New Year's Day Barbeque
Les Fils de Vitesse - Hayling Island
Report courtesy of Gillian Mitchell
Photos courtesy of Gillian Mitchell and Tony White
Sunday January 1st 2017 New Year’s Day Barbecue at Hayling Island
New Year Day came round again (seemingly very soon after the last one) and Les Fils de Vitesse invaded the beach at Hayling Island for about the 29th consecutive year. The weather forecast was not happy reading and the day didn’t start well but then the rain fizzled out in our area in good time to light the fires and all was well.
The Hayling Island Light Railway have kindly been our hosts for some years now and they pushed one of the spare carriages out of its house so we could use that for shelter and seating as well as the engine shed. They also supplied the hot water boiler for the all-important hot drinks and gave us a discount on the train fares.
Tony brought along a stout pop-up gazebo under which we lit the three barbecues. Luckily the ‘Renault’ logo was barely visible! Even the wind behaved itself and didn’t go round to the North until later in the afternoon.
We were down on numbers a bit. The forecast, and rain north of Hayling Island, probably deterred some and some regulars had shoved off to the sun for a few weeks but it was very gratifying to see how far some of those who did attend had travelled.
Later on I managed to get the big Barbie home and into its garage before the rain started at 16:30 so, once again, Tony got away with his ‘trust me etc.....’.
See you next NYD, possibly at the other end of the line where the new engine sheds are nearly finished.
The Hayling Island Light Railway have kindly been our hosts for some years now and they pushed one of the spare carriages out of its house so we could use that for shelter and seating as well as the engine shed. They also supplied the hot water boiler for the all-important hot drinks and gave us a discount on the train fares.
Tony brought along a stout pop-up gazebo under which we lit the three barbecues. Luckily the ‘Renault’ logo was barely visible! Even the wind behaved itself and didn’t go round to the North until later in the afternoon.
We were down on numbers a bit. The forecast, and rain north of Hayling Island, probably deterred some and some regulars had shoved off to the sun for a few weeks but it was very gratifying to see how far some of those who did attend had travelled.
Later on I managed to get the big Barbie home and into its garage before the rain started at 16:30 so, once again, Tony got away with his ‘trust me etc.....’.
See you next NYD, possibly at the other end of the line where the new engine sheds are nearly finished.
Peter Mitchell (Pompey Puddleducks)
Photos courtesy of Gillian Mitchell and Tony White
Photos courtesy of Gillian Mitchell and Tony White