I must apologise for missing the last lunch meet,and the club night, but I was enjoying a trip down to Spain. I found diesel at 89.9 cents a litre, definitly worth going for. Just to clear up any misunderstanding about our visit to the Railway photo shoot. We went along to support one of the trustees of the railway, who is also a trustee of the North Norfolk Railway, and a friend of Julian. A couple of years ago, Julian arranged a trip there, and we all had a lovely day there including a workshop visit, Tours of locomotives,trips on the train and footplate rides.Because not everyone managed to get a footplate ride, we had a second invitation so everyone had a go. That goes down as one of the ultimate audio visual experiances ever for me.
Now,in my opinion, not only were they among the best trips we have ever had, it was a very generous thing to do. If we had paid for the experience it would have been costly to say the least. So when Julian asked if we could provide some fifties bikes for the day, at the Mid Suffolk Railway, we felt it was a way of saying thank you,even if it was a bit belated. And of course another trip to the North Norfolk Railway was always a possibility. I spoke to Mr Durrant , the trustee, on the day, and asked if this was a profit making exercise for them and he replied,"not this time" It was a toe in the water exercise for them for the future. The fact that the photo shoot itself was a money making exercise was really none of our business. And you have to say that if John Surtees was asked to bring his MV four, or Sammy Miller his AJS Porcupine, they might expect some payment. But its unlikely that we would be paid for bringing some old bikes that people rode to work on in the fifties,and in my opinion not expected.
And we always said we would be leaving after lunch.I know we have been invited again, and my feeling is that if you want to go along, do so, and if you are not happy about it, stay at home. I did think the workmans trolley with its V twin JAP was the star of the day, and it sounded a treat. We have been trying to maintain the momentum of riding the bikes every month, and we had an excellent run into the depths of Essex in April, thanks to John Walsh. Its not a part of the world I know very well and we dont get that way much so thanks again to John for a good ride and lunchtime venue. Yesterday we had another good ride, this time into the depths of Suffolk, thanks to John Swan. Considering three or four of our regulars are attending the International Jampot rally, we still had four bikes out. We were also treated to a tour of an amazing scrapyard in Diss, where one of our members got excited over some flue pipe! We enjoyed ourselves so much we had to take the direct route home! I hope to see some of you at the next lunch meet and all of you at the next club night. We might even get a short run in before hand. Dont forget to support Dereck at the Alma as he has his bank holiday Classic car and bike event.
Gordon