It was our first car rally that we have been to and we were thrilled with how great it was. We had seen a few messages and pictures sent from Liz Curtis and Bridget Howard on their train trip across the Nullarbor with Ken & Gloria and John Ingham and you can see the excitement building in their faces as they made their way over. For us, we were not in a position to take our Valiant over and instead flew over to Adelaide to take part in the 7th National Rally!
 
When we touched down at Adelaide Airport the crowds were already gathering at the Adelaide Shores Resort for the pre-rally meet and greet dinner. It wasn’t that long after touching down we picked up our Toyota Corolla hire car and made our way straight over to meet everyone. It was a bit daunting at first as everyone was hungry and already seated waiting to eat when Tim Schapel and Liz Greig introduced us to everyone.  “The Crocker’s are here…we can now eat!” Seriously though it was a very warm welcome by everyone and a met a number of new people straight away!

We started early on our first day meeting everyone at a nearby local reserve car park, which was to be our starting point each day over the next week. Our first pre-rally run was seeing some local attractions in and around Goolwa. After some of us got lost on the local streets we finally found our first activity taking a small river cruise on the Murray on the steam boat “Oscar W“ (www.oscar-w.info).

After this nice cruise we explored the local townsite, local markets and came across a nice bakery for some lunch, as well as finding the most popular street in town! (any guesses?). We couldn’t resist buying something at the markets that was too big to carry on the plane back with us. So, thanks so much to Liz for taking it in her car back to Perth!
From here we went to Victor Harbor and visited Dennis Martin’s personal car collection! This garage and the amazing view from his house was the envy of everyone!
 

On our second pre-rally day, we had tour of the historic Chrysler sites in and around Adelaide hosted by Gavin Farmer (For some information on Gavin have a look at the article titled “AP5 Valiant Prototypes” below). This was the coldest and wettest day that we experienced while in our whole time in Adelaide. 

This was an optional tour for people to attend and for the people that did join in it was a great day. But lunch time the weather had improved and we all had a great lunch at the Chrysler Bar in Tonsley. (http://www.tonsleyhotel.com.au/chrysler-bar) 

On the last day of our pre-rally car runs we visited the historic townsite of Hahndorf, Australia’s oldest surviving German settlement (http://hahndorfsa.org.au) located within the Adelaide Hills, 28 kilometres south-east of Adelaide. Here everyone looked around the settlement checking out lots of local German tourist attractions, cafes, gift shops, fashion and of course the local bakery which was a hot spot for most of the people on the car run that day!

 

After a filling lunch most people went to Melba’s Chocolates and Woodside Cheese Wrights at Woodside, while a few people went with Tim Schapel to visit a collection of old trucks, bulldozers, stationary engines, vintage Chev cars and trucks and some classic Ford Fairlane's. From there most of us we made our way back to Adelaide Shores Resort or Caravan Park where we were staying… just ask Ken! 😊

 

The next day, was a free day where we could do whatever we wanted, for us, it was a trip into the City on the tram from Glenelg and for Ken it was getting a haircut! Later that night we had the official start of the 7th National Rally with a meet and greet dinner where a number of new faces appeared! It was a great dinner and we met a number of new people!
  
For the first run of the official start to the 7th National Rally we went to Mallala, where we visited the local Mallala Community Museum and some people also went to the local race track. That day we had a fantastic light lunch put on by the Country Women’s Association (CWA) and then went to St Kilda to see the Tramway Museum. At the museum we all had a ride on some restored Trams that took us to the nearby Adventure Playground. While at the Tramway Museum, we had a photo shoot 

On Friday, there was a run to Port Adelaide, where we went on a 2½ hour port river Dolphin Cruise where we all saw a number of Dolphins following the boat and then afterwards some people went on to explore the various attractions in the area such as the Maritime Museum, Railway Museum, Aircraft Museum or the Clipper ship (as seen in the photo below).
 
That afternoon people didn’t get back too late as everyone went back to their accommodation and prepared to polish and shine their cars in preparation for the “Show and Shine” judging day at Wigley Reserve, Glenelg. (who could believe that it rained that night so that many were seen re-polishing their cars again that next morning!)
 
John looks very proud here showing off his Valiant for everyone to see. Even though it was forecast for rain, the day was perfect, nice and sunny! After judging most of us went back to our accommodation and relaxed in preparation for the presentation dinner at Glenelg Golf Club that night!

For some people, like Laurie and Wayne from Victoria they were happy to feed the ducks and local birds before heading off to the dinner!
 
That night John Ingham and his son Johnny picked up 1st place for R Series restored and Tom, Bridget and Kim Howard picked up 1st place for R Series imported! Congratulations to them for their great achievement and for representing our club.

 
The next day, we went to the Big Rocking Horse at Gumeracha to view the Bay to Birdwood run with 1,700 cars, trucks and bikes driving past! We were also very surprised to see the Howards near the very front of the pack when they drove past us… Tom wanted to get there early for a good spot and since the run started off very early I would hate to think what time the Howards arrived at the starting location!
For most, this was the last day in Adelaide, Ken and Gloria commenced the drive back to Perth, Liz went to see friends and family and the next day Tom, Bridget and Kim started their journey to Victoria. For us, we stayed in Adelaide for a few more days and used the time to see more sites and play mini golf. By this stage we were very tired after so much activity….

 

I want to thank the South Australian club and especially the Rally committee in SA for a great, well organized and run National Rally. The South Australian club were great hosts…thank you!

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Neal Crocker