Freedom for NSW! (For those reading in WA, SA and other unaffected states, I know this won’t mean much to you.)

And what are we doing with it?

Well, we’ve had our first very well attended post-lockdown Tyre Kick, relocated from Kokoda Cafe to the Carss Park location. Thank you to everyone who turned up at relatively short notice! Apart from far too many Chelsea Tractors (including one very careless one), it was a lovely morning full of joyful conversation following our start to return-to-normal.

For November we will return to the regular Tyre Kick cadence, and the calendar is now fully updated, so I look forward to seeing you out and about, particularly as the weather is definitely trending (albeit in a slightly up and down sort of way) in the right direction.

Speaking of calendars, ours is looking great, now including all the activities for WA, ACT and Tas. If anyone is feeling left out, please drop a line to Tom and Seth and it will be updated.

Our 2018 Christmas lunch at Tunks Hill

Looking slightly further ahead, December 12th will see us gather for our AGM and a DIY picnic at Tunks Hill in the Lane Cove National Park. The DIY nature is necessitated by our inability to get a caterer to react in time, given the uncertainty still surrounding publicly held events, so we ask that you all bring your own, and include chairs in case you want to be out on the grass. The AGM will be held from 11am to 12pm ahead of the picnic, so if you can, we would love that you attend to help both review the year that has been, but more importantly be involved in the year that is to come.

Importantly we will have the usual round of election of your committee, so if you would like to be involved, please let me (or any of the committee) know, or contact Elliott for the election paperwork. We will be asking the assembled membership to vote on our revised constitution, so please could you come prepared with that in mind too.

Then the long and well-earned Christmas break will be upon us, ahead of what we are all hoping will be a somewhat less disrupted summer and new year. For those heading overseas for the break, I hope you have a safe and wonderful time with friends and family you have not seen perhaps in several years, and for those staying in Australia, I hope you have plans to have a thoroughly restful and enjoyable break – I know we have!!

On which subject, the return of cars to roadworthyness is looking slightly more hopeful for the Roskill garage – the Elite, which was badly damaged when I was barged off the track at Eastern Creek in June, is nearly finished and ready for paint. The Eleven is due to go back together over the next month, and I am quietly hoping to be able to get up to Queensland to pick it up over the Christmas break.

Gidget will then need some focus to prepare her for the fun of several rally opportunities over the next year, including COTT in April, and the Perth to Sydney Marathon, which was delayed from this year (we should have been on the road/track as I write this) to the same time next year.

The Elan continues to delight, although I do need to replace the rear discs as one is slightly warped and gives that annoying sense of pulsation when braking, and the Elise finally has a battery that works, so can be rolled off the ramps and swapped for the Elan!

And of course the trusty Land Rover continues to do what it does best – leak oil and break down. Most recently the clutch appeared to give up, but it turned out to be a dodgy piece of engineering of the linkages (not by the original designers I hasten to add). So that’s now fixed.

On that happy note, I will wish you all what I hope is an increasingly warm and summery November, and I look forward to seeing many of you either at Tyre Kicks over the course of November, or at our Christmas Party and AGM on 12th December.

Meanwhile, take care of yourselves and your loved ones, and stay safe, upright and mainly on the blackstuff,

Pip pip,
Ashton