A Grand Day Out

[ncarring]

Well what a cracking day that was! 200+ miles of Welsh roads and scenery, some absolute corkers amongst them. My personal favourite was the second stage including the section up through the military firing range, culminating in a friendly meet at the top with the group of Harley riders, while my rather blue discs cooled down a little

Many many thanks to those who put in time to organise what was a great event (and it's not finished yet, but I had to leave a day early), especially Colin, Jon and Ian. Can't wait for the next one.

Pics tomorrow - shattered right now.

[Alex]

i feel the same as you nick the organisers did themselves proud it was amazing i never realised you could make the fabia fly!

thanks to everyone for looking after me

i think it is time i look into chipping exhausts suspension and brakes the bug has bitten!!!

ps my navigator says sorry to rob for getting us lost oh and he wants to buy a furbie.

thanks again to everyone:)

[Dr Zoidberg]

Yep , absolutely superb day.

I got there nice and early with plenty of time to spare before the main goup arrived at the start so Jon and I headed off to McD's for some much needed food. When we got back the rest had arrived and I was presented with a very professional looking route plan (thanks Colin).

The first stage to the little chef was a nice chance to get the cars warmed up and for people to find out which of the other drivers was going to travel at a speed to their liking ranging from very brisk to OHMYGODITHINKWEAREGOINGTODIE.

The second stage had some of the best roads with the route across the firing range being a highlight for all concerned.

Lovely sweeping twisty bits where you could bury the throttle (and have fun seeing if a TDi will keep up with a VRS) and a spectacular view over the valley where we stopped to talk to the Harley owners (pics to follow)

After the valley stop there were some of the most spectacular roads along a cliff side next to a big lake that you can imagine , most of which were refreshingly clear of traffic. It was a wonderful site to see a line of 10 Octy's all going flat out although the two women out walking along the road didn't seem to think so. Most of the cars we caught up with pulled over and let us through which was nice , just in time for quite a bouncy bit of road with a lot of sharp twists and turns.

As we drove through this bit I remember saying to my self that you shouldn't be able to have this much fun in a diesel!

Having avoided the suicidal sheep we then got caught up in a big queue of traffic and somehow managed to acquire a white octavia taxi in the middle of our group. To be fair to him though he did get a move on and at one point I thought he was going to pull over and join us for lunch.

The roads in the afternoon were almost as nice but were somewhat spoiled by the rain and the fog which put in an appearance to make sure we knew we were in wales and by the time we reached the pub at the end I was absolutely shattered.

Thanks to everyone who came along for making it a superb day , and especially Colin , Jon and anyone else involved for organising it.

How you have as good a time today and I'll see you at the next big meet.

[DaveU]

Gutted I couldn't make it :( car is still on a ramp somewhere waiting for new brakes...

Hopefully there will be another opportunity for those who missed it due to mechanical problems or work/SWMBO commitments.

Glad you guys enjoyed it. How many cars went in total then?

[rich1068]

And who'll be first to post piccies? Lets have some with the drivers on, I've never made it to a meet and it would be great to put usernames to faces.

[Dr Zoidberg]

Lets see if this worked.

Will post more later

[TaviaRS]

Needs a wash

[Dr Zoidberg]

The first stop Pt1

[Dr Zoidberg]

and Pt 2

[Dr Zoidberg]

Originally posted by TaviaRS in this post

Needs a wash

It does indeed , although I'm sure I can find a pic of yours looking dirtier

[TaviaRS]

Not exactly hard though is it

[Dr Zoidberg]

Oh , and this one deserves a mention too.

[TaviaRS]

almost as classy as Qs with wash me written on it

[FabiaTDi]

Absolutely fantastic time!

Thanks to Colin and all who helped organise the event.

Great to meet everyone - now i can put faces to names on briskoda.

I was knackered by the end and feel i could sleep for about a week.

Had an absolute riot of a time trying to keep up with Jon TaviaRs leading the little fabias - Jason i think you'll agree!. The roads round Elan were so much fun and had the tyres squealing in protest.

I've never pushed my car that hard before and i was surprised just how well it coped. We didnt even seem to slow down that much in the wet either!

Still have the rorty sound of Jons exhaust popping away in my head - loads of fun.

Thanks all again & lets organise another one.

(btw have poo PC at the moment thats really slow so i wont be posting much til the other gets fixed!)

