Interior modifications

We're now almost packed and starting to feel that the Windy 500 has actually started. It's time now to reveal Ollys interior modification's. As we are co-owners of Lets Go Disco along with Barry Newbury there was no other way to go than......................



LED lighting, glitter ball, interior sound system, 15" TV with  DVD player and..........................

Fully operational cocktail bar of course!

Complete of course with Optics, a cocktail menu, flashing mixer, umbrella's, morello cherries and lemon slices. You can even slam a shot if thats you're bag. We have Cocktail to get us in the mood on the DVD if it's raining and sitting in Olly is the preferred option.

We're planning to rock up to a campsite and share a cocktail in a very civilised manner with our fellow Windy travellers, if we can raise a bit more for our charities along the way our bar may be more help than we first thought. Maybe a cocktail or two can be swapped for much needed services from other Windy goers with talents much needed. A meal from Lucy for starts!

Olly is dressed in her finery

Well with 1 more sleep to go Olly has got dressed at last after much help from Barney with his expertise as a member of the Auto Glym Technical support team. He has given up his time to make sure Olly looks her best on the outside and Nik & Craig have worked on the inside with help of our good friend Aaron.

To top it off a local print firm has made us some additional signs to promote our Blog and to thank those who have helped us along the way to get to this point.

We would like to make a special mention of the following   =

Watermans Jewellers  -  www.watermansjewellers.co.uk

Lets Go Disco    -   www.lets-go-disco.com

Abyss Dive, Fuerteventura   -    www.Abyss.Fuerteventura.com

Rob Wheal Photography

We would like to say a special thanks to Bamboo creations, who have provided the extra logo's for us. 

  www.bamboocreations.co.uk

So here she is......................

It took some effort to get her name on and I don't think Barney was all that pleased with us in his ear. Hannah, his girlfriend also joined team "Auto Glym".

Team Newlywed did do some of the work but Barney supervised the job and being a perfectionist didn't let u get away with the "that will do" approach.

The rear doesn't look too bad either.

Even I had a go, notice I have a small corner to smooth out, they just don't trust me! Whats my job in this team, of course cook, bottle washer and photographer!

The adventure begins

Blog 17th of June

Delayed updates as strange and bizarre adventures................

Start at the start I guess. Packing of the car ready to leave was a huge challenge and Nik was not amused. Pack, re-pack and the nightmare continued. The debate on how to maximise the space was heated and as you know we have a Limo so there is plenty of space, or was till we filled it up.  Our good friends Dave and Kirstan were coming down in convoy and bringing Mum but arrived to enjoy the last minute stress.

We finally got away at 12 ish with an unexpected return of Az to wave us off. In convoy the Boyntons and Team Newlywed hit the road, southbound to Weymouth. We had a quick stop off at the Boyntons lovely Art Deco style hotel on the hilltop overlooking Weymouth beach. The Reveria looked a great place to stay. In character we changed clothes into our Newlywed gear. Nik in Tux and me in dress complete with veil and bouquet. Craig was supposed to bring his suite but forgot so as Team Newlywed chauffeur he had to borrow my Dads. Priceless!!!!! Tan and 2 sizes too big with his straw hat he morphed into Manuell our mexican driver for our tour of Europe, he slipped into character too well.  We hit Morrisons in character to stock up the cocktail bar in the back of Olly. We did get some odd looks.

The big send off started from 6.00 at Weymouth football club. We arrived to find most of the vehicles were already there and the starting grid was marked up with team positions. We are Team 27, the date we married. On arrival we drove the circle of the car park and Olly got to make her big entrance. It was finally great to meet the teams and check out everyone's vehicle of choice and modifications to make the journey comfortable and some extra's added just for comedy value. Team Mobster had their mob outfits on, think Bugsy Malone! Team Lotus took on the full James Bond in their Tux's with bow ties undone, very suave. Sleeping quarters were interesting! The guys with the Ambulance had done a great job of cleaning out the blood, guts and smell of antiseptic. Nice kitchen area where a stretcher would normally be. We were all surprised to see how The Morris minor would cope on the long drives and more importantly how they had squashed all their gear in such a small space. Especially as we had trouble with all the space we had!!!!!!

