DDMBC Paddler Day 2008

[Eddy Matthews]

Hans Freund (scotfriend) arrived today with a couple of friends.... Great to see him again. This afternoon we went down to Hartlepool Marina and Hans sailed his Graupner Glasgow tug alongside the PS Wingfield Castle - He even tried to push the ship with his model, but it may need just a little more power

Glorious weather, and the same is forecast for tomorrow

[Eddy Matthews]

Well, I've just got back home from our Paddler Day - Got there at 7am this morning, and it's now 7:30pm... I'm knackered!!

But anyway, an absolutely fantastic day, LOTS of models and modellers. Perfect weather, and everything ran like clockwork. Hopefully everyone that attended enjoyed the day, at least everyone that I spoke to said they had...

We had visitors from England and Scotland, Germany and Sitzerland....

Sadly I didn't get a chance to take any photos myself, but we had one of our club members, Dave Wood, who did nothing else all day long - So there will be LOTS of images to come, though it may take a week or so for me to get them all sorted.

The prize for "Best Model on the Water" went to Sandy Thomson of Tynemouth MBC for his gorgeous model of the Jeanie Deans. This was voted for by everyone that attended, so it wasn't just one person (or our club) that decided the outcome - A fully justified result!

The prize for "Best steam powered model" went to Peter Massey for his sternwheeler Bickerstaff.

A special thankyou has to go to everyone that made the trip down from Scotland, especially the guys from Knightswood MBC in Glasgow who came with their large model of Talisman, and to Peter and Andrew from Edinburgh MBC. Also to Hans,  Jörg and Daniel from Switzerland and Germany for making such a huge effort to attend with about 10 models between them!

I thoroughly enjoyed the day and it made all the effort worthwhile!

Regards
Eddy

[Eddy Matthews]

I forgot to add, a much fuller report will follow once I get all the photos sorted, and I'm sure Bob Golder, Walter Snowdon, and others will add their take on the event over the next few days....

Eddy

[Eddy Matthews]

The day started at 7am for me, off to the club to help with all the bits and pieces that needed doing ready for the visitors to arrive....

When I got there, Walter Snowdon and Geoff Fish, were already getting on with things - So, to get the priorities right, I put the kettle on for a cuppa.... I don't even get started until I've had at least three cups of tea, but I think the others appreciated it none the less

Over the course of the next hour, most of our club members who had agreed (or been pressganged), into various jobs arrived, and things really got into full swing. By about 8:30am everything was ready. Visitors started to arrive from 9am onwards.... Just to show the commitment of some of the Paddler guys, we had guests who had made the effort to travel from Knightswood MBC in Glasgow with their superb 7ft plus model of the Talisman, Andrew Gray and Peter Sneddon from Edinburgh MBC with Sir william Wallace and the sternwheeler Southern Belle, and without doubt the furthest travelled was Hans Freund (scotfriend) Jorg and Daniel who had even resorted to buying a Transit van to transport all their models from Germany and Switzerland! Who could ask for more?

Whilst an event such as this is never going to attract hundreds of people, a good turnout was apparent. Although I didn't count them, I would think that we had 60 people turn up, most of whom were there with models to sail or display. Some of them had travelled a significant distance as explained above. Some had even arranged an overnight stay in local B&B's so they would be there bright and early!

At this point, special thanks should be given to everyone from Darlington & District MBC, who did a sterling job in making sure everything ran smoothly throughout the day - Far too many people to name individually, and even if I did, I'd be certain to miss someone and cause offence! Bit two (none club members) do deserve a mention, namely Sue and Nicola, who made sure everyone was fed and watered throughout the day. Thankyou ladies!!

The day was designed to be as light hearted as possible, with no competitions, or anything like that. Just a day for people who love paddlers to get together and have a pleasant days sailing with likeminded people. A few bouys had been laid out to give something to steer around, but that was about as close as it got to any sort of competition! Fortunately, the weather was glorious.... Fine, dry and warm, with just a very light breeze - Perfect paddler weather!!

Everyone got on extremely well, and the range of paddler conversation was unbelievable. But with guests from England, Scotland, Germany, and Switzerland, and models of Scottish, English, American, German, French, Australian, African, and Swiss paddlers, there was certainly something to interest most people. Everyone I spoke to said that they enjoyed the day, so we must have got something right! But of course we're always open to suggestions when it comes to improving future shows!

