“It’s April 2020. As I write this, the first blog-post I’ve ever written on our website, we are in lock-down. Despite the sun shining and the River Wye looking glorious I’m smashing through admin tasks next to a phone that doesn’t ring.

But I consider myself among the most fortunate… I’m not on the front-line, I’m safe and so are my family.  Our business is definitely suffering but not so much that it can’t be repaired when we re-open again.”

With that in mind, and in order to be as proactive as possible in our thank yous to the NHS and front-line workers we then decided to join in with other businesses and offer a pay-it-forward plan. With your help since all the way back in April 2020, we get NHS and Blue-Light Front-Line Workers and their loved ones out on the river enjoying some very well deserved quality time. If you buy the NHS a “canoe voucher” we’ll make sure that a canoe adventure gets into the hands of a well deserving NHS or Blue Light Worker. They deserve to be rewarded we more than canoeing but at least it’s a start! It’s a Pay it Forward scheme that will benefit us as a small business, other local small businesses in our home-town Hay on Wye but most importantly those that deserve our thanks.

Each “canoe voucher” (£35) that’s paid forward goes into a kitty and can be redeemed by front-line workers until the kitty runs out… perhaps this is something that will happen indefinitely – that would be cool.

We as a business gave the kitty a head-start and put in 50 canoe vouchers to kick things off and will continue to top up the kitty with free trips as required.  If you’d like to get involved and Pay It Forward you can do so really easily (it doesn’t have to be £35 it can be any amount that you feel comfortable with) by using the button below, OR if you’d like to leave a message to accompany your gift (we will compile and publish all your messages of thanks) then email us for bacs details OR just pay when you come on your own canoe trip! If you can’t afford to Pay It Forward but you are able to come canoeing with us then PLEASE DO and in that way you will be supporting these gifts and thank yous by supporting our small family business!

*if PayPal doesn’t work for you, get in touch with us directly and we can arrange other payment methods by bank transfer or card over the phone with a nice chat! x

So now anyone from the NHS and Blue Light Services can contact us with their id, book a time/date for their canoe adventure and get out on the river on us/you! How lush is that?!

Stay safe x

Clare & Aub, Ros & Geoff, Katy and the #dreamteam x

*We dedicate this initiative to four nurses, a mixture of past, present and future nhs workers, who are VERY important in our lives – Janet Biddiscombe (Mum – now retired but has nursed her whole working life), Bea Metcalfe (Dream Team and trainee nurse), Niki Rayner (bestie and highly talented nurse specialist), Gary Jennings (this nursing legend has attended to Aubrey in A&E more times than we care to remember! lols) x