Category: Club Runs

With the third day of heat of over 35 degrees and today the 2nd of March reaching 38 degrees we manned the sausage sizzle at Bunnings in Notting Hill.

As usual the club was well represented, and made it a lot easier for many of us to share the cooking duties. There was a great turn out of customers to Bunnings considering the weather and it did get a little quiet at 2.00pm during the heat of the day. One thing I have learnt is that we seem to run out of sauce on these days. So I made a trip to the supermarket to buy more supplies, which seems to take an eternity. Oh well that was the only mishap for the day.

By the time 4.00pm came around we had 4 cooked sausages left and eventually gave those away to Bunnings customers, which in itself was a little difficult as it showed there was not a great deal of customers heading through the doors even at 4.00pm.

Those Bunnings customers who did attend, enjoyed the static display of earlies that were on show. A special mention here to Garry and Judy Hislop who travelled from Traralgon just to cook some sausages, unfortunately it was a longer drive home for them due to the bushfires in Bunyip State Park. Just on the bushfire at time of writing Derk did not attend the sausage sizzle as he was home attending to his house due to the bushfire. By all accounts Derk and Vicky are safe.

Members with Earlies. Members without,
Peter Corrigan. Alan & Michael Delzoppo.
Trevor Dempsey. Wayne Fleming.
Daryl Dunn. Aldo Gianchino.
Ray Edsall. Chris Kane.
Ralph Edwards. Jason King.
Bruce Graham. Geoff & Lyn Ogden.
Rod Grummitt. Kim Radenic.
Gary & Judy Hislop.
Garry Hodge.
Jeff White.

Lazy Hazy Days of Summer of cake & beer & wine.

The first job of the day was to put out the directional signs which I hope everybody found ok.

A good show of cars – 10 in all for the locals to look at. One very nice resident came along with a large photograph of his FJ racing car back in the 50’s & 60’s – very nice. It never ceases to amaze the people you meet on the club runs. Only two Hot Rods turned up as they were at other venues throughout Melbourne. At that time of year so many places to go not unlike our club.

The bar is open, the cake is a flowing & might I say many thanks to the ladies who bought cakes & nibbles.

Lunch supplied by Blue Hills Rise Social Club and once again many thanks to the ladies and gents at the BBQ and serving table. They also ran a raffle which Rod Grummitt was lucky enough to win 2nd prize.

Barefoot Bowls was the order of the day, coaching on the finer points of the game being etiquette and all there is to know about the bowl with its bias and how to bowl it out of your hand, but this soon went out the door then rafferty’s rules prevailed but then fun was had by all & much laughter.

A very relaxing day under the verandah and umbrellas.

Members with Earlies. Members without,
Gary & Lesley Beardsley. Jim & Kaye Bishop.
Peter & Cynthia Charman. Alan & Jan Delzoppo.
Trevor & Sue Dempsey. Michael & Brett Delzoppo.
Ray & Dianne Eaton. Aldo Gianchino.
Rod & Sharon Grummitt. Alan Newsome & Wayne.
Garry Hodge. Ray & Janet Howlett.
Derk Tuik. Kim Radenic.
Mark & Janet Waghorn.
Jeff White.
Kelvin & Dawn from Melb Chapter.

Well here we are for the first run of the new year and it is in January. We decided to have this Australia day run after there had been requests made to the committee by some members, so we gave it a trial run and it has proved to be very popular.

We met at our club rooms at 10am for a 10.30 departure, with the result of 11 early’s and Chris and Lyn’s Buick lined up for the convoy club run to Cardinia Reservoir Park.

After the last couple of day’s extreme heat, today’s lower temp and lovely light breeze was perfect especially for Chris and Lyn in their convertible with two large Aussie flags attached flying high and a big one draped over the boot. The flags were also present on most of the earlys as well this made a very special spectacle with all of these earlys combined with lots of Aussie flags.

It was quite a site in convoy and so we started off with Bruce and Lillian Graham and Pete and Linda Corrigan leading the way for the forty minute drive to the lake,along Springvale Rd then left onto Wellington Rd with lots of waves and toots from passing motorists obviously liking what they were seeing.

