I've sent this into LRO today, lets see if they publish any of it - Thanks Wany Mifes for the content.
Mud Club Halloween Bash 21st-23rd October 2005
Stonehenge, 60 mad people, dressed as witches, ghouls & ghosts, not unusual you might think, However this was to be a weekend with a difference!
We met at Stonehenge touring & caravan park, a nice friendly, and family run Caravan Park. Most of us arrived late afternoon / early evening to set up camp, have a couple of beers and get to know each other. One member, who shall remain nameless, decided that they’d try to get a quick bit of off roading in, in the pitch black, on a live firing range, towing a caravan, apparently the gps went a bit wrong and they arrived at 1am to a bit of good natured banter and a much needed coffee.
Still the mud club had arrived, a motley crew driving land rovers, range rovers & discos met early the following morning. After being joined by more of the local mud clubbers we had a quick briefing. We were given our prize donors LRO & Specialist Leisure stickers, 18 grid references of which we needed to answers questions on 12 and be back before 5 pm so as not to incur penalty points. We were also told about the army exercise running across the plain and advised to avoid the danger area,
We then split up, some choosing to just go for it & heading for a grid reference, others choosing to go back & carefully plot all the grid references before choosing where they wanted to go. It was a very well thought out day, with clues for the adults & children as well as things to collect along the way, for example a thistle, a star or planet and a hole!!! . This helped to keeps the kids amused and interested in what was going on .We chose to plot our route, trying to avoid tanks and the live firing, some clues seemed to go remarkably close to the danger line & we ran into a few army vehicle (not literally)
The lanes were perfect, because we could all pick our own routes, we had no congestion on the lanes & everyone we met had a smile on their face. Everyone helped each other out, whether by helping with the grid reference points (008xxx is about 10 miles different to 088xxx or helping when someone forgets to check their vehicle correctly (Thanks Chris, for not laughing when our wheel fell off) He just helped to put it back on again, meaning both cars were late back & we incurred 5 penalty point each. but at least we had fun. Some of the question were baffling & you had to really look at the environment around you, we spent at least 10 minutes looking for how many bolts holding a shovel up, you’d look for a shovel, but no it was a picture of a shovel bolted to a post, or what colour is the tank & how many courses? Being near to army bases you’d think tank course, but no the bright spark that thought up this clue was talking about a water tank & the course of bricks holding it up. The scoring didn’t really come into it, it was just great to get on some lanes with a mixture of surfaces & get muddy.
The early evening saw the children all change into fancy dress for a quick game of trick or treat around the tents and caravans, led by the grim reaper. This gave our judges the chance to do the marking & the adults chance to get into fancy dress for the evening in the local pub.
When we arrived the place was packed, the food was gorgeous & we were made very welcome. After eating, prizes were given for the best fancy dress, boys, girls & adults. And also the main sponsors prizes, a year subscription to LRO & a special edition hi lift jack from Specialist leisure these were won by Steve Gadd and Chris Ward for the most points obtained during the day’s treasure hunt. The evening rolled on with a pub quiz & a photo quiz, have you tried to identify parts on an out of focus picture, only showing part of the object, quiz master you need to get out more, By the way what vehicle was it??? Gradually as the night wore on we all drifted away, it had been a long day.
The following day, after a chat, coffee & a promise to meet up again, we all went our separate ways, tired, but happy.
Me I learnt that you never forget how to read a map & all those years in the scout & guides weren’t wasted I could still read a map & be as accurate as my mates GPS.
Thanks to those who arranged it & also to our prize donors for the weekend it was great & just how off roading needs to be shown to those who don’t understand us, Obeying Glass rules, but having fun and showing the next generation how to do it without wrecking our environment.
