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The R & R started up once again and continued along to the end of that bouncy and sandy track called Lavis Lane. When the last bit of sand disappeared it was replaced in turn by dusty gravel and then the good 'ol bitumen. We drove slowly to one of the new service stations at Williamtown, looking for fuel, snack food and air for the tyres. We queued for the air hose and (unlike last year) finished inflating all our tyres without much delay. David & Tracey got away from us here. They wanted to leave an hour or so early so as to minimise the fight in the Sunday afternoon Sydney traffic. Roo can now comfortably do 100kmph on the freeway and keep up with traffic because it now has a special high ratio transfer box, but it is all for nothing if the traffic is bumper-to-bumper from Mt. White to the southern end of the Sydney freeway. About 1pm the R & R began it's last leg up to Warwick Lord's new house. For a number of members the convoy north was a real highlight, as we looked for all the world like the real thing. After 15 minutes on the bitumen we pulled into Warwick's front yard and then walked around the back to see his ex-military 'general store'. He had a number of ex-military trucks for sale as usual. Dennis liked looking over the ex-Army 6x6 ACCO Mk5 Wreckers that were for sale. They are Vietnam era of course and they have familiar switches and maplights. Then we went to look inside Warwick's shed. To say that it is full of rarities is a bit of an understatement. There are many curios, both little and large (some money changed hands too). I looked at all the goodies on exhibition. The one that got my attention was the complete Army CES kit for an Australian Army Land-Rover Series 2A. It was packed in crate dated 1968 and it had some heavy items in it (such as the set of snow chains). Warwick also had a Bamford winch and some cab canopies. There were other Land-Rover bits too. Sometime after 2pm we all said our good-byes and drove homewards. It was all over 'til next time. How wonderful to have a cloudless weekend for the R & R and how good was it that no-one had got bogged or had a mechanical hassle. Before the end of the afternoon I had put away all the gear and hosed off Castrol inside and out. While I was working my mind was full of memories about the people who had come on the 2002 R & R. And that campfire. And the stars. And I thought, 'What a great night'. Later on, about to email around news about the R & R weekend, it occurred to me that we should get rid of the "toTTT" name which is bit of a tongue twister: how about we rename our camping spot and call it Camp Cobbler from now on? It sounds good to me. Postscript: A day or so after this year's R & R, Dennis rang me and read out a news item saying that Lt-Col Dick Mort had passed away on the Sunday of the R & R. He was the wartime CO of Fort Wallace and the other batterys along the bight. He was 96 years old. I had interviewed him about the bight in 2001. He had contributed information years before on the Fort Scratchley project as well. R.I.P. |
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