Christmas Rally at Woodville

It was an 80im trip to Woodville on Friday, and we went up and over the Saddle Road.  It was cloudy at the top of the hill and the wind turbines were slowly rotating, putting electricity into the national grid.

At the top of the Saddle Road

Our venue for the weekend  was the Woodville and Pahiatua Racing club.  We parked on the hard standing, and had the  use of the kitchen, dining room/hall and toilets during our stay.  It’s always great to have somewhere to meet inside in the evening or because of inclement weather.  We drove up the tree lined drive, found ourselves a site, and settled in to enjoy the weekend.

The weather was warm enough to enjoy 4zees outside on Friday afternoon, and then we gathered in the hall on Friday evening.  Dave related the upcoming changes to the regulations about toilet cassettes, seems the new idea will impact us all and at a cost.  We will await developments.

The following morning I climbed the grandstand steps to get an elevated view of our vans parked up.  Nine vans were in attendance this weekend

Here we all are

The tantalising smell of bacon cooking led me over to John’s van where he and Flo were cooking up a hearty breakfast on the BBQ.  It did look tasty, bacon, eggs, hash browns, mushrooms and tomatoes.  That will be a good start to the day.

John and Flo with their BBQ breakfast

We settled into our chairs outside for morning tea.  Dot had brought along a cake to share to celebrate her recent birthday.  Our club members never say no to free goodies.

Dot sharing her birthday cake

Later in the morning the members pooled cars and set of to Dannevirke, to go and visit the Fantasy Cave.  Our club had visited this many years ago, but the building being used was not up to earthquake standards and the Cave had been in recess for some years.  This Christmas it was a “pop up” show in another venue – that sounded like fun and most of us were keen to go and check it out.  Handing over our gold coin entry fee, we stepped into a Christmas wonderland full of trees, ornaments and sparkly lights.

Christmas Fantasy Cave

Oh look, there’s Santa in the corner.  At only $5 for a photo with the big man in red, how could I resist!  Put your arm around his shoulder, I was told, and hold onto his hand.

Hello Santa

Then we spotted the toy train and Dot and I remembered having our photo taken sitting in this on our previous long ago visit.  It took a wee bit of body contortion to slip in to the tiny carriages, but we made it. 

All aboard.  Helen, Owen, Sue, Jenny, Deb, Dot, Murray and Dave

That was certainly a fun visit, we all had lots of laughs.  With lunch next on the agenda we all walked down the main road to the Black Stump and enjoyed a light lunch.  Luckily tables were rearranged to fit our group in comfortably.  The café was very busy indeed with pre Christmas shoppers out and about in force.

Back to camp again for another round of 4zees, then it was time for the highlight of our weekend, a  shared Christmas meal.  Sue and her helpers had done a wonderful job setting the tables and decorating the room.  She had also produced some table place names for us all, that was a lovely touch, just like attending a rather posh dinner!  Sue pointed out that the caravan and motorhome owners both had an appropriate  picture of their rigs on their cards. 

Everyone prepared their own main meal, and the club provided strawberries and ice-cream.  Flo had kindly prepared a couple of pavlovas for us, for the second year in a row.  We reminded her that she had done such a great job we would now expect her to keep this donation up in the future.  Everyone was asked to feel under the table for a ribbon, depicting a prize.  After much hilarity with us all patting underneath the table, Pamela was the lucky winner.

And the winner is……Pamela

My camera decided to go into fuzzy mode that evening for some reason, so the photos of the dinner were not at all good.

Fuzzy wuzzy people

The weather turned bad overnight and on Sunday morning, rain and strong gusts of wind had us concerned about the drive home.  We enjoyed our final morning tea of the weekend, complete with fruit mince pies courtesy of the club.  Deb had brought along a Christmas tree strewn with chocolates, and some tasty apricot coconut balls, thanks very much Deb.  Luckily the wind did drop a little in the late morning so we said our farewells, wished each other a Merry Christmas and made our way home.  Thanks to the committee for running such a splendid Christmas Rally.