On Wellington Rd Bruce and Pete drove side by side on the triple lane highway with Jason and Janine behind Pete and the rest of us following Bruce, then Chris and Lyn drove past us with Lyn almost standing up in the passenger seat blonde hair flowing in the wind and sunshine taking Photos of us all. It was quite a site I wondered what all of the other motorist’s thought ? ‘Great Fun’.

Part way down Wellington Rd Garry and Lesley Beardsley and Aldo in his old Statesman joined our convoy along with the Delzoppo clan. We entered the park and drove down to meet Peter and Cynthia Charman and Paul and Elaine Annetts who had secured a great shaded spot with a huge rotunda and lots of trees for us.

All of the cars were parked and we settled in for a great sociable afternoon with lots of catching up to do with Xmas and the Nationals to discuss.Scotty Woodbridge soon turned up also, Pete Corrigan’s new ‘Racing’ car created a lot of interest as most of us had not seen it before, great to give it a once over, to use Pete’s phrase “lots of fun to drive”.

With no BBQ.s on site we all had our picnic lunches with exception of Alan Delzoppo who had brought along his Mini portable BBQ and cooked and shared some snags, thanks Alan. There was plenty of time to inspect and chat about the cars and enjoy the afternoon, at about 3 pm we started to pack up and head for home after a very enjoyable run.

We had 15 earlies along with Chris’s Buick and Aldo’s Statesman and total of 33 members and families, a great turn out.

After such a successful Australia Day run it looks like it will become a set fixture on our run calendar.

Members with Earlies.	Members without,
Paul and Elaine Annetts	Alan and Jan Delzoppo
Gary and Lesley Beardsley	Michael and Brett Delzoppo
Jim and Kay Bishop	Aldo Gianchino
Peter and Cynthia Charman	Chris and Lyn Kane
Phillip Cleven with Ashley and Sienna
Peter and Linda Corrigan
Bruce and Lillian Graham
Rod and Sharon Grummitt
Ray and Janet Howlett
Jason and Janine King
Russell King
Brenton and Lyn Schier
John Shore
Jeff White
Scotty Woodbridge

This year we headed off to Murray Bridge for the Nationals, which was hosted by four FX FJ clubs in SA.
Four club members debuted their cars at the Nationals;
• Jason and Janine King with their V6 FJ ute;
• Gary and Judy Hislop with their supercharged red motor FJ panelvan;
• Steve and Sue Whiting in their “wild” FX sedan which was previously owned by John Cadona in Canberra, this car has been to every Nationals since Jindabyne in 1994; and
• Tim and Luke Sells with their grey motor Group Nb race car. This car was last seen at the Jindabyne Nationals in 1994 when owned by Bob Harris.

December 27 was the day most of us chose to drive to Murray Bridge, early on the weather forecast was for a hot day and they got this one right. My car showed the temperature as high as 45 Celsius as I drove over and hats off to the guys who drove their earlies in the heat. I trailered my van across so I had an air-conditioned ride in relative comfort. A few of the guys had overheating issues with the odd blowout but everyone made it over.

December 28 was the scrutineering day, as it was also a hot day a lot of us were there ready very early when the day kicked off and we got through scrutineering quickly. The scrutineering was a little different this year with many cars going into the higher class compared to other Nationals.

That afternoon about 10 of us went down to see Ian Jeisman’s NOS collection. Rod picked up a few $5 bargains while other deals were settled after two days of haggling. I did pick up a NOS tail-lamp switch with wiring loom for my stock 49 project which made the trips worthwhile.

That night we had the Welcome BBQ and the Les McVeigh Memorial boat race was held, the club was well represented, and club members came first and third. Ray Jones was expected to do well for the Melbourne Chapter but didn’t want to rush the free beer so sipped his way into last.

December 29 was the Show N Shine, the organisers separated the sedans, utes and vans into three groups and this was a great display. There were 16 panel vans on display which is the highest seen in more than 20 years. There were five 265 vans including two recently completed baker’s vans complete with sign writing.

As you would expect there were lots of previously not seen SA vehicles on display including two barn-find utes, widened sedans such as 308-053. There was a father and son team who had a sedan with a Garrett turbo red motor on the road from the mid 80’s along with his son’s 6.2 litre unfinished project (winner top mechanicals). Even the mayor of Murray Bridge was there with a recently completed V8 FX ute, this won people’s choice, not registered but who’s going to stop the mayor?

