Women's Institute MEMBERS started the April meeting with a few moments silence in memory of a long-standing and very popular member, Mary Drury who died recently. She will be sadly missed by us all.

Twenty-six members enjoyed a very full evening. The talk given by Mr Colin French, was on the subject of SARS - the Suffolk Accident Rescue Service. His presentation was illustrated by some occasionally graphic slides, covering a brief history, the organisation and working of the service.

Supported by mainly voluntary contributions, SARS supports around 25 doctors, including anaesthetists, who are on instant readiness to attend accidents and incidents in the county. Often they arrive before the other rescue services and are able to give immediate first aid and then co-ordinate the work of others. They operate in close conjunction with the police, fire service, paramedic ambulances and also the RAF Air-Sea Rescue Service. The talk, which was laced with humour, was very well received. Sue Ryman gave the vote of thanks.

After the usual delicious refreshments, we settled down to the business of the evening, catching up with news and hearing about future plans for the Institute. These include a Scrabble evening, the summer garden party, plans for a theatre outing and visits to other institutes.

Our next major undertaking will be a coffee morning and cake stall in conjunction with the annual spring plant sale held by the Bures Horticultural Society to be held tomorrow.

After all the business was done, members were entertained by our Drama Queens who produced a play reading of The Grapefruit which had been written by a past member of the institute. This caused much hilarity and was enjoyed by all.

Israel Trip A GROUP of 31 people led by the Rev David Wakefield, have just experienced a ten day organised pilgrimage to the Holy Land. The group left Bures at 3am on Tuesday, April 17 being driven to Heathrow Airport by Chambers coach. The reason for the night time departure was to catch an early flight to Israel, one that would land at a reasonable time. With a very packed programme of visits to the various sites in Israel, the group prepared themselves for other early starts, sometimes setting their alarm clocks for 5.45am in order to have time to explore all the many interesting churches, basilicas and gardens. Special attention was given to the footsteps of Jesus as He moved from Galilee to Jerusalem and eventually to his death and resurrection.

What was especially noticeable by the group members was the respect given to the different sites by all three major religions in the Holy Land - Jewish, Muslim and Christians.

Visits included trips to Bethlehem, Masada, Jericho and Nazareth and these were linked with coach trips to the Dead Sea, the Sea of Galilee and the river Jordan. The ten days were emotionally charged for the entire group and many spoke about the experience as seeming to go very quickly indeed. The journey back was a little eventful not least because of a security close down at Ben Gurion Airport and the resultant delay at Heathrow. Arriving back home, again by Chambers, was uneventful but typical of the ten days in that the coach arrived in Bures in the early hours of the morning; just 18 hours since the group had been dabbling their hands in the river Jordan.