After photo's,  recordings for the local hospital radio and more photos it was nearly time for the off. We were very lucky to have had some great support to wave us off from both Dave and Kirstan who also enabled my Mum to come along too. My brother, Barney joined us to see the result of all his hard labour take to the highways. It was a photo opportunity he just couldn't refuse! Friends from work Caroline, Mel and Helen also made the journey and Nik made them a special cocktail from bar Olly. Complete with Glitter ball spinning and LED lighting, saving the horn until the off. The atmosphere was electric with all teams pumped and ready to go. In disbelief though that we were all at this point and almost on our way but to where..............

Kirstan Boynton we salute you

Dave Boynton we solute you

Mummy Dobbs we solute you

Craig rocks out his Manuell our Mexican driver

Nik raises his hat to you all,it's going to Ben an adventure

Caroline, Helen and Mel came down all the way from Banbury to wave us off

Steve announced the money. Raised so far was at £16,000 with more coming in so to this point the efforts to raise money had been immense. Following on Steve announced destination 1 was to be.....................

Thank you to those who have helped us get on our way

We're on the move, almost so time to say some thanks to the following who have helped to get us to the start!

Bamboo Creations   -    Bamboocreations.co.uk

  

Who have helped us with some additional sign's for Olly to promote our Blog

Rob Wheal Photography   -     Robwhealphotography.com

Who shot the pictures of our wedding and the amazing  picture at the start of our Blog. Rob has also contributed to the Fundraising on our Just Giving Pages.

Watermans Jewellers          -       Watermansjewellers.co.uk

David gave us a day we'll never forget where we made each others wedding rings.  So special and a really lovely guy. We definitely recommend it to anyone else becoming "Team Newlywed".


Who Abyss Dive center in fuerteventura  -   Abyss.fuerteventura.com

A great destination to learn to Dive with great instructor's. As an Occupational Therapist I'm very impressed,they have trained to be able to take someone who has a Disability and enable them to have an experience at Diving by finding ways to be creative to maximise ability.

Lets Go Disco     -   lets-go-disco.com

Our inspiration for Olly's interior modification's and has helped through gigs and events to be able to even take part in The Windy 500.

Raffi at Hinksey MOT centre, Oxford who has donated a free MOT to get us going

Mark Kershaw at  who arranged for Olly to get some new boots (wheels) to keep us stuck to the road on those mountain pass's

Karen and Paul at  RBCpetcare.co.uk

Their kind donation towards a tyre for Olly 

Huge thank you to Barney Dobbs for making Olly look her best for our wedding day, I don't think she will have ever looked that great in all of her 24 years. Barney has given us a lot of his time and hard graft and we all really appreciate it. Auto Glym should be very proud.

But most importantly our families and friends who have all helped and supported us along the way.

Lastly but in no means least is to thank those of you who have dipped into your pockets and helped us raise funds for our chosen charities. Every pound is a great help to enable The Air Ambulance and Julia's House Hospice deliver the services which we at some time in our lives may need to provide care for us or our loved ones.

And it begins.....................

 

Minus 3 days and counting

We have officially passed the marker of 1 week to go. We are now on a day by day countdown. The dining room is looking more and more like a jumble sale of things to pack but Olly on the other hand is looking awesome.

Once again my brother has come to put his skills to good use and got the Windy logo's on with us all lending a hand. Not so helpful when we're all shouting left a bit, right a bit! We left it to Hannah, his patient girlfriend to give the final opinion. She can take his death stare!

Craig was, as usual under the bonnet and doing some mean work on the wiring. Lots more needed based on the up grades!

Aaron and Nik have been working on the interior modification's and I am impressed, we are now super classy!

I was on camp kitchen preparations and on a mission to pack all domestic supplies into our 1 allocated box. I then had to make sure the seating arrangements were all fit for purpose. That takes time and dedication and a full review takes at minimum 20 min's per chair and in sunny conditions. In summary all passed and Hannah and Beckie  also took part in the seating assessment process. Good work seating testing crew.

Now to more packing.......................................................I am bored of packing now!
A pot noodle, pair of pants and a toothbrush will have to do.