The calibre of the stock vehicles was very high with more than 10 stock FX’s on display and a higher number of stock FJ’s. The modified earlies included a stretch limo, not one but three 2-door coupes, an FJ with a rear spoiler, half a dozen race cars or drag cars. Two of the drag cars had supercharged red motors and even an FJ taxi. The cars were from all across Australia including two from WA including our old mate from the Mansfield Nationals.

Leigh Mackin had his recently retrimmed FJ sedan there which was my pick for Grand Champion. The judges didn’t seem to be getting their knees dirty and they judged a FJ ute from Queensland as superior.

December 30 was the cruising day where we headed out from the showgrounds to the National Motor Museum in Birdswood. Early on I could count 21 earlies in procession around 100 earlies took the trip across. There was a wide variety of vehicles on display with the first 48-215 off the production line on display, it maintained many of the one offs for an early build. A prototype Torana GTR-X and WB Kingswood were on display. Many people took the long way home visiting Hanhdorf and other towns.

December 31 was the driving events were held in the racecourse carpark. The first course had you coming to a stop three times to place an “egg” in an egg cup. The second course was a go to whoa, followed by a reverse garage park and then a slalom to the finish line. Our club was very well represented in the competition with many people having three or more goes. Luke Sells put the race car through its paces and Sue Whiting took my van around a couple of times. That evening we had the presentations and auctions with the banner going for $3,250. Congratulations to Steve and Sue Whiting on having the only car to win a trophy from the club.

January 1 we stopped in at The Bend after the farewell BBQ and a Mustang was the pace car for some slow laps and then one faster lap. I was third in line and Tony Dowsett was the actual pace car holding me back. We could see the whites of Tony’s eyes in his rear view when I lunged late under brakes a couple of times just to spice things up.
Special thanks to the organising committee and club members from the SA clubs that put this event together, they did a great job and we are all looking forward to Cooma in two years’ time.

We left Wheelers Hill Pub Thurs 27th Dec 4 pm had a good & hot run through Melbourne for a few hours, then out on the highway heading to Dimboola for the night, during our run we passed a tow truck carrying an early heading back to Melbourne, it belonged to Ray & Gaye from the Melb Chapter, could not be started, Peter Cammo’s ute stopped running as well, neither caused by heat, unless it was fuel related.

Derk’s ute got a bit thirsty on part of his trip 12 litres gulped in, back to cammos, apparently when filling up radiator it was spitting out steam, so it was pretty hot.

However we continued on our way to Dimboola, arriving at our destination 9.pm and we met up with Ian & Jane, after a quiet wine & Bundy, we retired to prepare for another day. We met Ian & Jane at 7 am outside Caravan park office & WERE ON OUR WAY , we had a good safe drive whist filling petrol tanks & all the normal duties on a road trip, changing lead drivers a couple of times, we stopped at Coonalpyn, to fill up with fuel, only to find the servo i thought was out of town was in fact not, so with a little bit of pressure on us we took things a little easy until Yumali, as we where getting closer to our destination we didn’t fill right up, waiting for cheaper fuel, todays trip was real good no rush, the day was not quite so hot & both engines performed ideally, arriving at Murray Bridge racecourse app 11.30 am to see most of our club member raring to go we all got through Scrutineering ok, had some lunch, then back to motel, GAME ON.

29th January, 2018
Today was the show and shine, we arrived nice and early and set our cars up. We also set up the club gazebos with the help of other members. Was a good turn out of cars and people for the show and shine.

30th January, 2018
Run to Birdwood Museum. Left Racecourse 8.30. Good run in convoy, maybe a bit slow, no mishaps.
Left about 12.45 to Hahndorf. Town was full up, half an hour to find a park with Trevor & Aaron Read looking, found 1 in IGA.
Had lunch with Reads and families, joined by Chris Fox and family.
Nice drive back to Motel on Freeway. let the ute loose a bit,
Movie at Racecourse “Sunday Too Far Away” .Big crowd enjoying the movie with app 5 seconds viewing of the FJ ute.

