Flying Boot Rally Reploughed

	PJ's Harley


Alex & Russ
Winner of best bike	Alan collecting his prize for best bike
	Big Phil telling his tale of woe
	Mike, a fugitive from the style police


Carol, winner of The Order Of The Boot	PJ, Bill & Ann
Bobby	Winner of the Grot Bike award

Phil receiving the Club Mileage trophy on behalf of Navigation MCC
	Packing up

The mythical 18^th Flying Boot Rally (2005) started on the 31^st September (which only appears every 18^th rally, or when Banger is pissed while doing the invites). It took place at ‘The Plough’ Llandegla, North Wales. Or perhaps the date does exist and all over the country people were mounting their bikes on platform 9 ¾ of the local station for their journey into the unknown.

Anyway once I arrived at the hostelry reality returned with the discovery of plenty of camping space, good food & good beer (I didn’t know there was any other type), and this was all complimented by regular deliveries of good healthy ‘WELSH’ rain.

Being the first to arrive at approx one hour before opening time (maybe Banger had altered the time as well), I started to have an erection of the canvas kind in-between doses of grass growing liquid generously supplied by Mother Nature. Imagine my surprise to find that since putting the tent away last time it had been given planning permission for either a skylight or solar panel, and that the hole where this modernising feature was going to go was happily letting in Mother Nature.

Deciding that I had no need for an on-suite shower my first task was to go and purchase some flysheet mending material, this done I set about the repair assisted by Mother Nature and her equally ‘helpful’ sister Gale Force wind.

Soon the familiar faces started to arrive, all quoting the same ‘well it was nice when I left, it only started raining down the road’ comment. However as the evening progressed all thoughts of the weather became rapidly dissolved by alcohol and friendly. Until the dreaded toll of the last orders sonata abruptly ended the mutual decline into the desired drunken stupors that we had all desperately been trying to achieve.

The only thing left was to congregate at the free tea & coffee tent and argue over who got the cream biscuits and who would be left with the plain ones, before wandering aimlessly around looking for a dark coloured tent on a dark coloured evening.

Saturday morning arrived and the sun appeared nervously, only to disappear behind the clouds when somebody looked at it, but the steady flow of bikes helped everyone to disregard the weather and concentrate on more life affecting decisions such as which of the beers to try first.

The numbers for this years rally were a little disappointing compared to previous ‘Flying Boots’ Having said that the brave souls, who had invested in good quality rain gear and made the pilgrimage, did not seem to notice, and with the addition of a few new faces to this years event the pub soon started to fill up.

All of a sudden at approx 18.30 hrs the pub seemed to empty, it was soon realised that this spacious void had been left by ‘Big Phil’ who, once again in his ‘Flying Boot tradition’ had over done the falling down water and had gone to ‘Fall down’. Rather than try to resurrect this sleeping giant we decided that the extra space would allow for dancing and merriment when the evening’s entertainment ‘Tobacco Road’ started.

This was a good move as the band soon had the place swinging, or more accurately staggering to some classic rock tunes, and when the band stopped for a well earned rest, (they were getting on a bit and did not have the stamina they used to have). The opportunity was taken to allocate the much sought after trophies.

ORDER of the BOOT – Carol Matthews (For her services above & beyond during the rally)

When the awards were finished the band returned, fully revitalised after ‘poppin’ some Philisan (to help fortify the over forties) and continued no doubt to have private bets on which overweight drunken rallyist would collapse first from to much boogying.

However the overall fitness and dancing skills were grossly underestimated and everyone continued to party until the bands Philisan wore off and they packed in.

Then it was of to the tea & coffee tent again to relive last nights fight over the best biscuits

A few hours later when everyone was happily dreaming about their own individual fantasies and perversions, Big Phil woke up fully refreshed and ready to party. Only to find the pub in darkness and the only available music was the combined overture of numerous snores and farts. Disappointed at realising he lived in a different time zone than everybody else he packed up and went home.

As the early morning alarm of tents being dismantled, and bikes being warmed up woke me from my alcohol induced coma, I realised that a strong cup of coffee was the only thing that could revive my remaining brain cells. So with the smell of Nescafe guiding my nostrils I headed for the drinks tent.

The rest of the morning was spent saying goodbyes, and packing up the rally site. With the unanimous feeling that it had all been a great success.

The only thing left to do was for ‘Banger’ (aka J.K.Rowling) to imagine the date for the next Flying Boot Rally.