Showcasing the city to visitors from our twin city

This week we have enjoyed a visit from the Oberbürgermeister of our twin city of Krefeld in Germany. Our guests were very impressed with the city and places visited included Curve, the National Space Centre and the new digital media centre at Phoenix Square.

I enjoyed personally showing our German visitors around the historic old town area from the Roman Jewry Wall to the Castle area and the historic old town walls in the vicinity of Ruperts Gateway. We also visited the Guildhall and the exhibition of German expressionist art at New Walk Museum & Art Gallery.

And of course, we had lovely sunny weather throughout the whole of their three day visit!

Make the most of Leicester's history

The Lady Mayoress and I enjoyed an interesting visit to Leicester Castle this week.

We visited the historic courtrooms, went down into the medieval John of Gaunts Cellar and went up to the top of the Castle mound.

For centuries our castle was at the very centre of Leicester's political life. Today it is in need of considerable restoration but we still do have regular tours of the building advertised in the local press. In addition, Castle Gardens are open for all to enjoy and St Mary de Castro remains one of the most magnificent old churches in Leicester.

We anticipate showing this and many other historic features of our city to the Oberburgomeister of our twin city Krefeld when he visits us later this month.

High praise from High Commissioner

Back again in Leicester this weekend was the High Commissioner for Namibia who so enjoyed his last visit to the City that this time he brought with him a superbly talented group of young Namibian dancers.

They visited our National Space Centre, performed at Curve and went on to London to help celebrate the twentieth anniversary of Namibian independence. During the course of their visit the young dancers also met pupils from Forest Lodge School.

I am posting pictures of the dancers on my photo album on the Lord Mayor's website at www.leicester.gov.uk/about-leicester/lordmayorcivic/

Twin city visitors enjoy their stay

It was good to welcome to the Town Hall this week a group of young people from our twin City of Strasbourg. They were spending the week in Leicester based at Judgemeadow Community College and had also enjoyed visiting our museums and other places of interest in the city.

Needless to say, they all loved looking over our splendid nineteenth century courtroom and a visit to the cells beneath.

So a reminder that we offer Town Hall Tours open to the public free of charge at 2pm on the first Wednesday of each month – no advance booking required.

New touring exhibition opens

I was delighted to attend the launch yesterday of an impressive exhibition of the History of Girl Guiding, currently on display at the Records Office in Wigston. The exhibition is set to go on tour to various locations in Leicester and Leicestershire over the next few months and is well worth a visit.

With the Leicester Comedy Festival coming up there will be a lot of extra visitors to the city in the next few weeks. I have also had the opportunity to meet a number of people visiting Leicester for the first time including the Australian Deputy High Comissioner who is definitely looking forward to a return visit with his wife and family.

It is encouraging to discover how highly these visitors rate key attractions such as Curve, the National Space Centre our fine museums and Highcross.

Cold snap doesn't deter visitors to city

With the foreseeing temperatures in and around the city, not many people turned out for our very first Town Hall Tour of 2010. Amongst those who did however was Paul – all the way from Melbourne, Australia!

Paul was born and brought up in Evington but emigrated to Oz 15 years ago and has not visited Leicester since. It was great to meet him and hear his comments on all the new developments within the city. Paul was also pleased to find many of his favourite places still unspoiled and was clearly very much enjoying the visit to his birthplace.