Kildare Active Retirement Lunch held in Lawlor's
Mary O'Kelly, Breda Muccahy, Brigid Luttrell, Phyllis Burke and Mary Quigley
The Newbridge branch of Active Retirement held their annual Christmas party in Lawlor’s Hotel in Naas recently, and The Kildare Nationalist was there to capture the event.
The lunch ran from 2-6pm, and had music and a raffle as one would expect.
While the event was formally for the entire eastern region of Active Retirement, and though all three counties were represented, the attendees were “mainly Kildare”, according to the Chair of the Newbridge branch Catherine Clarke.
There were an estimated 300 attendees, aging between 65 and 90 years old.
“I’m the youngest, and I’m the feckin’ chairperson!” laughed Catherine.
“There were far too many,” she said, but they were still accommodated within standing rules.
She explained that when you join Active Retirement and participate for 15 weeks, you qualify for the Christmas lunch, but if not, you will have to pay a proportion of it.
Catherine told they would have had the do in Newbridge, but now with two branches in the town finding a central venue with enough parking for such a crowd was problematic, hence the pilgrimage to Naas.
“We’re hoping for a bigger venue next year to accommodate the numbers, and one of the members suggested we bring in one of the local councillors to discuss this,” said Catherine.
“We looked at the Town Hall in Newbridge, but where do over 300 people get parking?” “Anybody with any good suggestions for a venue next year feel free to ring me on 087-6978265,” she volunteered.
