Social Evening – 18th June
Blog by Philip Wadlow
We decided to try something a bit different and arranged a navigational ride for tonight’s social.
Each Rider/Team had 11 points given to them with a What3words (W3W) and Ordinance Survey grid references, the idea was for each rider to organise their own route to visit each point, where they answered questions about the location.
Ten bikes, including 3 pillions took part in the navigational ride, it was interesting to see the different ways that each rider prepared from totally using the W3W app on their phone, to riders that had per-programmed a route on GPS, to the old fashioned map on the tank highlighted route!
After picking up the questions at Haddon Services, and following a short brief, everybody set off at differing times.
Although most routes were 35-40 miles, it took around 2 hours (or more) to complete.
Myself and Bob Armstrong met Pete Williams at Etton/Marholm level crossing, this is a manual crossing, where the Railwayman opens the gates himself.
When we arrived Pete had already been waiting 20minutes, and it was a further 10minutes before the gates were finally opened! Very unlucky timing!
Myself and Bob A, arrived at The Golden Pheasant, Etton around 8pm to wait for the finishers to arrive.
I must say, although we didn’t eat, the food looked and smelt delicious, the pub does, indeed have a good and popular reputation.
Eventually, everyone returned, some decided to cut short the route to get to the pub for a well earned drink, with motorcycle gear on in this hot weather, who could blame them!
As a bonus, everyone picked up a raffle ticket en route and Bob Armstrong conducted the draw and distributed Easter Eggs to the lucky winners.
We went through the locations and the answers to the questions, some requiring a bit of googling on phones at the pub, and looking on an OS map, yes I am rewarding those that still know how to use them!
Out of the teams/riders taking part, the winners of the navigational challenge were Kevin Hudson and Denise Hyland, who won the inaugural commemorative tankard for this event.
A special mention to Mike Arkley and his Wife, who came a very close second, needing to brush up on his pop trivia!
The evening was pleasant, sitting outside on a lovely warm evening, rounded off by a standing, clapping ovation as Bob A left, riding off on his brand new BMW GSA (did he mention that to anybody??)
Hopefully, everybody enjoyed the taking part and this may become a staple future event.
Next Month’s Social, will be an organised rideout with a destination of a pub venue and a general knowledge quiz, Members can take part in the rideout, or just attend and impressing us with their general knowledge, keep an eye on Slack Social Channel nearer the time for full details.
Blog by Philip Wadlow.