Race the Rain Mini-Run

05 December 2013 / Phil Mayo

The November run for the Hunter Chapter was planned to drive past five National Parks and several State Forests, which should have meant lots of corners with the tops down, taking in the bird calls and bush smells as well as exhaust notes, to finish at Wisemans Ferry.

However the weather forecast, as the working week drew to a close, was not good – Sunday – "heavy coastal showers with thunder storms in the afternoon."

Saturday rainy weather brought out lots of emails and Facebook posts on Sunday morning early "is it on?" An early look at the weather radar showed it was coastal and we could do the first 120kms of the planned run relatively dry so it was decided to give it a try.

Five cars turned up at the usual Beresfield start venue, so after a coffee and another check of the radar, we started on a back road path through Mulbring, Quorrobolong, Millfield to Wollombi about 120km.

At Wollombi Park we were able to all fit under a shelter shed to share our morning tea delicacies with the rain starting to sprinkle. Down towards the south, where we were supposed to go looked very dark and stormy so it was decided to head north away from the weather.

One thing rain does – it keeps the motor bikes at home, so we had a relatively clear run to Broke and then into the vineyards having the road to ourselves. Just short of Pokolbin we turned north again to arrive at Greta and it was decided to have lunch at the Greta Workers Club.

Having a small group (8 people) allowed us to all fit around the one large table and hear the discussion. The comment was made "it reminded us of when the chapter first started with only a few cars." Shortly after we left the club we drove into torrential rain on our separate ways home.

The full run is planned for September 2014, hopefully the weather will be more suitable for MX-5s.