Weymouth and Portland officials say bonjour to twin town of Louviers (From Dorset Echo)

Weymouth and Portland officials say bonjour to twin town of Louviers

3:30pm Thursday 20th September 2012 in News By Martin Lea

GUESTS were given a warm welcome as a union between two towns was celebrated.

Mayor of Weymouth and Portland Margaret Leicester led a delegation to the borough’s twin town of Louviers in France.

Reminding town officials that the borough had ‘welcomed the world’ during the summer, she presented them with two commemorative pieces of glassware in the shape of a sail marking the 2012 Olympics . Copies of a Weymouth history book written by Weymouth & Portland-Louviers Society member Andy Hutchings were also handed over.

Coun Leicester, who received a hamper of Normandy food and drink from Louviers Mayor Franck Martin, said twinning was a positive way of keeping contact with other countries and cultures.

The presentations were made at the end of the twinning dinner at the civic hall in the Normandy twin town.

Coun Leicester said: “I found everybody extremely friendly, the food was lovely – if rather too plentiful – and I found the town a most interesting place.

“I particularly applaud the work being done to restore an old church in the town and to convert old cloisters by the river Eure into a music conservatoire. I met some really nice people from both sides of the English Channel.”

Town Crier of Langton Herring Doris Eastwood was thanked by Louviers Mayor Franck Martin for her good service as Honorary Town Crier of Louviers for 39 years. On the way to Louviers, the 34-strong delegation visited the First World War battlefields around the Somme and the cathedral city of Amiens. Weymouth and Portland has been twinned with Louviers since 1958.