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9 jun 1999
The Townsville rally was great. We do not
go to rallies for the entertainment, the politics or the excursions,
we go to meet old friends and make new ones and we did that in abundance
at Townsville.
We flew up because it was just too damn far to
drive and I am supposed to be spending all my time building our
motor home. Still I figured I had one last chance to get some new
ideas.
I met fellow chat club members Val and Dennis,
some off-road MH owners including Don who owns a 4x4 Isuzu and friends
Adrian and Carrol Capel, and some people that I just happened to
bump into like Shane and Melissa, a young couple full-timing who
are planning to build an ACCO (Shane sells digital speedos/trip
odos and can fix your electronics problems as well as flip the image
on your reversing CCTV, if your interested in any of this I can
put you in touch).
Here are some photos I took at the rally. Here
we see the main hall (top right) used for the entertainment etc.
Many of the motor homes were packed very
tight. We saw several whose awnings were touching their neighbours.
Yet others had plenty of room...
Motor homer's get around a lot, that's
the whole idea really
CMCA rallies are often situated in showgrounds
or race tracks. Townsville was no different in this regard. After all,
where else can you park 700 odd motor homes.
Mt Stuart in the background.
If you're from around Sydney you may recognise Adrian & Carrol Capel's
somewhat unusual 6x6 Thornycroft (with the pop top on the right).
The temperature was very pleasant and the atmosphere
quite laid back. One evening I said to Chris that I should phone
home and check our answering machine. As I reached for the phone
we looked at each other and, in perfect unison said, "Nah,
who cares?"
All-in-all we thoroughly enjoyed the trip and
the rally.
On our way to the airport the taxi driver, on
learning where we had been, said "I'd love to just pick up
and travel 'round Australia, it's something I've always wanted to
do". So why don't you I asked. "Well I'm on my own"
she said. I told her of the solos network. "But then I might
break down", I told her of the insurance policy and the fact
that there is nearly always a member living nearby who will help.
"But then there's the family...", at this point I gave
up.
As it happens there was a fault in the aeroplane
we were due to leave on and the flight was cancelled. We stayed
an extra night which gave us a chance to show our photos of the
ACCO to Shane and Melissa, they plan to build an ACCO based motor
home as well. Maybe we can get enough off-road motor homers for
a new chapter.
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