TWO Thurlestone residents have launched a new website for the Thurlestone parish – the villages of Thurlestone, Bantham and Buckland.

Mike Bone and Paul Martin, two retired engineers who moved to Thurlestone in 2013 and 2009 respectively, have set up the website after finding that the parish was ‘behind the times’ as 200 other Devon villages had their own sites with information for residents and visitors alike.

The website features information on local events in the parish, links to information on the church, beaches, pubs, shops, parish hall, the Bulk Buy Oil scheme, the parish council and the neighbourhood plan, as well as information on things to do in the area.

There is information on local tide times, surfing conditions, what to do in an emergency – with the locations of the three defibrillators in the parish – where the nearest hospital, doctors surgery and pharmacies are and anything else you might need to know if you live or are staying in the three villages.

You can also access every edition of Village Voice, the parish bi-monthly magazine, all the way back to its inception in 1982 – its on its 196th issue – and the last five years of parish council minutes.

There is also a business directory with listings of local suppliers of anything from boarding kennels to window fitting.

Mike and Paul have created a website that can be added to by local residents. ‘We chose a host that is user friendly so people can take control of certain parts of the website’, said Paul, with the parish council clerk already adding his own documents and plans to do more. One of the church wardens has shown an interest in doing the same for All Saints’ Church.

There are pages of local photos, events and the hope is that people will contribute their own photos to the website, showing off the best of Thurlestone, Bantham and Buckland, with images of events, views, historical photos and anything else that people want to send them.

‘We want to showcase every aspect of the community,’ continued Paul, ‘with visitors and local people very much in mind.’

The website, which has around a hundred pages of information on it, launched on January 1, around the same time that fibre optic broadband came to the area, and draws its funding from the parish council for the start-up.

‘We are both retired engineers and a bit “techy”,’ explained Mike, ‘and when we started we expected it to take months, it’s actually taken a year.’

‘We need it to be constantly updated and moving forward,’ continued Paul ‘so we want the community to contribute as much as possible.’

You can visit the website: http://www.thurlestoneparish.co.uk/ and if you would like to contribute to the site, contact Mike and Paul via the ‘Contacts’ section.