Well here we are in November! Who would have thunk it – I’m not exactly sure where this year has gone, but it does seem to have flashed by a bit faster even than the last few.

I’ll blame Covid. And that’s the last mention, I promise.

This is late as I was away all weekend at the delayed HSRCA Spring Festival at Wakefield. What a great turnout of varied and unusual cars – I am constantly surprised that there are so many hidden gems, and better yet that they are brought out to play. I’ll try to scribble some notes elsewhere to go with Seth’s awesome photography.

A few weekends ago we wrapped up the CSCA series for the year at the Druitt circuit at SMSP. The event was organised by the Jag Club, the new scrutineering, sign on and briefing process was seamless and relatively simple, and certainly reduced the amount of stuffing around. It’s amazing how little bureaucracy you really need to get stuff done! Thank goodness for common sense over red tape. To be fair, the same can largely be said for the HSRCA meet last weekend, so I sincerely hope there is no inclination to go back to the bad old days.

This coming weekend we are going to try for the second running of the Southerners Tyre Kick at Carrs Park, and after last month’s amazing turnout, I am looking forward to seeing lots of you there. You even get a bit of exercise walking from the car park to the cafe and back. And for the uninitiated, you turn right uphill to an overflow car park as you are coming into the end of the park nearest the sea.

We had continued to hope that we might gather a few together for a Christmas Party, but the number of locations willing to accommodate a group of 30 or so is close to, if not actually, zero. So we’ll call that one unsuccessful, and instead I’m going to suggest that we make the Tyre Kick and Coffee before Christmas our quasi-Christmas Party (or parties – we could have two), and ask you all to bring the obligatory silly paper hats, party poppers etc to litter the area (no, please don’t). But please bring the other half if you can persuade them out of bed.

Just as a reminder, the Carrs Park event will be on Sunday 13th December from 8.30, and the Kokoda Cafe one will be on Sunday 20th December from 9.30. And you can’t use he excuse that you have a million competing parties to go to – that won’t wash.

Overseas for a moment, and I am pleased to report that, having prevaricated a bit, I have finally decided to sell the Porsche Boxster that I’ve had in the UK for nearly 7 years. In that time, it has served me and many others who have used it well, including multiple trips to Europe (which is what they do best, blasting down French A and B roads) but given the likelihood of using it again in the foreseeable future (no, I didn’t mention it, just alluded to it), I decided someone else can have fun with it. And I’ll ship Gidget over there next time I need a car on foreign shores. So if you didn’t borrow it, you’ve missed your chance.

Righto, better get this off to Tom, and start getting the planning underway for our trip around country NSW in April. I gather the VSCCA (Vintage Sports Car Club of Australia) has previously organised a run over the Blue Mountains and down to the Snowies, so I’m going to find out some more details on that route.

Meantime, please keep yourselves and your loved ones safe, and stay upright and mostly on the blackstuff,

Pip pip,
Ashton