Speaking on Saturday, June 6, 2026, we have :

1st: Helen Spencer – Expedition to ski to the South Pole – a physical, mental and emotional challenge!

At the lowest point of her life, Helen decided to pivot and aim HIGH.

From zero fitness or experience; she learned how to ski, pull a pulk, and just about survive on an expedition to ski the last degree to the South Pole in the footsteps of her polar heroes.

Find out more at @adventure_vet_spence

2nd: Daniel Stables – Fiesta: A Journey Through Festivity.

Daniel Stables’ talk, Fiesta: A Journey Through Festivity, invites audiences into the vivid, surprising world of global celebration. Drawing on his work as a travel writer for National Geographic, the BBC, and major newspapers, as well as his acclaimed debut book of the same title, he traces how festivals illuminate the ways humans express identity, belief, and belonging. Through richly observed narratives, he guides listeners from the masked elegance of Venice Carnival to the spinning mysticism of Konya’s whirling dervishes, and from the ritual funerals of Sulawesi to the intense devotion of Spain’s Romería de El Rocío.

Stables shows that festivals are more than spectacles: they suspend ordinary life, dissolve hierarchies, and create liminal spaces where people connect to culture, community, and the sacred. His talk reveals festivity as one of humanity’s most vibrant forms of expression—dazzling on the surface, yet deeply revealing of the shared motivations and emotional truths that unite societies around the world.

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Date & Time: Saturday 6th June 2026

Doors open at 14:15 in London and on Zoom with the talks starting around 14:45 (London see Event Time Announcer for local times), please arrive before 14:45 and switch your phone to “do not disturb” or silent.

We would ask that anyone with respiratory symptoms participate via Zoom.

Admission costs:

• £7 for members. (Members can access a ticket code below (Log in))
• £10 for non-members. (save £3 if you join at this meeting)
• a recording to watch later will be available to members and non-member ticket holders.

Please sign up for meeting updates to get notifications for future meetings.

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Tickets go on sale just before the meetings.