The first ever Torbay Symposium of Ideas is being held on Saturday May 6^th at Central Church Tor Hill Road, Torquay. It is a completely free event arranged by Ageing Well Torbay and everyone, whatever their age is welcome to come along.

On the day there will be talks, including how to become an amateur astronomer by Torbay Astronomical Society, you can also find out how far you have travelled in Space between 11am and 3pm with Symposium steering group member, Joyce Mitchell.

Dr Maggie Irving will give a talk on the power and pleasure of comedy and creativity, in the afternoon she will also be leading a fun workshop using comedy and movement to encourage the playfulness we all have within, definitely not to be missed! Another unmissable talk comes from legendary music promoter, Lionel Digby, who will be giving a talk entitled “Rock Around the Bay” about the many famous acts he brought to Torbay from the 50s through to the 80s.

Arts and crafts a plenty will be on offer throughout the day. In the morning attendees can try a mixed media, card craft session, where they will be able to take home the card they make. The session is being ran by Paula Brennan, who runs regular craft sessions at the Crafty Fox in Paignton. In the afternoon, from 1.30pm until 3.30pm Michael McCord, who runs regular sessions at the Artizan Gallery, Torquay will be giving a still life, art and drawing workshop. There will also be a chance to see the winning entries of the Symposiums’ Art and Poetry competition. If you haven’t entered yet the closing date is the 21^st April, all of the terms and conditions can be found on the Ageing Well website or by ringing the Torbay Community Development Trust office.

The Symposium will also have a focus on health and wellbeing. From 11am until 11.30am there will be a chair based exercise taster and a chance to chat to the Strength and Balance team about the support they offer, (if you miss this session the team will be running it again in the afternoon). From 11.30am until 12.30pm the Healthy Lifestyles Team will be running a Healthy Eating and Question and Answer session.

During the recent Ageing Well Food for Thought participation events we heard repeatedly that older people wanted more help and advice regarding benefits and entitlements, as well as support using IT.  As a way to help people with these requests the steering group have created an Advice Corner at the Symposium where you can get free advice from solicitors, meet the Ageing Well Torbay delivery partners and also get some IT help too! There will also be an IT taster session in the afternoon, so if you need some help pop along.

Finally the perfect end to a brilliant day comes in the form of dancing! There will be a circle dancing taster session ran by Dorothy Nicholls from Young at Heart in Paignton, followed by a Tea Dance to see the day off in style.

Look out for brochures about the event, we will be posting them around the Bay over the coming weeks, you can also ring the Ageing Well office to request one and we will pop one in the post for you. Or if you are tech savvy you can find everything online at the ageing well festival website.

The Symposium is in addition to, rather than replacing, the very popular Ageing Well Festival, which this year will be held at Lupton House near Brixham on September 30^th, save the date!