As you may remember, the Beach Picnic car run in 2010 din't go anywhere near the beach. The reason? It was cold and windy and threatening rain.
Instead we visited the Three Brother's Arms Ale House in Macclesfield where a virtual sand castle building display was provided by Robyn with the help of Julie. We discovered that if we did get to the beach they would have built a replica of the then recently devastated Haitian Royal Palace. After the memorable presentation we had our picnic back at the 'Chateau' in Glenunga.
Things went a lot better in 2011, although I do believe, Haiti is still in a sad and sorry state.
We gathered at Ruby's Cafe in Stirling then set forth in convoy. The Mini led the way while Alexander in his truck brought up the rear. About 10 other cars made up the space in between which sometimes stretched a little too far as evidenced by the convoy missing the turn to head towards Clarendon near the Blackwood Golf Course corner. The truck made good progress and after a few more regroupings of the cars and a rapid descent into Clarendon via Turner's Gully Road, we headed along Chapel Hill Road toward our first major stop - Seaview Winery. There we sampled the wines and enjoyed a break and the sunshine and took time to admire the car's new to the group - Mark and Don's MGB GT, Garth's (?) Porsche 911 and Wayne and Chris' days's old Porsche Cayenne (diesel - It only does 230 km/h as opposed to its petrol sibling which can go a further 20kp/h faster!).
The convoy then headed toward the beach and its final destination - Maslins. We parked in the north end car park at the bathing costume mandatory end. However disaster had struck the truck and it had failed to start back at Seaview. Rod went to the rescue, the truck duly started and after a scenic tour of that bit of the Fleurieu they joined us at the beach.
The main activity of the day then began - the sand castle building competition. It was obvious many had carefully pre-planned their structures and had brought along digging implements and accessories to place on their finished structures. Kay and Sal built an NGK spark plug castle to add "a car component" to the proceedings, and while holding a glass of crisp and fruity white told us that we were a car club not a food and wine club! Robyn and Julie had gone to great lengths in preparing their sand castle - a scale replica of the Sydney Opera House. Using her laptop Robyn used visuals of the building to ensure the building was correctly captured from each angle. Brenton and Clinton took a minimalist approach to the competition and re-created the "mostly underground" Coober Pedy. It came complete with and underground garage. Brenton and Jason created a castle with added bling and Rod and Alexander created the largest of the castles also along traditional lines. As there were five prizes on offer each group received a prize for their ingenuity and industriousness.
We then all reverted to being a food and wine club and enjoyed the tipples and morsels we had brought along.
Picnic enjoyed people drifted away to head back to town and suburban domestic bliss.
Photos from the day. Taken by Harvey and David. Photos can be enlarged - just click on them.
Not content with re-creating a Beijing Olympics inspired sand castle, Alexander decides to dig to China.
Robyn snaps the sunset.
Rod and Alexander's castle at sunset.
Beaurepaire inspects Alexander's workmansip.
Diggers digging.
Beaurepaire inspecting again.
Brenton and Jason's construction.
Proud castle builders.
Silhouettes.
Beach action.
Lucinda Hillman-Minx.
Big men, little dogs. White dog, Gusoline, Black dog Zachillac.
Big men, little toys. Is that a dinky watering can?