31st January, 2018
Car Skills course day at Racecourse. Dropping golf ball into glass, negotiating forward and reverse into garage, etc .every entrant had a ball losing themselves in their own dust from slides & wheelies, it was a time trial of course, my first time at that, thoroughly enjoyed it,
Lunch with members at Foxies at Motel, good afternoon.
Evening
Picked up at 5.30 in Minibus taken to Racecourse for Presentation night dinner and raffles etc. Great meal, Cold night, Great Band, Silent Auction got me another small carry bag. Just what i needed.
Members not lucky this year, no trophies for EMHC, except for Driving events, list in Mag.

1st January, 2019
Farewell breakfast at Stuart Reserve cooked by Bikie Club, a lot of chit chat between all clubs. Most of us drove on to “The Bend” racetrack at Tailem Bend. After a lot of signing papers we started on our laps of this very new impressive Race Track. We started with 2 laps at 60kph. Slow drivers were supposed to go at rear, did not happen, subsequently slowing down yours truly and 1 other ute. After pulling into pits and parking cars out in the parking lot, a lot more chatter between friends, next thing the Pace Car driver was calling out for drivers to do 1 lap at 100kph. Well about all raced back to their cars, jumped in and tried to get up front. I finished up in the middle which suited me, as the cars were much faster than myself and cars behind were quite a lot slower than me, or was it the driver! So with Michael Delzoppo urging me on, we decided to go and catch up to the tail end of front drivers, we managed to do this feat with the old ute rock & rolling around the track. Good job by the Ute and I could not have driven any harder, my drive was approx 90kph.
This was a great finish to the Nationals, I feel every participant would agree.

After the laps, all involved started on their way home or to halfway town, Dimboola.
We headed to Mannum on the Murray for 3 days. then Christys beach another 3 days. caught up with family & headed Home.

Members with Earlies	Members without,
Paul & Elaine Annetts.	Garry Allen.
Peter & Linda Corrigan & Connie.	Gary & Lesley Beardsley.
Ray & Judy Edsall.	Alan Delzoppo.
Chris & Jane Fox. & Angus, Chloe, Olivia.	Michael Delzoppo.
Richard Fox.	Brett Hall.
Rod & Sharon.Grummitt.	Ray & Janet Howlett.
Gary & Judy Hislop.	Alan Newsome & Wayne.
Jason & Janine King,	Brenton & Lyn Scheir. & Aiden
Ian & Jane Maclean.	Glen & Vicki Sherry.
Barry Maxted.
Aaron & Lisette Read, with Kaela, Zahra & Tamsyn
Trevor & Sandra Read
Tim & Luke Sells & Michelle
Derk Tuik
Steve & Sue Whiting

So a couple of months ago with a bit of help and encouragement, from my good mate With the previous night’s wild weather still on our minds as to what it may do today Kay and I arrived at the club rooms at 9.15. and began to set up for our Xmas breakup, Rod and Sharon arrived soon afterwards and we set up the tables outside. I unlocked the garage doors and both Rod, and I decided to wait for some younger muscle power to lift the garage door as we both suffer old folks’ aches and pains, with that Bruce and Brenton arrived and raised the door.

After some debate on the best location for the BBQ trailer it was finally set up along with Santa’s Gazebo. More people started arriving and the ladies started sorting out the food and setting up the tables in side hall.

We also took advantage of the open garage and more helpers to move our excess tables and chairs into the garage in preparation for the pending hall renovations. As we can safely use the garage now that we have evicted the locale wild life.

At about midday with more folks arriving we started up the BBQ, Derk had purchased the meat from his local butcher and as usual it was great. Burgers, snags and Aldo’s favourite marinated steak. As Pete Corrigan was lighting the BBQ Janine’s youngest son Eden asked if he could help, he did not have to ask twice and with Pete Charman as his mentor using his teaching skills the three of us got stuck into the cooking, with Allen Delzoppo also assisting and cleaning up the BBQ plate afterwards we had it all done.

Everyone went inside to collect their lunch from the tables of numerous salads and meat. A special thanks to Pete and Aden for doing the Lions share, well done guy’s.

With the weather holding we all enjoyed a great lunch. Then it was time for Santa he turned up bell ringing and lots of HO HO HO’S and his bag of presents for the little ones who joined him sitting in his chair to get their Xmas present. Santa then assisted by his helper Pete Corrigan handed out lolly bags to the ladies and to some of the Guy’s that had been good!!.

