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The most important hot rodding event in my diary is the Pre
49 weekend. Dave and I are regulars at most NSRA events but the joy of driving
our Model A Phaeton around beautiful countryside to interesting destinations,
spending time with a bunch of friendly
Hot Rodders, enjoying the comfort of a nice hotel ticks all the boxes and it
has become a must do event for us. We even left our son Paul to his own devices
at Santa Pod Raceway when we would normally be crewing for him rather than miss
this event!
For the third year running it was organised by Bob and April
Sheppard and once again it was a fantastic weekend. This time we found
ourselves just north of the M25 at Theobolds Estate, just outside Cheshunt. The
beautiful hotel building and grounds provided the perfect back drop for the 31 weekend
registered cars plus a few daily attendees to assemble each morning for the
cruise.
Everyone arrived at their leisure on Friday. Our rooms were
allocated together surrounding a courtyard and had the weather been a little
warmer this would have been perfect for everyone to get together for pre-prandial
drinks each day. However it didn’t take anyone long to find the bar instead and
so the weekend began the same way it finished - mostly with beer and wine. (And
not a plastic glass in sight!)
We awoke to sunshine on Saturday and set off on our first
cruise, a 30 mile trip through Hertfordshire and Essex countryside to the (not
so) Secret Nuclear Bunker in Kelvedon, an enormous three storey building buried
in a farmer’s field. This was a
fascinating and thought provoking place. After a couple of hours we moved on to
Lee Valley White Water Centre where the London Olympics canoeing was held in
2012. This is now a busy sports centre and has a huge terrace café where most
of us bought drinks to warm ourselves up after surviving the downpour of rain
and hail on route. I take my hat off to Valerie and Barry Tickle for braving
the deluge in their Model T Nickelodean! The evening gathering in the Barn for
a carvery was followed by a “Ladies” race night. Our horses were definitely
nobbled as our table didn’t win a single race, earning us the moniker “Losers”
for the weekend. Thank you to everyone that contributed to our losers’ prize - an
NSRA goodie bag containing an empty Malibu bottle, a dirty napkin, empty ice
cream pots….. Never mind, the running order sheets made good paper planes. The
evening was topped off with entertainment from the incredible DJ Harley (aka
Mick Harle).
Sunday morning and the sunshine gods blessed us for our next
cruise along the M25 to the RAF Museum in Hendon. Confronted by Justin Woolmer’s
Rat Rod roaring past him, the Mazda MX5 driver decided to stop showing off to
the rest of us! Incredibly we managed to stay together and arrived in convoy,
to the delight of other museum visitors. A Pre 49 day was held here in 2009.
Since then there has been a major development of the museum and is even better
than before. Mick and Paula Harle organised both cruises and used their local knowledge
to keep us off the M25 on a busy Sunday afternoon for the return journey,
taking us on country roads and showing us some of the lovely places the area
has to offer. Our final evening was in the splendid Lambton Suite. For some
reason the alcohol consumption was more muted than for Saturday. Our meal was
followed by the now traditional quiz and I feel I must mention that “The
Losers” won.
Monday and it was time to say goodbye. While long distance
award winner Brian Daly started the long journey home to Scotland, some of us
topped off the weekend by cruising to the A602’s Wheels on Woolmer Green show before
heading home for some much needed lounging on the settee.
I’d like to extend a big thank you to Bob, April, Mick and
Paula for organising this weekend. I know this was a difficult event for them
this year. They faced numerous problems with the hotel staff leading up to the
event but from a participants point of view we had a blast!
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