighting, back-stage, costumes, make-up and publicity. If you are at all interested please do give me a call. Thanks. Andy Smith tel. 720034.

Films back by popular demand - Third Monday of each month

Now that we have the projector and screen in our lovely refurbished village hall the LCA are able to start a new season of films. Emma Smith is kindly masterminding these events on the third Monday of each month. Doors open at 7 and the shows start at 7.30. Entry is free for LCA members but donations to help cover the costs will be welcome. The terms of the licence do not allow us to name the next film here but you can read about it in Hill & Valley. Please note there will be no film in December becuase there's so much else going on.

Richard Mayon-White's single handed transat

Richard Mayon-White from Longparish Station is sailing the Alantic single-handed in his tiny 21 foot yacht Hascapa. The voyage started from Gibraltar on 26 October. Richard will sail south, following the western coastline of Morocco and the Western Sahara, until reaching the Tropic of Cancer at 23 degrees north. Richard will then alter course to steer the yacht due west along the Tropic of Cancer, which he will follow for 3,000 miles until reaching the Bahamas.

Richard is raising funds for Sail 4 Cancer (who provide sailing breaks for families affected by cancer) and Sobell House, the hospice where his mother was looked after. You can read his blog here. It includes a link to a map which is regularly updated from to show his progress.

Core Stability Classes - Thursdays at 6pm in the Community Hall

Longparish Craft Club are a social group with a shared love of making things. We meet fortnightly on Tuesdays at Longparish Village Hall in either the main hall or in the meeting room to the rear of the hall. The club runs from 7.30pm until 9.30pm and entry costs £2 per person which includes tea and coffee.

Find out more on the Craft Club Page

Smooth Movers Ladies' Exercise Class - Thursdays 9.15 to 10.15am

Classes are led by Lauren Mildenberger, a fully qualified instructor. She teaches low impact short routines to music. This is kinder to your joints. It is not a fast pace class so is ideal for complete beginners and senior ladies. Each session includes gentle warm up, cardiovascular exercise to increase heart-rate (nothing major!!) and toning – concentrating on those problem areas (Arms, Bums, Tums).

Wear comfortable clothing and non-slip footwear. Everyone works at their own level, no pressure. Come along and give it a try. £5 per session. Free parking - so why travel to Andover for a class?

Need more information? Phone Gina on 01264 720128.

LCA - L2SOTM - The Longparish Second Sunday of the Month handicap running race

The L2SOTM is a race of about 3 miles (5km) held on the second Sunday of every month. The next race is on Sunday 12th January starting at 10am at the Cricket Ground. Runners of all standards are welcome as are brisk walkers. The handicap system means that the slowest have as much chance of winning the cups as the fastest. Hope you can come. There will be refreshments afterwards and supporters of all ages are very welcome. More details are available on the L2SOTM pages.

LCA - Recycled Teenagers

The Recycled Teenagers’ Club is open to all older members of our community and was started by Longparish Community Association in 2007.  We organise regular outings and other events using Test Valley Community Service’s minibus for transport.   We are very grateful to the Longparish Community Association for their continued support as that helps us to keep the cost to participants down.

If you’d liketo find out more please contact Corinne on 720643. 

Visits have included singing in Wherwell, Exbury Gardens, Birdworld in Farnham, a Morecombe and Wise tribute show in New Milton and an excellent garden centre near Eastleigh. We have also got together with KidzZone to raise over £400 by holding a cream tea in Forton.

Another trip was to the Hawk Conservancy.  Despite a very poor weather forecast the only rain was when we were indoors having lunch.  We saw three flying displays of birds of prey and Jim got a new parting in his hair from the talons of a low flying vulture. A mini bus load of us went to Winchester for "Get Hampshire Singing". We sang everything fromThe Happy Wanderer to Delilah and they gave us an excellent free lunch as well. Thanks very much to all concerned.

LCA Kidz Zone: Longparish Youth Club

Kidz Zone meets fortnightly on a Wednesday. It is open to people aged 11 to 18. More information here

Parent and Toddler Group

Our thriving Parent and Toddler group meets weekly in the village hall. Click here for more information.

Walks leaflet

Our Longparish walks leaflet was distributed to every household in Longparish and Hurstbourne Priors. They are in great demand from visitors and locals alike and are available from the pubs, the church and the shop. There's more information in our local walks area

Golden Jubilee - 11 June 1887

Going back a bit further there was a huge celebration on 11 June 1887 for Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee. Details are recorded in a notebook belonging to John Woodcock. You can read a transcribed copy here.

Where is Longparish?

You can see some maps of the area at different scales by following the link 'How to find Longparish' in the menu. If you are still puzzled, "Southern England" (the first map) is the bottom quarter of that little island to the top left of Europe.

The Quick Tour

You can find out about Longparish in the Village Handbook's History and Environment sections.

Photo Gallery

We will gradually be adding photos to this part of the site. If anybody has any (new or old) that they could let us have, we'd be pleased to see them. Obviously digital is the easiest, but we can scan in prints as well.

Parish Council & Community Issues

This section explains the responsibilities of the Parish Council and gives you contact details for members, as well as dates, agendas and minutes of council meetings. You can also access items of general village interest such as the Design Statement and the Community Project, in this section.

Local Services and Organisations

In this part of the site you should be able to find a substantial amount of information on such things as local government, and how it impacts on Longparish, as well as details about the church, schooling, shops and pubs, and many organisations that operate in or around the village.

Village Handbook

The Village Handbook gives some of the history of the village, its landmarks, families & traditions. It also suggests sites of interest and wildlife you should look out for as you wander around the village.

Hill and Valley

Hill and Valley is our local community magazine. We have copies of the Longparish pages.

Contact us

We're delighted to receive any comments about either this site, or issues of interest in the village especially notice or reports of events that you would like us to publicise on the site. The webmaster will pass on comments to the appropriate people. Just use the Contact form, which is available on every page in the menu bar at the top.