Well after Santa it was time for dessert and we had a brief rain shower, so we went into the hall to enjoy the sweets. We then had our door prices raffle ticket draw, there were some lovely large hampers put together by Janine from some very nice donated items, along with some very nice smaller hampers sorted by the ladies. Everyone seemed to enjoy the event.

Then we returned outside to join in some games, with Rod and Rob organising the Hub Cap Tossing and the younger ones enjoying the egg and spoon racing. There were prizes for the winners and with the Hub Cap Tossing lots of the ladies got very competitive that made for a fun event to watch.

Well it had been a long day and we started to pack up with everyone helping and so ended another great club event. Thank you to everyone that assisted in setting up for today and making such a success 30 free spins no deposit required keep what you win.

Have a happy and safe Xmas and new year, and with the exception of those members going to the Nationals we will see you again in the new year.

Jim and Kay.

Members attending                                                                                                                                        

Kevin and Stevie Baird	Gary and Lesley Beardsley
Jim and Kay Bishop	Peter Charman
Peter and Linda Corrigan	James Creswell
Alan and Jan Delzoppo	Michael and Brett Delzoppo
Trevor Dunstan	Ralph and Dianne Edwards
Wayne and Anna Fleming	Richard Fox
Aldo Gianchino	Bruce and Lillian Graham
Rod and Sharon Grummitt	Gary and Judy Hislop
Doug and Jean Hedington	Garry and Heather Hodge
Jason and Janine King	Russel King
Ian and Jane Maclean	Rob and Di Martella
Brenton and Lyn Schier	Tim Sells and Michelle
Chris Shepherd	Andrew and Fe Staines
Derk Tuik	Jeff White

It all started on Saturday morning at Barry Bourke Motors Berwick for Registration and Scrutineering. Rod Grummitt, Peter Charman, Chris Shepherd along with many other club members queued up, and the scrutineering started and cars began to move forward. Except for Chris’s car as some early’s do from time to time it would not start, proved to be a dud battery so his car was pushed into the dealers workshop to receive a new battery, while it was there they carried out the scrutineering on it as well.

There were lots of very hungry drivers putting pressure on the sausage sizzle but they coped and all went well.It was all completed around midday and then it was time to get ready for the Saturday evening Dinner.

The Dinner started with Kay and I meeting Rod and Sharon Grummitt and Rob and Diane Martella at 6 pm at Trios Restaurant Cranbourne Race Course.While we waited in the foyer for the dining room to open many others began to arrive including Peter and Linda Corrigan, Rod and I were sitting on a low couch together and Linda approached to say hello with a kiss, well Rod being the gentleman that he is suddenly moved his feet so as not to trip her up, well the opposite happened and Linda fell straight forward onto him, going by the look on Rods face he must have thought all of his Christmas’s had come at once.Well with pre dinner entertainment done with we all went into to start the evening dinner and events.

We were welcomed by the AEHF President Tony Dowsett and dinner commenced. Between courses we were entertained by a guest speaker Mr Norm Darwin regarding the early development of the 48-215 and the correct data that is now apparent.In addition we had a trivia competition that included a lot of questions regarding early’s including technical items ,this was won by a table that was occupied by our club members, well done.

Also one of the raffle door prizes was won by Diane Martella, a nice bottle of Mascato. The evening finished with the auction many items were available to bid for, as usual this event encouraged a lot of competitive bidding with a good result for the evening.Two people that attended the Titles were our distant members from Orbost Glen and Alison Farley it was great to catch up again with these folks.So at approx. 10.30 the night ended and we left to rest and get ready for the Sunday Show and Shine.

Sunday started with a cloudy sky but it remained dry throughout with sunshine in the afternoon.

Registration and Scrutineering continued along with the Show and Shine a really good turn out of great cars, including the iconic Holden EFIGY and the 48-215 Peter Brock competed in. The Delegates meeting resulted in the FX FJ Holden club of Australia Inc Melbourne Chapter putting their hand up to run the State Titles 2019.

The SES put on a demonstration and cut up a Mazda to mimic a car rescue, very interesting to watch.

During the afternoon there were the Rocker Cover Races, Hub Cap Toss and Spark Plug Change always a lot of fun.

Then the Trophy Presentations started.

