Pat & Walter

Tall Pines Rally 2004

We went to see the last leg of the Canadian Rally Championship on Nov 20th. It is held every year in Bancroft, Ontario which is only an hour or so north of my Mom's place in Madoc, which is about 45 minutes north of Belleville. The name of the rally is Tall Pines, and the rally stages are held in the dirt roads around Bancroft.

Everything is free (no admission) and you can get very close to the cars before the race and when they come in for service. Service was required on most of the cars as it's a very tough event for the cars and the drivers. Out of about 50 cars that started the event, only 11 made it to the finish line. All the others either crashed, or broke down, or crashed and broke down.

The first three stages took place away from the spectator areas so it was interesting to see the condition of many of the cars that crawled back into the first service stop. Unfortunately, during the third stage the Sprongl brothers were out with a broken transmission...we never got to see them fly by. As the cars were dropping like flies the number of spectators did not diminish. The cold and damp, sometimes pouring conditions did not prevent us from watching the five spectator stages. Three of them were near the Iron Bridge and the cars came barrelling around the corner covering us with gravel and dust. Much to our delight! We watched until all the cars that were left, including the mighty Subaru Justy drove (or putted) by.

As the cars went in for service we drove 45 minutes to the night race location. It is very dark in the country; good thing we had purchased our mighty flashlight at Home Hardware. It took us a few tries and U-turns before we found the correct abandoned road to park our car and walk into the even darker woods. There were two designated spectator areas, one at the top of the hill and one near the bend to another uphill climb. While waiting for the cars to start screaming by, the two groups of spectaros tried to blind each other with their flashlights. We need to bring a bigger light next year! By this time there were only two stages left and very few cars so it did not take long for all the remaining daredevils to fly by. Unfortunately, not too many of the fast competators remained and none of the jalopies (Justy, very old BMW, and Capri) survived the madness of the day.

Overall, it was a fun day, but after seeing the advantages of being a VIP guest, we decided this is the way to go next year. By 8:30PM we were ready to head back to Madoc.

Click on the picture or here to view some pics and videos.

-Pat & Walter

State of the Deck

Mom was asking how our deck was coming, so here's a picture of how it will likely remain until the spring. Cedar decking is on, and I added a strip to the ends of the joists to clean them up for the winter. Just so our neighbours don't have to stare at open joists for the next 4 or 5 months. There was a patio set on the deck, but it's been put away for the winter.

-Walter

Pat's Mini

Just realized that I never posted a pic of Pat's new car. My bad.

-Walter

CIBC Run for the Cure Oct03/04

Woo Hoo!!

Pat did a fantastic job this year for the CIBC Run for the Cure! Not only did she raise more than 200% of her goal ($410 woot!!), but she finished in a very good time of 31:32! Here is a picture after the race with her running buddy, Sue Bigg. She also met a few firemen who were there to promote their fundraising calendar. "Stay warm: Hug a fireman". I mean, if you are into that kinda thing.

-Walter