Hants & Berks Point to Point 2006
 

Hants & Berks MC 49th PAIRS ‘POINT TO POINT’ 29th January 2006.  Andy Greenland and Pete Farmer organised three MCAC crews to take part in this event where teams of two cars work together to locate answers and marshals.     Results now available.  Overall, 13 teams started (26 cars) and 2nd overall (plus best MCAC) were the team comprising Rob Brook/John Brook and Mike Cawthra/Lara Cawthra (plus Annalisa).  7th Overall were Kevin Dawson/Andy Greenland (plus Kathleen Dawson) and Andy Stacey/Gordon Phillips (plus Maria Phillips).  DNF (but not last) were Pete Farmer/Paul Brown and John Wilson/Neil Wilson.  All the action took place on O.S. Map 186 with a start point in Farnborough. Secretary of the Meeting was H&B's David Madgwick. 

'Peter and Paul take a drive in the country'

After several years of clashing with the Oakington Stages, the Hants and Berks Pairs Scatter took place this year on January 29^th, a week before Oakington.  We should have been wary of entering as it was the day after the Awards Dinner at Stockley Park Golf Club.  Despite that, six cars from MCAC assembled at one of the car parks at Cody Technology Park adjacent to Farnborough Airport.  Some more aware of things than others after the night before (now known as the Rob Brook Awards Night, but that’s another story). 

The three teams of two cars were:

Team One

Kevin Dawson and Andy Greenland with Kathleen Dawson in the back.

Andrew Stacey and Gordon Phillips with Maria Phillips in the back seat.

Team Two

Rob and John Brook

Mike and Lara Cawthra with Annalisa in the back seat.

Team Three

Pete Farmer and Paul Brown.

John and Neil Wilson.

After a short calibration run to calculate the accuracy of the speedometers, we were off.  This year, the route was defined by map references whereas in the past, it has been by semi-cryptic clues.  This was going to be a stroll in the park.  After spreading the map out on the bonnet of the Astra in what was probably the windiest part of the country, we soon plotted all of the clues.  We then shared out the locations to be visited and arranged to meet at a convenient mid map location to work out where the lunch marshals were hiding.

Soon we were sailing down the A3 in search of the first clue at Alton.  This turned out to be a granite monolith on the far side of a roadside green.  We drove round the green and soon had the first answer safely in the road book.  Then on to the second location which was found with equal ease.  We were then wondering how they were going to sort out the winners as everyone would surely clean the morning and afternoon routes and arrive at the finish with top marks.  Wrong!

During our ride to location 3, Paul said “How do you fancy going down a white, it is a more direct route and will save us several minutes.”

That did not seem to be a problem as, when we arrived at the white, we were pleasantly surprised to find that it was a tarmac road.  No problem here, we would probably arrive at the lunchtime rendezvous and have time for a bite to eat before John and Neil arrived, we should have made it a pub instead of a car park. We got to a junction and should have been warned by the large puddle at the end of the track that we wanted to travel along.  We carried on, the road now getting a little muddy.  It was still not a problem as the mud was a few inches deep with solid ground under it.  We than discovered a gate to our horror which was locked closed.  We looked at the map again and were relieved to discover that we had to turn left just before the gate.

We turned the corner to be faced with so much mud we thought that there was no way the Astra would make it through.  We parked up and walked through the mud to see how bad it was.  It was slightly deeper but still not too bad and, after about 50 yards, the road bore right and onto solid gravel again.  Back to the car and onwards.  Unfortunately, the flat and solid gravel road did not last very far.  Ruts were beginning to appear at either side of the road.  But not to worry, there was still plenty of track to enable us to avoid the ruts and drive along the peaks.  Soon there was more rut than peak and your erstwhile driver was beginning to panic a little. 

If he has any faults, Paul is too enthusiastic.  He leapt out of the car and started to walk backwards in front of the car to direct me away from the more serous ruts (often laying flat on his face to check the ground clearance).  I was now getting seriously worried.

