2012 "Back to Bundanoon" Australian National Velocette Rally...a pictorial stroll through the week of the rally.....

An earlier posting under almost the same title "DQs off to the Back to Bundanoon Velocette Rally" I left Sydney for 8 days taking in the 2012 National Australian Velocette Rally.

 It was based in a small town, Bundanoon, in the Southern Highlands of NSW some 750 meters above sea level...in early Spring the altitude gave nice cool weather for Velocette riding...although a severe weather change that swept through on the Thursday evening of the event brought light snow to surrounding areas and heavy rain closed some roads such that the main days ride for the Friday was cancelled and two smaller rides in undamaged areas replaced it...

 The Rally started on the Sunday afternoon 7th October with the usual check-in with some 144 people entered including 100 motorcycles of which around 85 were Velocette and we usually had some 75 Velocettes on the daily rides....
Australia's a big place and the rough breakdown of entrants was 14 from Western Australia,25 from Victoria, 18 from South Australia,22 from Queensland,53 from NSW,1 from Tasmania,2 from California USA, 1 from UK and 8 from New Zealand.

Showing most of the bikes in the lineup on the final Saturday for a press photograph for the local newspaper...the railway station behind, the photo taken from the roof of the Bundanoon Community Hall by our erstwhile reporter, Colleen Canning!

Oldest Velocette at the rally was Dave Dettmar's 1925 model K ( Gill Loe pic).

The club's newsletter editor, Doug Farr has a son into woodwork...he made this half scale model of a Mk.2 KSS he is fiddling with...interestingly it has a concentric carb. on it and the wooden model has one also!
Doug carefully transported it the 900km to the Rally and then back again...

"Mr and Mrs Rally Director"...Di and John Jennings on a lookout during a days ride.
The Jennings started the rally series for the Velocette Owners Club of Australia back in 1982...a 2 day event at Bundanoon.
Hence the "Back to Bundanoon" Rally title....

Daily maintenance during the ride....

I call him "The Scarlett Pimpernel"..Graeme Glover aboard his BMW R80 during the Velocette Rally with Kiwi Caryl Sanson pillion...GG shows up at Vincent Rallies in the UK, BMW/Velo/Vincent Rallies in the USA and Canada as well as Velocette Rallies in NZ...."they seek him here, they seek him there...."
In fairness to GG he loaned Velos to NZers over for the Rally...On ya GG!!

Stuart Hooper...the World's Fastest Velocette with Gil Loe(USA) on the Rallies fastest FT500 Honda! Both rode down 1200km from Brisbane,Qld to the Rally and then Stuart with wife Marsha pillion toured further south into the alpine area of NSW and then rode home all on his Venom. Including engine main bearing replacement on the far south coast after arranging the bearings to be couriered to a helpful local who was also a motorcyclist...
Tough man...

Peter Wolfenden ( left) with his neat little 250 MOV special...yours truly DQ (centre)...who sold the engine to Pete and Tony Keene. PW machined up the hubs a la KTT....

Annie Albrecht's 1951 MAC pictured against a south coast vista during a morning tea stop at Stanwell Tops.

Peter Ellis starts his 1958 Mk.3 LE ready for a days ride...Richard Fanning and Peter Boros look on...

The Rally was accommodated in three venues in Bundanoon and one afternoon in the YHA, the Rally breakdown/catch vehicle driver, Rob D'Jarlais with partner Willi provided a beer tasting of their home brew....

Rallyists Dennis Fry and Dennis Quinlan were re-united with DQs VMT that they rode together in the 1971  Castrol 1000 6 Hour Race at Amaroo Park raceway. The current owner brought it over from Western Australia for the Rally.

 As per usual, the Club's AGM was held on the Tuesday evening.
The existing committee and ex-officio members were all re-elected unopposed.

The Club's patron...Anne Frampton ( nee Goodman), the daughter of Bertie Goodman the managing director of Veloce Ltd, manufacturers of Velocette is re-united with a Velocette Vogue scooter after almost 50 years.
Anne was the model for the original B&W publicity photos of the time..pictured below..Californian Club member Mick Felder models his "Velocette" sweater.
Mick was presented with the Annual "Bertie Goodman" award, presented by Anne at the Rallies final dinner on the Saturday night.

Anne presents a surprised Mick Felder with the framed BJ Goodman Memorial prize, pictured below.

Speaking of the final dinner, the Bundanoon Hotel dining room was suitably decorated with black and gold with memorabilia on the walls and each table....

 The Saturday morning, following the motorcycle lineup in the main street of Bundanoon, featured earlier in this post, a short ride was taken to nearby Robertson where they were celebrating the 80th anniversary of a rail spur to the town, with a double headed steam train...a 32 class and a 36 class locomotive hauling carriages of rail enthusiasts.
We were invited to line up Velocettes and three horseman from the Lancers army unit which took over from the Australian Light Horse Brigade of WW1 and WW2 were present.  
On 31 October 1917, the Australian 4th Light Horse Brigade charged across two miles of open terrain in the face of Ottoman artillery and  machine gun fire to successfully capture Beersheba in what would come to be known as the  Battle of Beersheeba.

 During the Rally there were plenty of our mounted riders...
A selection follows...

Next year, 2013, sees the National Australian Velocette Rally move to Tasmania... with Adelaide, South Australia in 2014 and Western Australia in 2015...

Thanks to Colleen Canning, Bev Wolfenden, Gil Loe, Tim Thearle and DQ for the photos...

Sorbo's recently restored BMW R69S 600cc twin.....

I've always been a bit partial to BMWs...well I've owned four, even buying one of them...a 1970 BMW R60/5 ...new....
So when Sorbo a mate of mine sent over some pics of his latest restoration project, I thought I run the photos through for you.
He had a Heinrich large capacity petrol tank for years and fitted it.
Sorbo always does a great job.....

 

A BMW catalog photo....above.