As is my want, I headed out of town a day or so early and lingered in Toowoomba to catch up with a friend or two. Then on to Stanthorpe to catch a couple more (just as well that I did this call in, as my Stanthorpe friends were all packed up and moving out of their house over Easter!) I snuck up on a cousin in Tamworth who recognised the nose but couldn't recall me without long hair, beard and moustache!
Good Friday morning in Tamworth and Michele SMS'd me as she left Armidale, she having driven down from Brisbane in one long move. Just the forces of darkness at play here. Having done a brisk trip along there the evening before, I allowed an appropriate time interval to pass before turning on the kettle. Ten minutes later I repeated the exercise. Just to be sure, I did it again a couple more times. When Michele did finally arrived she had some story about flashing lights and men in blue. Obviously too much with the forces of darkness going on there. I've heard stories of women finding men in uniform attractive, but it really is all about how you attract their attention that sets the mood for what follows. $115 and you don't even get to check out the policemans' ball!?
Using a pair of Uniden handheld CBs we played chasey down to Scone, where we rested in the airport lounge. By now Michele had been on the road for well over eight hours so she had trouble getting motivated to get up off the floor and on to Singleton. Heading down the Putty Road it was a bit of a contrast in police presence. Prior to here we would've seen a Police car, or bike, of some kind at least every five to ten kilometres. No more were seen until well onto the Northern Road down from Richmond. The traffic density on the Putty Road was good and we were able to drive with just the right balance of fun, speed and caution. And the "Halfway Road Stop" isn't. It's over 40 kilometres closer to Singleton than Windsor! Coming into Windsor I got confused by the road signs and we had a brief tour through a street market, before driving past the motorkhana ground, around Richmond Airforce base and again with a little zen navigation headed on to Camden. Somewhere in here I was spotted by crow eating spies!
I never saw their "obvious at half a kilometre" mobile homes! My little "pocket rocket" is easier to spot than a Ford campervan!? Just as we came up to the old spectator entrance to Oran Park my mobile rang! It was Kerril checking up on the progress so far. She was hoping that I would've infiltrated the lair of the NSW organising committee and would have some fresh gossip and tit bits to report. (And still no-one is talking about the tit bits.) (It's believed that they may have been seen at Oran Park.) The entrance to the Camden Valley Golf Resort is badly placed on a semi-blind crest and, especially when not marked with a "Welcome Honda Members" sign - quite easy to miss. The understatement continued with both the room check-in and finding the operational headquarters for the weekendÆs action. But there were some signs of familiar vehicles and people. (Even if one of our contingent, (Ed. Who'd been on the road for 16 hours with no sleep!) did start chatting with a poor innocent golfing couple, under the mistaken belief that they were familiar faces, that had been seen at Hoppers Crossing the year before! Then again, not everyone went wandering around that carpark near midnight with a lost expression on their face and a glass of whiskey in one hand!) I'm not sure if this was a contributing factor but the door to that couples room seemed to have a "Do Not Disturb" sign hanging on it for much of the rest of Easter! The other member of our contingent was later approached by one half of that couple just to check exactly what we were up to! I cannot say what story was given, or believed.
The Jude 'Lude was brought into the car park on a trailer, it having developed a rather undesirable top end knocking. Engine still ran well, but that didn't sound at all well. Friday night was a fairly reserved occurrence around the barbeque (see January edition of the NSWHCC newsletter for more information on their secret mens rituals.) Eventually it did bring together most of the Victorian delegation and a few of the traditional NSW campaigners. Michele slept through this, so I have to keep my story straight to protect the innocent. (And so had they. Thanks.)
Breakfasts were listed as being in the "clubrooms"!? After some head scratching, it was realised that this meant the Golf Club clubrooms. My initial attempts to get everyone to drive over went unheeded, so we had to walk the two hundred metres (hey, we're a car club, not a walking club.) The club caterers were caught unawares by our 7.00am breakfast and had to hurry up the hot water and cold milk. The breakfast area has superb views across to the west and southwest over Narellan and we were able to see the Global Ballooning and Balloon Aloft balloons drifting down in the distance. For the one hour drive from the motel to the Ansell Park motorkhana grounds, Michele and I didn't bother to use the CB radios for communication between us as we were now both in her Civic. The park was relatively easy to find, hidden behind a line of trees across a little creek. This brought us together with the South Australians in their numbers (shows how times have passed when a recent Junior Trophy winner is bringing along his girlfriend!) And a few more NSW competitors.
As the motorkhana was being run by the Lower Blue Mountains Christian Car Club, we had the drivers briefing which was followed by a prayer and the blessing of the stop watches. In this manner it means that all timing is actually done three ways via the Holy Trinity. However this still doesn't help your time penalties when you WD or hit flags. The four courses ( Oh, What a Feeling, Fleur-de-lis, M.G. and Honda H) were all set out on the field and the competitors divided into four groups and sent of to raise hell. Oops! This was a blessed event so it was only dust that they now raised. And some did. Though not as bad as at some other southern national meets, on a couple of occasions there was enough dust to hide a flag or two. There were a couple of persistent WDers, but the light spot, for many, was when a certain father-son combination managed to WD the Honda H, upon realisation of this, in the finish garage, some spirited blame attribution was witnessed. To cap it off though, the duo managed to lock the keys in their CRV, with the engine running, whilst doing their driver change over! Do you know that CRVs are very difficult to break into, their engines are difficult to stop and that they can run for hours like that! Eventually, through the use of a cross town relay of "pass the keys", a spare set was brought to the car and order (though not necssarily, harmony) was restored to the family.
