Friday 16 September 2011

Thames Run

The 8am Saturday morning start was a bit too early for me, but Martin, John and the rest all departed close to the allotted time. Leaving the motorway at Bombay, they toured through the back roads towards Miranda, and then on to Thames itself.
First port of call was Seagulls, the 'recycling' store at the tip which recovers usable junk and on-sells it to customers. An interesting visit apparently.

Karen and I joined everyone around lunchtime at the next stop, the Museum of Technology based at the old pumphouse. This building used to pump a huge amount water from the various goldmines in the back hills out to sea. Most of the large machinery to do this is no longer onsite, but the original crankshaft, all 70 tons, was recently rediscovered and is still there. The custodians have also built and mounted in the original location replicas of the main flywheels.

We had a brief stop at the War Memorial Monument which overlooks Thames township, before travelling on up the coast to Terry and Joanne’s place. Here we were able to examine the treasures in Terry’s garage, while Joanne made tea & coffee, and provided some munchies for everyone.

Despite being a cool-ish day, we had a good turnout with John (Anglia Tourer), Martin (Y), Chris and Jo (Y), Harvey (Y), Bud & Thelma (Prefect) Paul & Delia (modern), Brian &  Bev (modern), Karen & Ant (modern). Andrew also travelled over from Morrinsville in his Prefect.
We then left in dribs and drabs from Terry and Joannes and made our way back to Auckland in the late afternoon.