Update 19 October 2005
Well, I've been having a nice relaxing holiday but as usual there has been plenty to do. I removed the mudguard support and took it into the local town to have it welded. The car was given a much needed wash. It almost looks like new again. The rear tyres were getting down to the wear markers so I organized replacing them later in the week.
I was contacted by the owner of a Fraser Clubman who lived in Forest Glen, only about 10 minutes from where I was staying. We organised to get together on the Sunday morning and go for a local drive.
In the meantime I discovered that about 10 minutes away in the opposite direction was a retired engineer who had built 2 clubman cars from scratch. I phoned him and then spent a couple of enjoyable hours at his place with him and his son checking out his 2 cars called Gem 7's and comparing engineering and registration requirements in our 2 states. The workmanship and finish on his cars was first class.
In his workshop he also had a body and chassis for a streamlined sports racing car under construction.
There was a bit of excitement on the Saturday night with a house across the valley from us catching fire. We phoned the Fire Brigade and they arrived very quickly. They ended up with 3 fire units there and surprisingly, considering the amount of flames , managed to save most of the house. From where we were you would have sworn there would be nothing left but a heap of ashes.
Rick arrived in his Fraser at 9 the next morning and after comparing cars we set off on the inaugural, combined Sunshine Coast/Adelaide Clubman run. We covered about 100km and managed to find some rain for 30 or 40 km. (This was the first rain I had driven in since the day I left Perth, so my timing across the top end had worked out just as planned. I hope I can have a rain free trip from now on as well, but somehow I think I'll end up getting a bit wet somewhere along the way).
After Rick left some of the neighbours came over for a look at the car so I was able to go through my car talk a few more times.
The rest of the time was fairly relaxing and uneventful. I'm heading off to Brisbane tomorrow to stay with friends and catch up with some others.