Christmas cards, Calendars , snow and past adventures

weekend edition:

Got up this morning (Saturday) and after cleaning up from the coffee maker disaster, Note to self, when setting up the coffee maker at 3 am, make sure coffee filter door is closed. Though it smelt really good when I was half a sleep and almost awake in the morning. The apt also smelt  rather nice the next day after doing a double at work.

Since I've received a few cards in the mail this week I started to think about Christmas cards and when my favorite from last year would arrive. So hopefully sometime next week it should arrive. For those who don't understand, here's what the Wide's sent last year and the only one also saved from last Christmas:

Also it's the last month of the scooter calendar ;-( So if you've seen a new one let me know.

Past adventures, well since it's snowing and Toronto's getting it's real first snowstorm, I'll have to cover some of my past trips of this year. 

Curdfest 2013

The run that I look forward to in August, it's a smaller run, though attendance was way up this year due to a great weather forecast. That and I think word has spread about the raffle draw. For those who've never been before the campsite is on the outskirts of Ottawa, you can be downtown in 20 min and a plaza is just down the road with everything that you need (ie liquor store, no fills and a Timmies). 

Over the past few years I've taken Hyw 2 most of the way but, I wanted to get there faster this year so 401/416 for me. No problem for the MP3, took about 6 hours to get there with coffee breaks. lunch and stopping up for supplies. A bit more of an adventure for the hobbits (Chris, Dave and Niall) as they decided to take Hyw 7 instead.  They try to take it easy and break it down into a 2 day trip. They had some problems, but they always seem to be able to get them running again. Here's some links to DaveYoshida's blog:

http://lambretta.ca/

Also Dave's the guy with the waterproof vid camera, and the talent to also put the videos together. So here's his video of Curdfest 2014

Friday night is usually mellow with everyone fighting off the bugs, so if you don't bring bug spray you'll be sorry!

It's also fun watching people slowly arrive and joining in the fun. A good night and a great sleep. A light breakfast of coffee and bagels were provided to get us going. I know it doesn't sound like much but those are the real deal bagels from a proper bakery and to top it off with a nice St. Albert Cheese after being toast on the BBQ is just heaven. The weather was perfect for the Saturday ride. We lost Dave wide to some jetting issues (better safe than sorry) and I did have to use the air pump at Mill st brewpub to pump up a flat but other than that the ride went well. Brunch was at Mill street new Ottawa brewpub. One thing about Mill st is that their food does not disappoint.

                                                   Potato winner (Matt) enjoying his Poutine


For those who don't know the Potato Winner story, here it is. At PVSC's band camp one of the Saturday day games is the potato game. You ride your scooter around the hay with the hidden potatoes. When the music stops your passenger dives in and tries to find the potato. 'Guess who won?

       With this pic, matt's life as a internet star was born, here's some links to see what it's morphed to:


                            http://www.bite.ca/bitedaily/2013/06/man-finds-potato-becomes-meme/ 

                         http://www.radass.com/2013/08/03/the-potato-winner-does-it-again-22-pics/

Like the Clockwork Potato pic, anyway back to Crudfest

After feeling rather full from Mill st, it's off to La belle province" and the hills/park of Gatineau.

Still hard to believe that this is only 15min from downtown Ottawa and it's also one of the reasons I keep coming back, year after year. Then we slowly head back to the campsite and the Saturday night festivities.

First was more food which was a great setup for the raffle draw, for those who have never been, Corey buys scooter related items all year. So by time Curdfest comes around there's tons of stuff to be given away. I'll even go as far to say that over the last couple of years, this is the leader for raffeling off goodies. Also with it being a smaller rally, everyone goes home with something. Here's a pic of my draw nemesis.

Even when I put it back in the pot, I get it again. 2 years in a row, so if you come to Curdfest and need some shop hand cleaner, you know who to see. After the raffle the trading begins. Watch out for Tamara as she was on a mission to amass the full collection of the Vespa Tecnica books that were raffled individually. She pulled it off, though next year they will be mine!

  Unlike last year, the evening was a lot cooler so out so we could actually use the Sumo suits this year.

I put on the suit and surprised Chris, you'd think it would be rather one sided but it ended up as a draw as I got tired out. I write the blog so thats the way it happened ;-) Then to close the festivities the fire show was put on. Then a great night around the campfire having a few drink and socializing.

Then the Sunday morning pack up, thanks again for the coffee and bagels. My thanks to all that go to a great effort on organizing this great run.  Since there's no hurry to get home I usually take the back roads down to Hyw 2 then slowly home. So that I'll save to the next blog, you'll be surprised on what I found on the ride back.


Cheers,
Tross


Note to self:
 On the scooter repair/ maintenance side. e-mail Josh about replacing the bushing on the JCosta on the MP3.