HOO's READY TO ROCK
The Party of the Year
Review
Well the waiting is over, the time is now, an early
to bed, and early to rise means we get to the Sturdee
club on the Thursday morning, fully wide a wake, fully refreshed and ready to
go.
Nearly 200 tickets have been sold, should be a good
turn out then. What about the weather? Who cares? Lets
just enjoy, AND lets make sure everyone else does as well
The alarm rings, I hit the snooze button and nod off
again, next thing I know Sandra, that’s Mrs Gibbo to you, suggests that I move
my arse coz its 9.30 you’re late again…
A quick cup of tea, and hurtle down to the party site, oh, that’s handy, the usual suspects are there, beavering away like demented bikers getting the Sturdee club ready for the VSOC party.
When I arrive, I find Rocket Ron and Denise,
Horizontal Steve, Ron Rabbitt, Tarzan Terry, Harley Bob and Liz, Jim Captain
Chaos, Pete mate Abbott, Chips Wilson, Big Al,
I’m sure all my delegating worked out reasonably
well; except I know that I didn’t delegate anything….
Anyway, the security entrance area into the site has
been allocated to Big Al, he’s got his camper van sorted, complete with an
awning, but I think it was big enough to be a conservatory.
The Yamaha, VSOC signage and the Smugglers flags etc
has been installed at the gate, and at various points around the site, we have
pretty bunting etc fixed to the club, hmm nice…. and its just about lunchtime, several of us
visit the bar, for a bit of nosebag and refreshments.
A bit later, I’m detailed with Terry Tarzan to attend to the arrow direction signs, so I’m in a car, signs in one hand, zip ties in the other, looking for lamp posts to attack. At one point we are approached by Mr Plod, he asks what we are doing, we told him we are putting up direction signs to the gay biker party, he seemed unsure what to do at this point, whereupon he backed off after being asked for a kiss, might see you at the party, bye. He drove off looking confused.
Ha that got rid of him I said. But he took my number plate Terry
said. You’ve problem then I said, ha ha ha.
We got back to the Sturdee club in time for a sit
down and cuppa, and to see Steve and Sue, the first of Centre 16 arriving.
Hands were shaken, cuddles with Sue. We just knew the
We retired to the bar for a well earned Pimms or several; coz the sun had retired over the yardarm. Pimms you poof, have a mans drink someone said, here’s a Smirnoff Ice… Bikers????????
Eventually after several shandies the consensus was
to retire to our tents, ready for an early start, so we managed to get to the
Gazebo instead for a nightcap or two, courtesy of Jack Daniel, before the
lights were turned off and the nighttime cacophony started.
Friday arrived in several stages, for some it arrived
at 6.00, others 7.00 and even later for others. There were one or two or
several tent-tortoise heads that poked out in the morning, you know, the sort
of head with little squinty bloodshot eyes, surrounded by a face that looks
like it could sink a thousand ships.
I’m not sure who was our loudest
snorer, Ron Abbot, Jim Edmonds, Dave Odin or me. Whoever you spoke to
the following day agreed that there was 10/10 for noise, 10/10 for content, and
0/10 for tune; we had to admit, if we were a boy band we would never make it on
X Factor.
Ian, the bar-steward, and his lovely barmaids, served
breakfast in the club; NO you can’t have a pint with a
full English, he said, have a tea or coffee... this left a few upset.
Filled by the fine food, we wandered out to the gate,
looking hopefully for a bike or two to turn up. A roar was heard. Here’s the
first arrival of the day. Nope, it was a car with a holed exhaust.
Terry asked if we should we go and check that the
local council fascist’s haven’t been out already and taken the direction signs
down, yes, that’s a good idea, piss off and take GIBBO with you.
While we were out, we put some more signs up, through Hoo village, just in case, coz we had loads. It turned out that we were worrying for nothing, coz when we got back; we found the field was starting to look like a field with some tents on it.
Bald Eagle, Ian Skinner, the best DJ on the scene
today (he told me to say that), had arrived and installed his combination
record player / radiogram, complete with his Val Doonigan records next to the
stage ready for the evening. The band, HEADLONG, turned up a bit later
and also set up.
By this time, late afternoon, there must have been
approx 120 – 150 tents in the field. It looked like everything was coming
together for a great weekend, there were a few sighs of relief that the weekend
was set to be fantastic.
Bald Eagle started the evening off, the floor was
filling up nicely, the band took over, they were supposed to be on for an hour,
the crowd would not let them go, they stayed for an
extra half-hour. Bald Eagle took over, playing into the wee small hours, the
place was rocking, the guys were rolling, I was just rolling drunk, what I want
to know is, who let me off my lead….
