Page 70 - BR December 2023

December 2023 December 2023

FUNERAL TRIBUTES

Bill from the station in his TR7. He rescued a fawn that got
stuck in a wire fence while out deer stalking with campers.
He rescued many a struggling campfire.

Mike was an excellent teacher and spent many hours
sharing his backwoodsman skills with anyone keen to learn
being quick to find another way to explain if the first
attempt had left blank faces. He was a great encourager of all the youngsters
and no task was beneath him at camp. Nor was he ever to be defeated, such
as when he arrived at a very muddy site one Easter on crutches having fallen
from the tree but still over saw all his tasks.

When it came to building the new cabins, the weather was a huge hindrance
and there was pressure to get at least four of the cabins ready for the first
camp of the season. A mini work party led by Mike had the task of building
the patios, first digging out around the cabins to make a level area, and then
putting down the paving. Once again Mike proved that he was able not only
to turn his hand to most practical tasks but also to manage a very large
number of tasks. Mikes wisdom and ability to work through a problem will be
greatly missed at camp.
Last year when a new Bishop was enthroned in Salisbury, Mike was there.
Everyone present was given £10 to go and bless someone with and so spread
Gods love. Mike immediately came up with the idea of using the £10 to
encourage others around him to join with him in providing a subsidy for
someone to go to one of the summer camps at Great Wood. He said he
became a Christian there and he wanted others to have the same
opportunity in this beautiful place.
I’m sure there’s a book’s worth of people’s further memories of Mike at Great
Wood, which would keep us both laughing loudly and thinking profoundly.

From Stephen Sanderson, former churchwarden at St Laurence
I first met Mike Menzies about 32 years ago when he and Hilly came to River
Cottage to pick my brains about the small Central American country Belize.
Belize has an enormous and pristine coral reef, second only in size to the Great
Barrier Reef of Australia, and Mike told me that he and Hilly were planning to
go there on a scuba diving trip. I realized very quickly that Mike was not only
an intrepid adventurer, Belize is a wild and remote place, but also a man of
very many parts with wide ranging interests, wide ranging abilities and
boundless energy. Mike was a man of many gifts and graces and over the
intervening 32 years I have come to recognise what an exceptional man Mike
was.

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