It all started off well; I met Dave Jackson, as arranged, at the Blue Star Garage on time. We agreed to stop at the Devil's Punchbowl café on the A3 near Hindhead and set off and were soon joining the queue of bikes waiting for the Isle of Wight Ferry.
We arrived just in time to get our tickets and ride straight onto the 3.00pm boat, oh if only all ferry companies were as biker-friendly as the Isle of Wight!
On arrival we cut across the middle of the island, heading south for the Military road and Atherfield holiday camp for the rally. This year, in order to ease my way back into the joys of the rally scene, I had booked one of the chalets.
I had been told that the chalet would sleep five and was expecting Butlins style accommodation, two bedrooms, bathroom and a kitchen diner type, but no, the chalet was a "Hi Di Hi" style single room with two bunk beds and a single bed, it was en-suite however, and that alone made it worthwhile.
Bands started at 7.00 with "Skybus" a very competent rock band followed by "Preacher Joe", young lads who have a large fan base but need practice and finishing up with "Shredder" who were ok (they had the shredded t-shirts) but didn't seem interested in being there.
Saturday and it was time to try the on-site breakfast in the huge campsite canteen, ordinary breakfast £5.00 fat biker breakfast £6.00. I had FBB: three eggs, three rashers bacon, three fried bread, three tomatoes, three sausages and free coffee and tea! Dave just had the ordinary.
We visited Fort Victoria (ask Dave & I about model trains) and had a ride around Ventnor and Shanklin with a visit to "The Crab" in Shanklin for a pint before getting back for the silly games. The Wightriders run their games on a team basis and games like the sack race with a team of four attempting to hop a large skip type builders bag just didn't work, another attempt with the same sacks on top of the teams blindly running from one post to another worked slightly better but basically, it was chaos!
Highlight of Saturday night was "Riptide", another very good rock band; they were a great relief after "Preheat Descent" who were most upset when no one asked for an encore. "Riptide" was really good, the whole marquee was rocking, and me, Dave, Shelley and the Isle of Wight dance teams were leaping about, a possible band for our rally next year? Final band were "Peartree Bridge".
Sunday and another FBB for me, just the sensible breakfast for Dave, before we paid a visit to Isle of Wight Classic Motorcycle Show at Ventnor and then later, another visit to the Tank Museum near Newport run by Dave Arnold. Dave had various projects on the go and showed us around, one project being the welding of two halves of a Sherman Tank together! Heavy engineering or what!
Sunday evening bands, Stevie - one man and his mandolin, "Feud" and "Cobra" were notable by the time spent setting up and sound checks, the quality of the band appears inversely proportional to the time spent setting up.
The final band was "Cobra" who we almost booked this year for our rally; they produced a hard rocking set to finish on with the rally entertainment ending on a high.
Monday, another fat biker's breakfast and pack up to go home, lots of goodbyes and head for the ferry, a really good rally to start with and one not to be missed next year!