News Archive
A most enjoyable and successful visit
Posted 03/08/11
Members of BSGTTS home from home
Members of the Barnsley Schwäbisch Gmünd Twin Town Society have returned home after helping their German counterparts celebrate the 40th anniversary of the official twinning of the two towns.
The visit to the historic and picturesque Baden Wurttemberg city coincided with visits by Worsbrough Brass Band and Barnsley's Mayor Coun. Karen Dyson and her consort.
They found the Gmündian citizens preparing to celebrate the 850th anniversary of the founding of the city with a festival of pageantry next year and also busy creating gardens for a massive garden festival taking place in 2014.
Hosts and members of BSGTTS gather for
pre- Farewell Dinner drinks at the
Congress CentreLed by chairman Tony Swales and president Stan Spencer the group were welcomed to the city by Oberbürgermeister Richard Arnold at a reception held in the Prediger.
Whilst in Gmünd staying at the homes of host families the party visited the construction site of a mile-long road tunnel being excavated beneath the city centre and a workshop currently busy producing more than 1,100 medieval costumes for the 2012 pageantry event.
Further afield, they visited the historic city of Rothenburg ob der Tauber together with Besigheim and Marbach where they enjoyed a cruise on the River Neckar.
Representing the hosts at a farewell evening event on Saturday, Professor Dr. Reinhard Kuhnert said
"The signing of the official twinning by the late Alderman Brian Varley for Barnsley and Dr. Norbert Schoch for Gmünd on June 23, 1971 had heralded a twinning so successful that it had helped spawn similar twinning agreements between Schwäbisch Gmünd and towns in France, Italy, Hungary and the United States. The relationship between Barnsley and Gmünd however, remained special."
Returning home by air from Stuttgart on Sunday, the group is now busy preparing to upload photographs from the visit to the website. Photographs and a more detailed report to follow .......watch this space.
