205 GTI 25th Anniversary - Forgotten Highway - Patea

[BigPete]

This was an odd weekend. The contingent left Auckland at about 9 am. I heard from Griffe at about 1400 that they were in Taumarunui. Couldn't get through to any phones etc and was starting to wonder what was going on when bazwad rang me from Stratford at about 2000. It was pissing down and there were slips everywhere. Two 205 GTIs and some random in a Fiat left the road at various stages of the drive. bazwad's whip is a bit damaged and on some farmer's front lawn. Hopefully the 309 GR will get them to Auckland soonish.

We had a choice feed of deep fried everything in some weird VIP room of a/the pub in Patea as it was the only thing open there at 10 at night and took photos of the freezing works this morning and saw about 435234 Ford Capris go past as well as rally cars, one of which was a b1nned WRX coupe.

I now have my 205 GTI in Hawera courtesy of Carpentry and bazwad and it is lush. After leaving the others in Inglewood this afternoon, I took the Surf Highway back to Haw'ra and am now safely home doing laundry.

[Freddie]

Oh my god, what a crazy trip. Can't wait to get the photo's up.. Well chuffed that my thirteen hundred dollar shed made it there and back in one peice (even if she was running at 100de-fucking-grees most of the way), and even more so that I kept up and she didn't end up in the b-1-n. Bit of a baptism of fire with all the crashes happening, wasn't really expecting to see any but given the pace I'm not surprised!

Will have to hit up Sanjay or whatever his name is and organise a trip down to New Plym for a curry..

Thanks agian all, had a mint time and your a bunch of GC's hard out.

[BigPete]

[Freddie]

Or should I roll your 205 Pete?  Can you promise that it's not going to break down on me/struts fall out?

That was close

Dodged a bullet there Pete!

Didn't take many pics as was to busy owning it fast style of course, heres mine though.


Always happy to have stock in stock.


First pit(read: piss) stop.


Wish my missus was this dirty.














Yes, I'm good I know..


This ones free but I'll only charge you $20 for a hi-res or alternatively you can give my lens cap back, I KNOW YOU HAVE IT ROB.


Morning after the night before

[Griffe]

I am still struggling to explain/understand the habits of the forgotten hi'way, was quite unbelievable really, like we were stuck in some sort of time warp/parallel universe, I still haven't been able to properly explain to anyone what it was like, words simply just do not do it justice, there was a complete culmination of boulders and trees in the middle of the road, mixture of gravel/sealed roads, handcut mud tunnels with bats, slips around every corner, loose gravel on swept corners, torrential rain, fog/mist, small towns with goats as mayors where time ceased to exist, 3 cars ending up in the b1n, roadside running repairs on exhausts and carbs, loose mudflaps, indicators being left on, foglights falling off & flashing LED christmas tree shaped buddha's just to paint a picture...will post up some pics when I can make sense of the tangled web of cables that is sitting in the lounge...

Oh and nice to meet you to Freddie, was great having another GC coming along!

[2052NV]

ok here we go.

sorry about quality as it was my first time out with my new slr and still getting used to it

 

[Lord Page]

How I meet the B1NZ Fiat.


We were parked at the exit of the one lane Hobbit tunnel exchanging questionable high 5's when a car arrived at the other end.


http://maps.google.co.nz/?ie=UTF8&ll=-39.019751,174.801621&spn=0,359.961548&t=p&z=15&layer=c&cbll=-39.019649,174.801669&panoid=goN_8vpkRGu2Ew73wIF97w&cbp=12,19.22,,0,2.99

We quickly mounted up and fasted off.  After a couple of klicks someone pulled over to take yet more photos of their cars looking moody (yawn).


Once we got it all together again we were off like scolded cocks, I was riding shotgun with Carpentry in V8Pete's 20fast at the back of the convoy.  We were flying, and the strangest thing started happened.  Someone was gaining on us.

Carpentry's comment summed it up "must be a local, but what are those lights?"  The car that was catching us was sporting headlights, foglights and red flashing dashboard lights.  Whoever he was he new the road, was in a fast car and almost certainly carried a national motorsport licence.  But what the fuck was those red flashing lights on the passenger side of the dash???

It turns out the red flashing lights was not some sort of performance measuring device.  It turns out the driver was not Chris Amon testing the latest in fast technology.  It turns out the driver wasn't a local who new anything at all about the road.

It turns out the red flashing lights was a plastic gold budda and the driver had been very lucky right up until he lifted off on a left hand kink:



http://maps.google.co.nz/?ie=UTF8&ll=-39.138465,174.743857&spn=0,359.980774&z=16&layer=c&cbll=-39.138377,174.743819&panoid=aG4khvio_QqoJqbUUbOWOw&cbp=12,60.1,,0,14.62

The thing is, his luck held.  The violence of the spin, which I watched in the wing mirror, should have put the car down the bank and into the river.  The loss of control was absolute and at very high speed.

The car finished up on an angle with the front wheels on the road.  The passenger side was in the air all the way up to the A pillar.  When Carpentry and I arrived the driver was out of the car and the passenger was just sitting there shaking wanting to know if it was safe to open his door, I sent him out the drivers door.  Both men were whiter than white.

We pretty much took over at that point.  Farmer John came past, hooked up his Holden and towed the car off the bank.  We jacked the car up, folded the exhaust back so that is was pointing in the right direction while not the same shape, Griffe reattached it with cable ties and we all gave the driver as much shit as we could think of (although he helped us with his thoughts on what had gone wrong).



They were on the road because they thought it was a short cut.  And do you know why he crashed?  Well according to Ramesh, it was the tyres fault. Muppet.

[Don Simon]

What about the looks we got when we were fasting mreddie furcurys clutch at the petrol station in Stratford!!!

has nobody seen a tog dorch before?



ooooooh theres a recall on those torches. They can give you lead poisoning if they bite you.

http://www.cpsc.gov/cpscpub/prerel/prhtml06/06100.html

What about the bread crumb cholesterol honorary banquet we had in we love to partier? Took me a week to get over that. More to the point,  my car should be back on the road soon

 

[Griffe]

[Griffe]

Vids from he forgotten highway weekend are now online...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HrdBPJ7AT3Q

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hCOxrx4x3HI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BvUWXwTE4ss

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=589gR2oEgvQ