Well our club shined,We had 25 early’s entered (well over 25% of the total cars entered). We had just on 50 members attend many with partners and the EMHC drove away with 10 Trophy’s, hey were as follows.

TOP SEDAN                                    James Cresswell
1st WILD CUSTOM                       Rohan Johnstone
GRAND CHAMP MODIFIED     Scott Woodbridge
PEOPLES CHOICE AWARD       Neville Mawer
1st RADICAL CUSTOM                Richard Fox
2nd WILD CUSTOM                     Russel King
3rd WILD CUSTOM                      Chris Shepard
2nd STOCK FJ                                Ray Daggers
2nd MODIFIED SREET CUSTOM     Chris Fox
3rd MODIFIED STREET CUSTOM   Trevor Dempsey

Well done to all of these ten members great to see them get the recognition for all of the hard work they put into their cars. So with the weekend ending on such a high note we headed home.

A special note of thanks to our hosts, THE SOUTHERN EARLY HOLDEN CLUB, well done a great success..

Members that attended – with an early.
Gary and Lesley Beardsly                   Peter and Cynthia Charman
Peter and Linda Corrigan                   James Creswell
Ray and Val Daggers                           Trevor and Sue Dempsey
Ray and Di Eaton                                 Ray Edsall
George Failia                                         Chris and Jane Fox
Richard Fox                                           Rod and Sharon Grummitt
Doug and Jean Hedington                 Ray Howlett
Rohan and partner Johnstone          Chris Kane
Russel King                                           Ian Maclean
Neville Mawer                                      Robert Peime
Brenton and Lyn Schier                     Chris Shepherd
John Shore                                           Derk and John Tuik
Scott Woodbridge

Without an early.
Garry Allen                                           Jim and Kay Bishop
Greg and Birgit Bubner                     Harold and Rosemary Bulman
Michael Delzoppo                               Ralph Edwards
Glen and Alison Farley                      Wayne and Anna Fleming
Aldo Gianchino                                   Brett and Sky Hall
Jason and Janine King                      David Le Gassick
Rob and Diane Martella                   Allen Newsome
Paul Quigley                                        Kim and Janine Radenic
Rob Redwood                                      Alan Saxon
Tim Sells and Michelle                      Mark and Janet Waghorn
Ross and Wife Williams

BUMPERS BY THE BAY RUN – SEPTEMBER 23RD CLUB RUN – WILLIAMSTOWN

 

The day started for Kay and I with a good 45 minutes run from Croydon North to Williamstown, a cloudy day but fine.We arrived to be directed into the undercover display area where we found many other club members and set up our chairs and table for the day ahead.

 

Then it was time to have a good look at all of the cars on display. There was a great range of many different makes,models and ages, Holdens/Fords/Valiants etc,with many local people and visitors also attending throughout the day. Plenty of food and coffee on sale along with stalls selling all kinds of auto signage and novelty “man cave” items.

 

The location of this site gives a great view of the city across the water,raffle tickets were purchased with all proceeds for the day going towards fund raising for the fight against Prostate Cancer.

 

As usual we had quite a bit of interest in the Earlie’s, Pete Charman’s car had quite a few people interested in it’s “Originality. I even had one older guy ask if he could poke his head inside my car to have a smell as he liked the odour of old cars? I guess it takes all types!!.

 

Big Trev gave me a hand with the car voting slips hand out and retrieval until he had a call from home saying that the gas hot water unit had failed, He had to head of early to fix it before he went to work later in the evening,I hope he was successful.

 

Later in the day around 2pm they had the raffle draw and car voting awards presentations.The car awards were for the looks and personal appeal of the vehicle’s as seen by the Judges. One of our members Neville Mawer won both a raffle prize and a car award for his car and trailer, Well done Neville.

 

So ended our second club run for the month, With 16 members and 11 earlie’s attending a very pleasant and enjoyable day.

 

On behalf of the EMHC I would like to thank the FX FJ club Melbourne Chapter for organising this terrific day for such a good cause,

 

Well Done.

 

Stay Happy and Safe.

 

Jim and Kay.

