The Green Umbrella Group in Tavistock kindly invited us back for their 'Alternatives' day so we were back in the town centre with lumps of wood, canvas and bits of bikes.

We were trying out a new system for the pedal powered sound system. While the generator was the same (the reclining exercise bike) we had supplemented the design with a simple electrical circuit that shut off the power from the battery to the amplifier if nobody was pedalling. This allowed us to continue to use a battery to regulate voltage and store excess power but made the whole thing seem far more immediate like a direct drive system that uses no battery. No pedalling, no music.

We had a peg loom and rag rugs on display adding a touch of colour. Our green woodworking was limited to making tool handles because although we had bought the lathe with us, we had somehow forgotten to pack the string.

We saw familiar faces from last year and pretty much the same organisations were present. On the VegFam stall there was a mechano model of a pedal powered food processor used in the Philippines. The design is very similar to an idea Ben has been toying with for a few years for generating electricity from lots of people pedalling, so he was quite excited.

The weather was similar to that we experienced last year, with some rain and gusty wind blowing leaflets everywhere. There was an almost constant queue of kids wanting to try the pedal powered sound system and plenty of interest in our leaflets. Despite having to photocopy more newsletters, at the end of the day we had broken even on the day's expenses thanks to donations. It had been our first public event of it's kind this year and despite forgetting vital bits we had fun and are looking forward to the next few green fairs.