Cotswold Navigation Capers
23 November
The weather forecast was dire, gale force winds, snow, heavy rain and floods. Stay in bed was the advice.
The reality for 14 intrepid members of Area 22 was different. Peering through the wipers at double speed as I arrived at the Frogmill Inn I saw Bert from RallyMoto struggling in gale force winds to erect two feather flags to indicate the event was still on. Had we made the right decision? Only one Aston in the car park and that was a DBX, Dave Hoare from Area 15! Entering the relative calm of the Frogmill I found everyone sitting round the big table quaffing coffee and putting the world to rights as if the chaos outside did not exist.
We were here for Navigation Capers, a follow up to the event we had held earlier in the year where cars follow a route defined by the electronic Road Book. As I have explained before, RallyMoto is a company based in Cheltenham who run navigation events for bikers all over the UK and Europe, but also happen to be members of Area 22. Over the next hour Bert and Bill described the “anatomy of a typical Road Book on a tablet” and how we would be following a 50 mile route around the Cotswolds. We would be tracked and our transgressions recorded. Wrong turnings, too fast, not keeping strictly within the limits of the road would all lead to penalty points being gained, the winner therefore being the car with least points.
The weather had not abated, but regardless we sallied forth on our navigation caper. I can only speak for what happened in my car, but within a few miles we were parked in a large muddy puddle: “what did he say that symbol meant?”, “how many kilometres in a mile?”, “where the hell are we?”. Confidence gradually increased until we came to a three way junction to see three cars going different directions… obviously they had both got it wrong! We drove on for 2 hours through deep puddles and mud, seeing no other cars, obviously, they had all got lost! We arrived back at the Frogmill to find them enjoying lunch! Inevitably I had had to undergo the banter of “why is your hair frizzy, were you electrocuted in your EV!!”
We waited for the results. Once again, the technical gremlins were present and only two of the cars had been successfully tracked, Chris Millard and myself. To the delight of the crowd, Bert announced I had picked up 27 navigational penalty points and had been recorded “speeding” on 15 occasions. Chris did much better and was declared the winner. However, the real winner was CALM, our chosen charity, who benefited by over £550 after taking Gift Aid into consideration.
It was still raining late in the afternoon, but we all agreed it had been a fun way to spend a Saturday. On behalf of the drivers I would like to thank the navigators for an excellent job. In leaving Bert mentioned MilleGT, a 1000 mile navigation challenge which is taking place in 2025 which we may like to consider.
Finally, thanks go to Bert and Bill from RallyMoto for making the event so successful and for making a large financial contribution to CALM.