 

Those with an Early                                                          Without an Early

Gary and Lesley Beardsley                                                Kim and Janine Radenic

Jim and Kay Bishop

Peter Charman

Trevor Dempsey

Ray and Dianne Eaton

Ray Edsall

Rod and Sharon Grummitt

Russell King

Brenton Schier

Scott Woodbridge

Neville Mawer

VIETNAM VETERANS MUSEUM – SEPT 16TH CLUB RUN PHILLIP ISLAND

                                        

The day started with sunshine at Croydon North when Kay and I left for the run to Phillip Island, after that the weather varied from sun to rain on the 90 minute drive.

 

There was a small group that left from the clubrooms at 9am with more meeting at the BP Lang Lang at 9-30 am. Unfortunately Jeff White did not get a lot further as one of his rear axels decided to remove itself from the car,with others stopping to assist including Rod and Sharon/Peter and Cynthia/Pete Corrigan and others it was obviously a tow truck job. Pete Corrigan stayed with Jeff for a while why he waited for the tow truck.The others started to continue on except for Peter Charman he had turned off his 6 volt early while it was hot and it would not start,luckily Cynthia was with him and she came to the rescue pushing the early while Pete got it started,well done Cynthia!!.

 

Well after all of these events we all made it to the Museum, Ray and Di Eaton met us there as they were staying at their holiday house around the corner, our lunch host Aldo also arrived and we settled down to a lovely morning tea of huge scones with lashings of jam and cream along with coffee. We then went into the Museum for a guided tour, this place is a bit of an eye opener from the stories that are recorded to the immense collection of very large planes,Helicopters and Military Machinery including a Personal carrier and a Tank all under cover,well worth a second visit to take it all in. While we were inside the rain and hail changed to sunlight and stayed with us for the rest of the day.

 

After the Museum tour it was time to take a short 10 minute drive to Aldo’s house at Rhyll. Aldo had been working hard to set up his outdoor undercover area for lunch, BBQ’S running and a drum fire burning nice and hot, we set up one of our club gazabo’s that I had brought along for extra cover and we all settled in. Aldo had prepaired hand made burgers special garlic marinated steak,snags and chicken legs and wings,we started to cook and folks started to get drinks and with the combination of Aldo’s and Kay’s potato salads and green salad we all enjoyed a great lunch.

 

Aldo’s large block allowed all of us to park on site with room to spare next to his lovely old holiday house that he is renovating and expanding up to a second story to take advantage of the terrific water views he has. After lunch all of the guy’s did the usual inspection of the car’s, new member Harry Bulman had his new car there and it created lot’s of interest when he said he was having trouble with his bonnet catch and release fitting not working the way it should. Lots of attention and expert advice followed, Bruce Graham put up his hand to rectify the problem,after refitting the plate and adjusting the release cable the bonnet was closed and declared fixed only to have it pop open by itself straight away? a second attempt did fix it to the satisfaction of all present.

 

After a great day and the afternoon sun heating west we started to pack up and prepare for the drive home. Kay and I were among the last to leave and head off, just past the Lang Lang proving ground site we noticed 2 earlies stopped on the road side, it was Darryl Dunn and Bruce Graham they moved of to the service road outside a farm house and we followed to see what the problem was. Darrel’s car was steaming!!  The radiator was hidden by a cloud of steam, Bruce suspected that a lack of water was the problem and being our resident mechanic for the day after fixing Harry’s car his diagnosis was correct. After we cooled it down with some water Darryl managed to release the radiator cap,by this time we had an audience,the family from the farm had arrived with containers of water, Darryl started the car and water was added it soon became apparent that it was bone dry it settled down with lot’s of H2O.With that done we thanked the farm folk and headed of,some time later on Eastlink near Ringwood we passed Darryl and Jeanette going along at a good pace and gave them a toot and a wave as we passed.

 

So ended another great run. A special thank you to Aldo for his hospitality and organizing the Museum morning tea and tour.

 

Stay Happy and Safe.

 

Jim and Kay.

 

Those with an Early                                                          Without an Early

Harry and Rosemary Bulman                                          Jim and Kay Bishop

Peter and Cynthia Charman                                             Aldo Gianchino

Peter Corrigan                                                                     Rob Martella

Daryl and Jeanette Dunn                                                  Kim Radinic

Ray and Dianne Eaton

Bruce and Lillian Graham

Rod and Sharon Grummitt

Garry and Heather Hodge

Trevor and Sandra Read

Derk Tuik

Mark and Janet Waghorn

Jeff White