Crich Show Report 2016 - Part 2, Saturday

22/5/2016

or "Carry on Crich 2016" or "Several fat blokes frolicking in a field"

by Mike Peake

Another picture shamelessly stolen from Paul Cheetham

Saturday morning, we all awoke bright and early and wondered just what was in that spring water we were drinking last night?

Gar had bought half a fatted pigs worth bacon so wakeup sandwiches were available to all on the lovely sunny morning (yes, SUNNY!), before setting off for the Museum.

Gar and I set up our HQ by the entrance and band stand with our boxes of cake at one end and admin paraphernalia taking up most of the 6ft table. Then, after a brief pause, all the lovely cars and people started arriving. Paul Cheetham was showing off his youthful vigour by running up and down the village to arrange all the cars perfectly and proving that he’s a jolly nice chap.

Gar and I used our experience and stood at the main gate and told people where to park, before directing them back to our cakey HQ where more and more cake was appearing.

The table arrangement had completely turned around now, with cake taking over and admin stuff squashed into a corner. Cake was coming in faster than people were eating it causing Gar to have a bit of a panic. He went running round the site waving his hands in the air and screaming “there’s too much cake!” like a little girl until the Brooks brothers held him down while I beat him with a daffodil and got him chanting “There can never be too much cake, there can never be too much cake”.

Mmmm Caaake...

The day continued bright and sunny and lots of cars, cake and even muggles were present. The venue was superb and provided a perfect backdrop for the cars as you can see from the many photos gracing our facebook page at the moment. All the Crich Tramway staff were friendly and helpful, making the day even more special.

There was such a range of cars at the show too. From the gleaming Apollo P5 Camper and Daimler 420 owned by Tosh and Gus Brooks to the wonderfully eccentric “Sheila’s Wheels”, a candy pink confection of madness that is a Reliant Rialto, owned by Kevin and Sheila Thompson, to my own slightly scruffy Herald “Poppy”. I must say I particularly liked the Thompson’s Rialto as it was as mad as a box of frogs and made everyone smile.

Yet another picture shamelessly stolen from Paul Cheetham

The other car highlights of the show for me were the Stewart Family’s pair of 1930s Austin 7s, Tony Miller’s stunningly restored Morris Marina as well as Benjamin Gretton’s Granada Ghia Coupe that was voted everyone’s favourite car of the show.

In all, there were over 60 Cars owned by our members at the show. All of them with a story to tell and entertainment to provide, and such an eclectic mix of cars too. I think that it is this mix of people and cars and our inclusiveness that makes this group such a great place to socialise both online and in the real world. Oh… and cake…Cake makes it a great group too.

A fantastic day came to its conclusion with Gar’s light hearted awards ceremony with prizes given as follows.

Best International Contributor - Robert Bothwell
Best European Contributor - Edwin Feenstra
Member's Choice Favourite in Show - Benjamin Gretton
Most Enthusiastic Member - Tony Tosh Brooks
Furthest Travelled - John Ticehurst
Oldest Car - Carolyn Stewart
Event Organiser - Paul Cheetham
Dedication - Zebidee Habib
Best Cake - Mike Peake

I must say that the last one came as a great surprise and a great honour. I am now the only bloke I know to go to a car show and come away with an award for best cake. It’s left Mrs FB wondering if I went to a WI meet instead by mistake. I’m also feeling the pressure to reproduce the Lemon Drizzle cake in quantity and to the same standard for Gaydon.

Our members left for home with smiles on their faces and positive comments on the day from all. Oh and Gar needn’t have worried about cake as there was none left at the end of the day. With just us hardy campers left, the Museum felt eerily empty so we all left for our friendly field to prepare for Crich’s own car show in the morning.

Back at the fatblokes field, we all took a few moments to compose ourselves and dress for dinner before gathering at The Brooks circled wagons again where we were joined by the friends made the previous night plus a few more happy campers that were staying over between shows. More meat was BBQ’d, more stream water drunk and just as we were thinking that some cake would go down nicely and bemoaning the fact that it had all been eaten, a 2nd miracle occurred. Doughnuts, a fruit cake, a carrot cake and marshmallows were suddenly discovered in the cake boxes!

This new miracle sparked talk of the previous night’s happenings. Liam White declared that the ”Holy Popup tent of Crich” was a highly significant relic and should be protected. He decided there and then that he would build a shelter around it as it had sheltered his family in their time of need. “It will be a very large shelter where Pilgrims can visit and worship in the 12 large bays each fitted with 4 post lifts and snap on tool chest and tools and surrounded by iconic British cars built before 1985” he loudly proclaimed for all to hear.

One of the new arrivals took issue with this though. “Surely” he said, “Our benevolent Lord of Old Cars would want us to be more inclusive and welcome cars of all nations into his loving fold. We could shorten our name to ‘Enthusiasts of Pre Millennial Motor Vehicles’ just like our Lord requested too!” Well obviously this was rank heresy, so he was executed on the spot in our time honoured fashion of being beaten to death with a plastic daffodil.

In the knowledge that we had done our duty unto the Lord we retired to bed.