News
The Duchess carries out engagements in Devon and Somerset
8th June 2009
The Duchess of Cornwall visited a charity which helps to conserve the Exmoor Pony during a day of engagements in Devon and Somerset today.
Her Royal Highness is a keen horsewoman and is Patron of The Moorland Mousie Trust, a registered charity dedicated to the promotion and conservation of the Exmoor Pony, currently classified as a rare breed.
The Duchess visited the head office for The Moorland Mousie Trust at Exmoor Pony Centre, which opened in July 2006.
It provides visitors with the opportunity to meet Exmoor Ponies, learn about the rare breed and offers riding sessions.
The original visit had been planned for September last year but was cancelled after a last-minute event to meet flood victims was planned instead, and a rescheduled trip in March this year also had to be cancelled after The Duchess developed acute bronchitis.
The Duchess signed a copy of the book Moorland Mousie, also signed by the author Lionel Edwards, on which the name of the charity is based.
She said: "I feel very honoured to put my name under Lionel Edwards', I think this was the first book I ever read.
"I'm really pleased to be able to come back, this is the third time lucky, and I have brought the sun with me, no floods this time."
The Duchess walked through fields to meet some of the ponies, including Burt and Tommy, before chatting to pupils from All Saints School, Dulverton about their visit to the centre.
The Duchess started her day with a tour of the Healthy Bones Service at Plymouth's Derriford Hospital where she launched a Mobile dual energy X-ray absorptiometry unit, a bone scanner.
She is President of the National Osteoporosis Society and has worked for many years to promote understanding and raise awareness of osteoporosis, a devastating brittle bone disease that affects one in two women and one in five men in the UK.
The Duchess’s mother, Mrs Rosalind Shand, was 72 when she died in 1994 as a result of osteoporosis. The Duchess’s grandmother had died from the same condition eight years earlier.
Plymouth Hospitals NHS Trust has worked with the National Osteoporosis Society to support the development of new bone health services, including the delivery of local scanning services through a mobile facility, a GP direct access service to facilitate scan requests and the development of a Fracture Liaison Service.
The Mobile Unit will enable the Healthy Bones Service to bring services much closer to the patients’ homes. It allows for much greater flexibility and will significantly improve access to bone health services for patients in very rural locations or who have transport difficulties.
Earlier in the day, The Duchess met homeless people and staff at the Shekinah Mission drop-in centre, in Bath Street, Plymouth.
Shekinah Mission is a homelessness charity which, since its foundation in December 1992, has been working for the relief of poverty, homelessness and social exclusion in Plymouth (latterly in Torbay also).
Originally just a drop-in centre, over the years the Mission has expanded and developed its services for vulnerable adults, particularly the homeless, addicted, ex offenders and socially disadvantaged.
The Mission’s projects currently include a drop-in centre, a night hostel (short term accommodation for rough sleepers and vulnerable people), education & training projects, a charity shop, social enterprises and employability programmes.
The Duchess is Patron of Emmaus, a homelessness charity which offers homeless people a home, work and the chance to rebuild their lives in a supportive environment.