After two runs at each test we came up to midday and time to head back to Narellan. Fortunately the Northern Road is a good connection and even with moderate Sydney holiday traffic it was a comfortable drive (easy for me to say as I was a passenger both up and down.) Sandwiches were enjoyed in convivial company beside that famous swimming pool as the Observation/Navigation Run question sheets furiously printed out up in room 19. Michele and I went off about last as we sorted out the page and question numbers. Before long we found ourselves in the midst of a walking club trying to answer some strange questions. After about a kilometre of walking, it turned back into a car club outing and we worked our way along. As we went we discovered that one question had been deleted and some others appeared to have multiple answers. In traditional National Meet style many finished after sunset. We were by no means last in. Whilst an adequate Navigation / Observation Run there were a number of deficiencies in our preferred National Meet standards. Even though we didn't place very well. Michele and I continued to talk to each other for the rest of the National Meet. No real fights here.
Saturday night was dinner in the club rooms and a pretty good time was had by most, even though virtually everyone had returned to their hides by ten o'clock. There were stories of some long time National Meet participants doing karaoke until late, very late. But no swimming pool shenanigans this time, clothed or not. Sunday breakfast was accompanied by another beautiful morning and the Global Ballooning group came in for their champagne breakfast as we left to prepare to go trackside. The Global crew chief had trouble believing that a fellow balloonist could be there with a car club and not doing any ballooning, not even a tether in the car park!
Oran Park is a lovely
short drive from the resort and being located so close to Narellan, many
people were able to dash down the road to fuel up with their favourite
"go-juice" (I'm sure that if needed even Av-gas could've been sourced at
the nearby Camden Airport.) Upon arrival at the track we used the old sheds
to unload and prepare the cars ready for scrutineering. Once comfortable,
it was discovered that the new pits construction actually gave all the
cover and comfort needed. There were a couple of discrepancies in the scrutineering
but eventually everyone was cleared and a couple of parade laps done. Then
it was down to the work/fun bit. Three flying laps in groups of four. The
full track was used with a variety of cambers and curves. Opportunities
to fall off the track at many different places were found and exploited.
Tyre companies saw their sales brought closer as drivers explored favourable
lines through tricky corners. Some drivers went closer to their limits
than they intended, some found that their cars did unexpected things and
Mark Warner needed some tissues when he borrowed the Parsons Civic for
a couple of quick laps. We only had a couple of EB Civics this year. An
EB running a City Turbo II motor turned up to spectate as well as one with
a twin cam Civic motor swap! Adrian Frankel had the bad luck of his EB
expiring at the motorkhana when it was found that it had developed a combined
cooling and lubrication system. Adrian, you have to win sometime. But there
were enough Type R Integras to give them a class of their own.
Maybe next year we can see that with S2000s?
Back at the motel, it was shown that the promise of a free showing of the naked lumpy bits in the top of a Prelude motor would get as good a crowd of young (yep, we're all still young) men to gather as the naked lumpy bits of a ......... In spite of the diagnostic efforts of the best of our clubs, we were still unable to be sure as to what ailed the Jude 'Lude and it'd have to be trailed home. There was an amiable gathering for the presentation dinner and apart from some minor scuffles as club cliques sought to establish their places at the tables (there weren't actually enough places set!), especially after viewing copies of the results and comparing photo prints of some of the Nav Run answers, you turned around to find that the numbers at your table had changed! The wine flowed well, the helpings were plentiful (though some negotiating did have to be done as those with tricky dietary needs sought to find an acceptable compromise) and most were pretty mellow by presentation time. Just as a quick aside, just which state club president turned up in a car not at all related to a Honda? (Of course that well known English manufacturer may one day build a car as nice as a Honda. Once they stop bits falling off some of their engines used on big QANTAS thingies.)
There'd been a bit of a drama earlier on when it'd been discovered that no-one was absolutely sure about how the points were allocated for some of the major trophies. Not an answer that I was able to give whilst in the shower, nor without consultation with the originators of some of the awards. But eventually most of us had a moment of glory, either receiving a trophy, or thanking our hosts, and the serious business of the National Meets was pretty well over for another year.
Another glorious morning for breakfast on the golf course, packed up and the longest delegates meeting in a long time, before heading off again. There was a shed in down town Narellan once that had an amazing collection of aircraft, but Narellan has changed since I was last there and in a brief drive around I was unable to find it and we had to really start driving home. Somewhere near Windsor, Michele wanted to go back to the motorkhana ground and I lost her. So much so that she went out of CB range and it was Telstra that brought us back in touch. We caught up at the "Halfway Road Stop" and convoyed on to Tamworth. Light traffic densities through here and my cousin recognised me first go and let me in this time. For Michele it was "Fill 'er up,drain 'er out and chuck 'er out" and she was on her way back to Brisbane. Once more under the spell of the powers of darkness. One day she'll see just how they have improved the road north of Stanthorpe. I went on to Toowoomba for a couple of days, my mother having a bit of a get together for her birthday and wanted me to chauffeur her and a couple of her sisters around in her Accord.
It was a good way to spend Easter and on behalf of the members of the Honda Car Owners Association of Queensland, I'd like to thank the Honda Car Club of New South Wales for the 2001 National Meet. See you all in Queensland next Easter.