What a fantastic night…
Saturday morning arrived the same way as Friday,
bright, sunny and warm, the only difference being somebody had managed to get a
tame gorilla to have a dump in my mouth while I was asleep / passed out, or at
least that’s what it could have been, I’m sure it had nothing to do with the
alcohol consumption.
I didn’t have breakfast until lunchtime, then it was just toast, dry toast….
The good guys were welcoming more new arrivals onto
the site, issuing wrist bands, giving out goody bags etc, I spent all Saturday
morning apologising to everyone, even people who I didn’t recognise, just in
case….
I was informed later in the morning that I had called
the fire brigade out through the night for a joke, and when they turned up,
there was hell to pay, as there could have been a real fire elsewhere, while
they were attending to an idiot hoax caller.
It wasn’t too bad, it appeared that one of our guys
knew one of the firemen, and managed to smooth it out, phew…. Mind you they gave me some real stick over
that, but I suppose I deserved it.
Pete mate had to go home to Sheppey to collect his
family, some others heard about it and asked if it was an organised ride out,
it wasn’t, but soon turned into one.
Odin offered to lead the ride out back, so well done you two brave boys.
By lunchtime, most if not all of the party animals had arrived, erected tents and had a walk round to see old friends and meet new ones. Its funny, I’ve only been a member for two years, but because of the rallies I came say hi to so many people, I might not know their names, but everyone is a friend, that we can chew the fat with.
A bit later my brother arrived with his much nicer other half, he saw me and said “what the f*ck have you been up to, calling out the fire brigade, I was gob smacked he had only just turned up and knew all about my antics of the previous evening, who the hell told you… shortly after that I was put out of my misery, you didn’t really call the fire brigade out, we were just winding you up…. Phew, I said
Mid afternoon and the GOB starts, sorry that
should have read the Games On Bikes commence,
the first game was a race, I should have won, but it was pointed out to me
later that it was a slow riding race…. Mr K from centre 19 taking the glory.
We also had the “pillion throws the water filled
balloon over the bar and catch it” game, this was won by our very own Anne
and Godfrey, they even beat a couple who took part on a trike….
The defrost the frozen Tee shirt and wear it
competition was won by Big Bill Mills and his team, use your imagination to
work out how the “water babies” defrosted the Tee shirt, if your
imagination doesn’t work and you didn’t see how the winning team managed it,
ask someone who was there, they were very clever.
All in all it was good clean fun. Quite a few other Centres remarked that they
really enjoyed it, lets just see who has games next
year, what’s the betting at least two of next years rallies / parties will have
games.
The other early Saturday evening highlight were the
two walkabout magicians, they were very professional, they even arrived wearing
proper dinner / penguin suits, some. I thought they were the club doormen.
Before they started, they admitted they
were slightly nervous about performing in front of you ruffty - tuffty mean
bikers; they were only booked for one hour, but as they were enjoying themselves
so much, they stayed on for two and a half hours. There was not a single person
who did not enjoy this form of entertainment.
The magicians enjoyed the experience of our party as
well, the way they could bamboozle everyone with their close up magic. They
have asked us to pass on their thanks for a most enjoyable evening. Following
this act it was back to HEADLONG, the band, and the Bald Eagle SPIN - A - DISC
Experience for rest of the evening.
Later in the evening, we drew the raffle,
the prizes were set out on a table, with the winning tickets attached, this
left everyone to see if they had won; it also allowed the music to continued
virtually non-stop through the evening, a much better way to have the raffle.
We owed Dumbo a really big thank you for most of the raffle prizes, because he
manages to coerce / scrounge the majority of the raffle prizes from his
clients, again a very big thank you. As for Steve the Hippy, raffle ticket our
sales man, he managed to collect a tidy sum, nice one Steve.
Well, Saturday went and the Sunday
arrived, summer looked like it had disappeared and had been replaced with
autumn, or in plain English poxy rain. Lucky for us the party had finished but
not to clever for various members riding home, we hope they all had a safe
journey.
I was up with the larks, and made a point
of shouting to all and sundry at breakfast, I WAS NOT SORRY TO ANYONE,
because I was teetotal on Saturday night.
On that note we should mention the five members
from
Well I think I speak for everyone who attended the
party, WHAT A CRACKER.
Our thanks go to all that helped to
organise the party, to those that pitched in and helped over the weekend, and
those that turned up to take advantage of being pampered for the weekend.
Our thanks have also been passed on to all
at the Sturdee club for the use of the venue. Ian, the bar-steward was pleased
that all went well, and that no real problems occurred.
All in all we have had a lot of feedback VSOC’ers,
from far and wide, who all agree
THE
HRTR PARTY WAS AN OUTSTANDING SUCCESS.
MANY THANKS TO YOU ALL….
See you
in 2007 for HRTR 2?
Gibbo and Chips.