Halfpint on the 3 Peaks run.

[Halfpint]

The MOA have had heaps of great runs organised this year to celebrate 50yrs as a Moke Club 

We couldnt attend many, leave from work and other pre planned trips limited us this year, but chose the "3 Peaks" over the weekend leading up to Melbourne Cup as the one Mrs HP and I could both attend.
I also asked a friend to come along and he happily jumped into Gulliver and had a ball driving a Moke and meeting everyone along the way.

It involved a tour around the central west of Victoria based in Donald, basically between Bendigo and Mildura. Somewhere I hadnt ventured before.

Of course, a very important friend decided to get engaged on the Saturday night  .
All our planning was thrown into chaos. I enjoy chaos so it wasnt really a big deal, but it delayed our start until Sunday Morning  .
This forced a 5am start and a 700klm first day to meet the group doing the Painted Silo run.

I have to thank all of the people who organised such a wonderful run, and all the people who went along, I think there were over 20 Mokes in total, some attended for the whole trip, some arrived a little late ( like us) and some just came for a day or 2, thanks heaps everyone, it was great fun driving and hanging around with you all  .
So a few pics, in no particular order, of some terrific back roads only locals know, and we totally enjoyed 

















It was Tuesday, and I still had a few days off, so we decided to continue on for a couple of days. Wayne headed home in Gulliver when we hit the Hume, and Mrs HP and I decided to head to Melbourne via Seymour, Yarra Glen ( Chocolate  ) then into Ringwood for the night.

Wednesday night was the MOA monthly meeting. We get very few opportunities to make a mid week meeting, so this was it, our 2nd ever attendance after many years as members. Also, someone had driven their Moke all the way from the QLD Sunshine Coast just to attend  , Top effort Dave  , so we had to go  .
To fill in the day, we drove PRU over to St Kilda for no other reason than to check out the "Oslo", the old building being renovated on the current season of Channel 7's "The Block".



Lunch at St Kilda foreshore, Dinner at Daisey's, then we went to the meeting which was good fun, and this morning had a magic run out via Healsville, the Black Spur (Awesome road  ) , a little detour through Marysville, then Bonny Doon and Benalla for lunch. The last 100k's was boring on the Hume.

1800 k's in total, both Mokes hummed along no problem at all, we had a ball as always,

Cheers
HP

[Maddog]

Fantastic HP! Good to hear you had a great time, and your Mokes behaved.

Really like that Victorian silo art - wish ours was half as good.

Thank you so much for sharing.

Cheers, MD.

[Halfpint]

Thanks Maddog,
They are amaazing. We missed the visit to the Murtoa Stick Shed (Look it up) and Sheep Hill Silos because we were late starters, but the ones we saw are very impressive with their detail and shear size.
HP

[Terry]

Hi,

on the Brim silos(2nd one down) the images of the people captured could be from any period in the last century or two as the weathered looks and clothing haven't changed much, except on the last silo out of shot on the right of an old guy well into his 80's has a smart phone clipped to his shirt. Doh!

I provided the mechanical entertainment for the weekend by blowing out my head gasket between #3 & #4 just before lunch on Sunday and was unable to get the Moke started again as the fuel kept getting blown back out the carby. So with Vern in his BV towing me and Scott M. scouting head to warn us of traffic and make sure the roundabouts were clear we managed the 60km trip back to the park without stopping, although I did have to run over a traffic island to stop the tow strap from getting caught up on a Keep Left sign.

As I was taking the head off to confirm the problem was a head gasket I was starting to think I had used up the spare head gasket I carry for the 1100 at some stage and sure enough when I pulled out the pack of gaskets I had 4 1275 gaskets and nothing for the small block. I waited for the pack to return and no-one amongst them had a spare head gasket so I went a head with a bit of a theory that a 1275 Gasket head could be used. However the dead slow turning over the next morning and the green water flying out of #3 suggests that it was just a theory that hadn't really been tested. There is a an extra hole in the head, not the block, between #2 & #3 that the fire ring on the larger gasket didn't quite clear.

So off with the head again to confirm that was the cause and a few calls to Horsham Auto parts suppliers all saying they could have a gasket there by Thursday.  However at the last place I called Kevin knew a couple of locals that might have one so I had to call him back. Turns out an ex-MOA memebr did have one and so I went for a 3 hour drive in the afternoon with SpiceMoke to pick up a gasket and check out a collection of Mokes and Minis(well a Manton Sports850 but the rest of the minis were wrecks). A bit of a legend in the club before my time I got to see the infamous fibreglass front ends, one on the Moke that rolled at the Templestowe Hillclimb, https://www.moke.org.au/moa-video-clips/182-1987-templestowe-hill-climb (2:35) and a curious collection of other vehicles and pop culture.

With the head back on just on dark with a steady flow of people just hanging around to have a look or chat it took a little bit of fiddling to get it running right the next morning but by the time we left Donald it was back to its old self and made it home no probs.

I only got to see one silo and I didn't do the Stick Shed but instead I checked out the town, got a big bunch of useful spanners for $5 at a garage sale and went to an Antiques and Collectables auction where there were some serious buyers looking for nuggets amongst a lot of junk. However the highlight was the $3 Scones with Jam and Cream being served up by the local CWA ladies at the back of the auction hall, yummy.

It was a soaking wet start to the weekend and more than once I heard, 'Why are you in Donald, there is nothing there', but despite the cool'ish weather it was a good trip and lots of fun and I got to catch up with a few people I don't see much  from the other states.

Terry