By now, it was impossible to turn back so we had two options:  First we could abandon the car where it was and walk home (It did only cost me £102 on eBay!) or second, gather some of the dead wood lying in abundance all over the place.  Option two seemed favourite as we would have had one hell of a walk home (we were at the bottom left hand corner of OS186) so we started to gather wood like it was going out of fashion.

While we were doing this, several walkers (hikers, not crisps) passed us and told us that the track got worse ‘just around the corner’.  We still could not turn round so collected yet more wood.  Paul was, by now, collecting fallen trees complete with roots!  Still it was working and, slowly, we were progressing along the track.  I think that, at their deepest, the ruts must have been about fifteen inches or so deep.  I was thinking of abandoning this idea and calling Kevin to come and tow us out in the Disco.  It was a good job I didn’t as he said that he would not have attempted such a rough road in the Disco when I showed him the photos at the finish.

At one time, forward motion had halted completely and I noticed that one of the rear wheels was about two inches off of the ground.  This was due to the fact that one of Paul’s trees had twisted and was now wedged under the nearside sill, lifting the rear of the car off of the ground.  This was not a problem as the Astra is front wheel drive and does not actually need the rear wheels except for stopping the fuel tank from rubbing on the ground.  However, the tree was preventing forward motion and so had to go.  We tried jacking the car up to remove the tree, but that proved useless.  I then leaned on the side of the car and lifted while Paul tugged at the tree.  Eventually, we managed to dislodge it and, once again, we were on our way, albeit very slowly.  Once we reached the end of our tree fill, we had to stop, go to the back of the car and retrieve all of the wood that we had driven over, throw it over the car to the front and start filling ruts again.  At one time, Paul had to have his feet in the embankment and push while I was driving forwards.  This was to prevent me from driving sideways into the chasm that was now the nearside rut.  At another time, while I was in the bushes having a ‘comfort break’ Paul drove the car forwards a bit and then found that he was trapped in the car, unable to get out.  He solved this by climbing out of the driver’s door window.  Mightily relieved, I then returned and set about our task with renewed vigour.  Was it our imagination, or were the ruts (or gorges as they now were) beginning to become slightly less severe.  Pretty soon, I was able to drive the car in the bottom of the ruts with the luxury of at least half an inch ground clearance.

It was a bit of a let down really when we reached the end of the track and were able to proceed on our way.  First of all, we had to stop for a cup of tea to enable our tortured bodies to recover somewhat.  We then decided to return from whence we came (on foot, leaving the car safely on the tarmac) to record the route that we had travelled.  The proof of our tale can be seem later in this article.

Because of the lateness of the hour (our minute saving detour had taken us about two and a half hours) we decided to open both of the panic envelopes to determine the positions of the lunchtime marshals.  It has to be admitted that we broke the rules slightly here and phoned John to tell him what had happened and to instruct him to go to the ‘east’ marshal and that we would go west.  Then off to the lunchtime rendezvous to plot the afternoon’s jaunt.

The afternoon was a bit of an anticlimax after the morning’s efforts and we soon had to location of the finish marshal.  It turned out that we had about fifteen miles to travel and about minus three minutes to do it in.  At this point we decided enough was enough, opened the afternoon panic envelope and drove straight to the finish where we were met with much derision from the other MCAC teams.

Photographs of the ‘road’ we took and of the car two days later follow.  It will take me about two weeks to get the car clean again, if I ever do.  All in all, and in hindsight, it was a fun day and Paul has been forgiven with the offer of a seat on the Valentine as long as he keeps clear of whites.

Finally, we have requested that we forego a points claim in the ‘road rally’ table and, instead are awarded some for the ‘off road’ table instead.  We have now decided that four wheel drive is for softies, Astras rule the forests and we look forward to taking it into more rounds of the off road challenge.  The Astra was back in ‘get you to work’ mode on Monday morning, albeit about twenty pounds heavier with all of the mud stuck to the underside and with my nice new front tyres fitted the day before now looking decidedly tired.  Hopefully they will clean up again.

We have not said anything about the other MCAC teams, after our efforts, it would appear a bit of an anti-climax to have finished on time and gain positive points.

Pete Farmer and Paul Brown.