OUR BEGINNING
It was in December 2017 when Catherine Wagner and Carwyn Arnold got together to start the idea off for a new club in the Mt Gravatt area.
After contacting PSPL and organizing the printing of leaflets for an information meeting we were off and running with the establishment of Mt Gravatt Pacific Probus Club Inc.
With the help of Merv Richens and the Rotary Club of Mt Gravatt who became our sponsoring Rotary Club we held our foundation meeting on 27th June 2018 at the Pacific Golf Club, Mansfield and our club was now a reality with 36 registered members as the foundation members for the club.
Our second meeting a month later we gained several more members whom also became foundation members bringing our numbers to 54.
Catherine Wagner was inducted as the First President of the club, Carwyn Arnold as first Secretary and Fleu Wellwood as the first Treasurer. Several members put their hands up for other positions immediately – Sue and Warren Parkinson – Outing, Narelle Carlson - Vice President, Craft coordinator and Newsletter editor.
As we grew even with the threat of COVID we still managed to maintain contact with all our members and we had an induction in the Broadwater Park, doing the social distance thing – with many of our members attending the day (Bring your own chair and morning tea) Throughout this COVID time we continued to meet in the open park keeping our distance when we were allowed to gather. Our main aim at this time was to keep contact with everyone and we developed a phone tree that we kept going for several months.
We held several meetings at the Golf Club but as the Golf Club was looking to extend with an retirement centre being built we decided to do some looking around for a new venue.
The venue we settled for was the Delavan Room at the Newnham Hotel, cnr Delavan and Newnham Roads. Here we were greeted with open arms and have been there ever since early 2019. We have a wonderful relationship with the Newnham Hotel and they look after us so well for our meetings. We have held Christmas in July this year, Our Christmas Luncheons, Our birthday Party each year (with our 1st being held there) Melbourne Cup parties to name a few and they have always set the rooms atmosphere with great decorations.
Our club has many activities other than our monthly meeting, where we listen to some exceptionally good guest speakers.
Some of our other interest groups are but certainly not limited to: - Coffee Chat, Evening dine out, day time dine out, Book club (Page Turners) Gardening Group, Craft Group, Romeos group (Retired old men eating out) a group just for the men. Currently looking at starting a walking group, another book group, mahjong group. In addition to these activities, we have BBQs at different parks, Outings to many different venues of interest to the members – e.g., Carnival of Flowers Toowoomba, Albert River Winery, Beenleigh Distillery, Beenleigh Historical Village, Coochiemudlo Island, to name but a few.
We look forward to welcoming new members to our club and look forward to hearing new ideas for outings and visits.
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