:drive1:

[panrix2002]

Just a quickie - still knackered and I've been to work today :(

1. Marvellous roads - can you make some of them twisty next time Colin to give yourself a chance - NOT!!!

2. Nice bunch of people - good to meet the new ones, nice to see the old ones

3. Goddam rain bu66ered things up a little - or should that be made it more interesting!?!?!?!

I made pretty good time coming home in the awful rain that lasted about 199 of the 200 miles home and just about managed a sarnie before trotting off to my PC for "five" minutes at 11pm. Next thing I know, it's 5am and I'm still in front of the PC :eek:

In closing, thanks to the organisers, you know who you are and I look forward to the next time - Donnington isn't it Jon????

Cheers all, Mark

[Neo_VR]

Yeah... twaz a goodun.. thanks to everyone who organised it and were there.

(basically everything i said in the other thread in the general section)

[ncarring]

Some pics now up here. Never as many or as good as you'd like them to be, but driving takes priority over photography :p. Once again - thanks for a fantastic day.

[ColinD]

Thanks to Jon, for initial "southern" route, we scouted it a few times (Jon and I) and we felt it should provide a good day out. Seems to have done the trick

Glad you were all discovering your cars and inspired by Wales, I hope you can all find the time to visit, even digest the route notes post event to find out about what that lake was

Hotel turned out to be okay, last pub, erm sorry, was led to belive it was a bit bigger than that.

Sad to see you all go on SAturday night, but commitments and I guess Mark, work are a fact of this day and age. The beer in the hotel was really cold and not very tasty atall --NOT

Twisty, hehe okay, maybe you can not use 5th on them straights to give me a chance to eat my apple

More later, oh and a great day at Oulton for those who could make it, if not were on the telly next week.

To those who could not make it, I'm sure another day for a repeat of the tour will be along soon

Thanks again to all who turned up, thanks to all who could not (only just coped ) but serisously I know a few of you were gutted at not been able to make it, timing is everything...thanks again to Jon and Jason for route planning and leading on the day, aswell as Nick and John for taking groups and all of you again for making the in some cases very long journey...

Was a really good weekend.

[fab16v]

Good pics there Nick. Gutted I couldn't make it. Would have loved to add another popping exhaust note! :p Couldn't warrant putting that mileage on the car though when the part ex value has been agreed! :(

Next time I shall be there in the hopefully Jabba'd Furby vRS!

[ncarring]

Today's outing can be seen here (no koda content ) - hence why I had to leave last night.

[fab16v]

2 car meets in 2 days. Busy weekend for you then mate! Some more good pics there. Looks like a good museum trip.

[MonkeyHanger]

Just been fed & watered after a very enjoyable blast back "oop north" (BMW's ? )

Now to the real business...

Many Many thanks to Colin & Co for arranging a truly enjoyable weekend.

I'm sure Mark (Panrix) will confirm that things got off to a fairly poor start on friday, with our journey south taking place in monsoon conditions & traffic not usually seen this side of New Delhi...

But saturday & sunday more than made up for it.

A superb 200 mile drive through some stunning welsh countryside (those sheep & 2 women walkers must have wondered what the hell was going on ) and then a great day on sunday at Oulton Park for the BTCC Championship decider.

I've got loads of pics, and will be posting as soon as i get them Uploaded and/ or developed.

Nice to see a few familiar faces, and a good few more new ones

Still smiling here

[mellowyellow]

Great weekend ! , although I had to miss the finale at Oulton Park . Firstly a huge thank you to our "leader" Colin for all the time and effort that goes into organising events such as these . Thanks also to everyone who lead groups , especially "the jabba'd granny" , cheers Nick , hope we didn't hold Q up too much .

Well Colin said he had chosen some of the best roads in Wales , and he wasn't wrong , a bit of everything .

For me these "get togethers" are as much about the social side as the driving bit .............as I like a pint or two and I wasn't disappointed - although the "youngsters" did go to bed a bit early on Saturday night !

Thanks to everyone for a great weekend . see you all at the next one .

[jawsnpaws]

Again thanks to all those who spent time organising this national event - I could only manage Oulton Park , and so I missed the best bit by all accounts ....although the motor racing was very enjoyable , I have to admit , and it was good to meet all those who were there .... a must for next year .

Being new to racing why is it that the yellow cars were always towards the back of pack ?!!

[MonkeyHanger]

Can't access my webspace right now (grrrrrrr @ Ntl) so here's a few selected pics...