FONFA AT THE 2008 BOURNEMOUTH AIR FESTIVAL

With some trepidation FONFA bought stand space at this first hugely successful Air Festival with, as it happens, a good pitch just a few hundred metres east of Bournemouth pier. Thankfully early bird charities got a substantial discount from Bournemouth Council which made the event affordable. We had a busy four days with lots of visitors and sold a lot of our Mosquito and Wellington prints so that in the end we probably covered about half our costs. That was actually quite good as the focus of the event for us was to be our educational role not just fundraising.

Participating in the Air Festival did however stretch us human-resource wise and unless we get an influx of volunteers (ideally some of them being younger and fitter than this year's crew) participation in next year's event has to be in doubt. This is a shame because an education and heritage charity with a focus on local aviation history should be there. Having said that we were the only one. Maybe next year we need to look at a collaborative stand, shared with other groups, shared both for cost and manning.