FUN DAY 2006
report by Alan Hill

click here for pictures of the day

Friday lunch time, phew it’s hot, what’s this coming up the river? Is it the Loch Ness Monster? No it’s a Seamaster towing a 20ft pontoon closely followed by a Sealine with the lady crew hanging onto a bit of string steering the rear end of the monster. Getting some funny looks from the caravan site. It must be fun day tomorrow. Successfully get pontoons to Radcot, lots of club boats already there.

Six hours, a lot of sweat and head scratching later and the pontoon game is ready. The marquee has arrived and been erected and thanks to Tom, Steve, Nigel and others the B.B.Q’s and geezbo are erected.

Half hour sit down, something to eat then over to the Swan, just to be sociable. Tom White (Lakota Sioux) is trying to tell us how to cook crayfish, he’s an expert, but I think he’s had to much of that falling down stuff, certainly the people he’s trying to teach have. He gives up and goes back to his boat.

Saturday morning, up early, no headache, I’m beginning to like this Old Speckled Hen. Final preparations and of we go with an early start to get finished before the football kicks off.

Jill (Emotion) has dealt out Chris & Heathers conundrums sent all the way from France. The winners being Bilbo Baggins Too. Warm up with the up and over beach ball game. I can’t remember who won but I know there was about eight in the team. Bob (John Bishop) & Dennis (Emotion) were joint winners of the egg and spoon race, with Olivia & Nigel (Anatolia) winning the egg throwing. We never did catch anybody red handed but I’m sure there was some skullduggery going on. I don’t believe you can throw and catch a raw egg that far. There again I don’t know what Ollie normally throws at Nigel, maybe they get a lot of practice.

Anatolia also won the boat dressing with their cat & fiddle theme. The pontoon game next. This was won by (and it wasn’t fixed) Dennis (Emotion), Alan (Sea Chimes), Tracy & Anthony (Enchanted). It seemed to go down well and as it was so hot (you sure it’s fun day) nobody seemed to mind getting wet, which was just as well as the “young ones” men’s team Steve, Dave, Geoff & Darrell spent more time in the water than on the pontoons. They should be hanging their heads in shame though because they were beaten by the girls team, Val (Escapology), Karen (Aquacadabra), Jill (Emotion) and Bob (John Bishop) (how’d he get in there)? Second place went to Tom (Bilbo), Steve (Tempted) and Nigel & Toby (Anatolia). Really worried about Nigel and Steve, they couldn’t wait to get those girls clothes on. Steve was most upset because there wasn’t any matching shoes or handbag. They became so attached to their skirts that they were presented with them in the evening.

On to the pentathlon, I think everybody had a go and seemed to enjoy it, with the new scoring system (which we understood even if nobody else did). Geoff (Aquacadabra) was the overall winner, (how)?

And so to the round the island race. Toby, in his kayak, came home in the fastest time to receive a medal with the traditional winners being Goeff & Karen (Aquacadabra). The safety boat had to go to the aid of a few stragglers, Kelly (Escapology) should never have gone with Steve, she’d have been far better off on her own, and Pat & Trevor (Sandy Dee) deserved a medal just for attempting to row that, what was it? Bath tub around the island. They were finally unceremoniously sunk by Geoff.

Wait a minute where’s every body gone, oh it’s kick off.

And so to the evening, the footballs lost so into the marquee to drown our sorrows. The booked entertainment was unable to attend, not his fault I believe he was ordered to hospital, but we have a new resident entertainer. It’s J. D. the D. J. Thanks to him (John Douse) for standing in (at least I think he was standing). He did a great job with a good mix of music which did the trick and got people dancing.
Although the numbers were down it was a good weekend, looking forward to Eynsham.

Sea Chimes.