Pebbles Project - Helping Children with Special Needs

UK Events

Pebbles Oktoberfest Invite London October 12th 2011

Keith Prothero has been an active fund raiser for Pebbles in the UK for four years now. During 2010 Keith Prothero raised over £40,000 with a number of projects and the support of the Wine-Pages community at www.wine-pages.com. The principal activity was a dinner at the Square restaurant in Mayfair, London in which the famous UK wine writer Jancis Robinson was the guest of honour. Guests bid for the 12 seats on offer to taste some fantastic wines from the cellar of Keith and a few bottles donated by Paul Day including two magnificent bottles of rare Madeira dating from 1807!! This dinner raised in excess of £14000.

Two "Blind Challenge" dinners were also organised, where guests had to try and identify wines provided by Keith, and these two dinners raised in excess of £4000.

Nearer the end of the year, a series of lunches were organised by Keith at the brilliant Ledbury restaurant in London, one involving the noted Burgundy writer Jasper Morris, and two others for the cyclists who raced from London to Paris for Pebbles. These lunches raised in excess of £6000.

For 2011, Keith is planning a Grand Dinner in the historic cellar of Berry Bros in St James Street, London and full details of this event will be advised later.

David Wainwright a UK based Wine Consultant with a superb cellar, has done sterling work during the year, organising a number of dinners for Pebbles, raising in excess of £6000. For 2011 he proposes a number of amazing events - full details will be published on the dedicated site www.pebbleswineevents.com

Jamie Hutchinson from www.thesampler.co.uk is auctioning a gargantuan bottle of second growth Bordeaux, Chateau Brane Cantenac 2005, Imperial (6 litre bottle). Described by Robert Parker as the 'the finest Brane-Cantenac I have tasted in over thirty years', it's worth about £500 and will require one very big decanter (or bucket) in the amazing 2005 vintage, also to raise funds for Pebbles.

The London to Paris Cycle Race

In September 2010, Joe Fisher, Guy Dennis & Ray Abercromby, having spent the previous 5 months training and getting themselves into shape, geared up and cycled over 300 miles in 4 days from London to Paris.

Only coming to know each other through the online wine community that is the WinePages.com forum, and indeed Joe & Ray only finally meeting each other for the first time on the morning of the ride, through local fundraising from friends and family, drawing attention through local newspapers, selling charity logo embossed t-shirts and a final fund raising lunch very kindly organised by Keith Prothero, they managed to raise a combined total of approx £11,000 for the Pebbles Project.

Each of them is overwhelmingly proud to have been able to provide such an amount of money for Pebbles, but knowing full well it will go a long way to continue to improve the lives of the children the Pebbles Project work so closely with.

In 2011 Joe Fisher & Co. intend to complete something even bigger and better, so watch this space!

The BUPA Great North Run
On Sunday 19th September 2010 just ten of the 54,000 runners who took to the streets of Newcastle ran to raise money for The Pebbles Project. The final total raised through their efforts and the generosity of their sponsors will be just a few pounds short of £8,000.

Special thanks to Charles Mussett and John Dickinson for the organisation and to Russell Faulkner and Druin Burch from the Wine-Pages community for actually running the race. Russell and Sema Faulkner must be especially commended for the substantial sum raised by their own efforts which included a number of dinners for which Russell donated some expensive bottles.

www.pebbleswineevents.com