During the day, everyone was given a voting slip, to vote for what they considered "The best model on the water". This was extremely closely contested, and only one vote seperated no less than four different models! At 4pm, Ian Archibald (our club secretary) made the presentation. The trophy, a book and a DVD was won by Sandy Thomson of Tynemouth MBC for his superb model of the Jeanie Deans. A second prize, for "Best steam powered model on the water" was won by Peter Massey for his model of the sternwheeler Cliff Bickerstaff...... Ian continued to thank all the Darlington guys for their help and support, and just as he was coming to a close, Hans Freund (scotfriend), from Switzerland suddenly stood up and asked if he could say a few words....

Hans started by reminding me of a calendar he had sent me late last year - Hans works for the BMW-Sauber F1 team, and he had sent me one of their F1 calendars. It had to be the biggest damned calendar I'd ever seen, and I said as much to him..... He then said something along the lines of "The Swiss only do BIG"! At that point, Daniel got up and handed me the largest Toblerone (Swiss chocolate bar) I've ever come across! It was Hans' way of saying thankyou for all the effort I'd put in to the Paddler Day - Needless to say I'm not the only one involved, it's a team effort, but his gesture was definately appreciated. I couldn't stop laughing!  So a sincere thankyou to Hans, Jorg and Daniel!

At that point, most people started to say their goodbyes and leave - Thankfully everyone seemed to be smiling, so it must have been okay? Walter Snowdon and I were the last to leave after locking up for the night - It was 7:30pm when I got home, tired but happy...

So anyway, did the day go well? You bet your life it did!.... Will we do it again for a third year? Just try and stop us!

Finally, a huge thankyou to everyone that turned up, and made it such a pleasant event. We hope to see everyone again next year, and maybe a few new people as well? And for those that couldn't attend, I hope the photographs will give just a small "flavour" of the proceedings....

Regards
Eddy

[Eddy Matthews]

I've added descriptions to the images I've posted so far in the Photo Gallery - All done from memory as I don't have the paperwork from the big day yet, so don't shoot the messenger if I got anything wrong!!

Regards
Eddy

[Eddy Matthews]

A load more images have been uploaded to the 2008 Paddler Day gallery - My thanks to Andrew Gray of Edinburgh MBC for all of these!

Regards
Eddy

[Eddy Matthews]

I've added descriptions to the first 8 pages of images from the 2008 Paddler Day, but I'm losing the will to live - It's a damned boring job!! 

So I'll continue tomorrow.... After a refreshing nights sleep.

Eddy

[Eddy Matthews]

I've now caught up with all the descriptions in the photo gallery - Ready for the next batch of images to arrive!

Regards
Eddy

[Eddy Matthews]

I've started to upload yet more photos from the 2008 Paddler Day into the photo gallery - Still more than 100 to go, but hopefully they should all be online later tonight.

My sincere thanks go to Dave Wood of Darlington & District MBC for this batch - Dave spent the entire day photographing models, and taking details of who owned and built them, as well as names and addresses, and member clubs etc etc - So that this time we had a full record of everything that was there!

Included in these photos are a few models that were missed in earlier postings...

Regards
Eddy

[Eddy Matthews]

Okay, that's all the photos uploaded...... What a boring job!! I hope they are appreciated....

Regards
Eddy

[steamboatmodel]

Hi Eddy,
The photos are very much appreciated. I have just ran them as a slideshow and plan to go through later slower, That's when the questions and requests for detail will come.
Regards,
Gerald

[mjt60a]

Just had a look through all the photos, it looks like it was a fantastic day, maybe I need to rent a van for the weekend next year!
Some beautiful models on the water, must've been difficult to choose a 'best' one (I like the Marchioness myself...reminds me of Caledonia)

[Eddy Matthews]

Funnily enough I liked the Marchioness best myself..... Wonder why that was? 

Eddy

[Eddy Matthews]

Attached is Andrew Grays report of the 2008 Paddler Day as submitted to "Swan Dodgers", the Edinburgh MBC monthly magazine...

My thanks to EMBC for allowing me to republish it....

Eddy