Getting Olly and us ready for the big adventure

We've turned our attention to getting Olly and us ready for the big off seeing as it's less than 3 weeks away!

Olly was due an MOT and following on from Niks plea on Radio Oxford a really nice guy from a garage in Oxford called into the radio to say he would MOT Olly for free. Raffy from North Hinksey MOT centre took charge of our precious Olly and although she failed initially he rectified the small problems and she was all good to hit the highways. We would would highly recommend him and he is a really lovely guy too. Give the Garage a call if your from the Oxford area and I am sure he'll be able to help. Raffy was inspired to help us out as it reminded him of his crazy adventure in 1975 when he drove a Transit van to Pakistan.

A huge thank you goes out to Raffy and the crew at his garage.

Raffy sends Olly off on her way

We have also sorted the Insurance and finally found a company who would insure Craig and not charge ridiculous prices as Craig is under 25. Things are falling into place and lots of ticks were made on the list of things to do. We finally decided on the accommodation of choice after months of debating.  We're camping for as much as we can tolerate to save our cash and to enjoy the whole experience at the campsites. We have debated on options of tent; our Geodesic - Good height to stand up in and space to store stuff but takes time to put up, Pop-up tents - easy to set up and pack down but no space to stand up and get dressed in, new tent altogether! Guess what, we have a new tent (we have a little collection of tents, one for all occaision's). We have settled on a Coleman instant 4. We spotted it last year but it was too expensive. However, Go outdoors have and we decided to go for it. Goes up in 1 minute they say! And.............................................it actually does (well when you know what your doing). It was so quick to put up and take down but will be cosy inside for the 3 of us. We hope it will be nice and quick after a long day driving when all we want is a cold beer and shower followed by some grub. We'll report back on it's success.

The hunt for new camping chairs has also been a mission. But finally after an hour trying them out at Go outdoors we settled on our personal choices. I tried mine out while doing a car boot sale on sunday to raise some cash. It was really comfortable, so much so that I was happy for customers to help themselves. It's no wonder I only made £27.

On Bank Holiday Monday all our camping gear was pulled out the shed to be cleaned and checked. We had hoped to have camped by now but to be frank the weather has just been shit until this weekend. The garden will have to do for a camping run as we're running out of time fast.

We have dipped into our wedding gift vouchers and made our first purchases. A Nespresso machine, not much help for the Windy but we will save money by not having to go to Costa etc. Our second will help, a fully loaded Sat nav but with me not trusting technology I have a back up old style paper version. Craig will have to learn to use an old school map and fast.

Officially now Team Newlywed

We are officially now Newlyweds and can now take up the team name for real. 

We married on the 27th of April in Adderbury Church and then made our way into Oxford for our reception. Craig was our Chauffeur and Olly as our chariot . Both performed their roles fantastically and scrubbed up well for the big event. Craig had his Chauffeur hat on and Olly had been buffed and polished by my little brother and was unrecognisable. Huge thank you to Barney Dobbs.

It was the Day of Dance in Adderbury village and we were danced out of the village after the wedding by one of the village Morris dance groups. It was so spontaneous and just perfect to show Olly off in all her glory. We had the rest of the guests traveling behind in the vintage Double decker bus. Nik's Dad loved this as he spent most of his working life on the Buses.

We had the most amazing day we could ever have dreamed and hoped for. We had planned our wedding for so long and I had driven Nik,our family, friends and all involved mad with lists and instructions. It all payed off. Nik pulled out all the stops and I was treated to surprise after surprise. I'm not sure if I trust him or our family and friends now as they all managed to keep such huge secrets from me! All of which were amazing so I'll have to forgive them all. As you may have realised our first love is Formula 1 and I always said to Nik I would rather an F1 helmet than a diamond well, turns out I got both..........................

Answers on a post card, who's helmet is this?

We even went for something different with our "cake". We had a chocolate Formula 1 sculpture of car parts.

We were also lucky enough to have some of the Windy 500 crew join us in the evening. Team 26, Lucy and James Howard came along in Milly. The 38 bus to Weymouth crew, Steve Blackmore and family came along in Jezebel to celebrate with us and Lucas didn't stop dancing from the minute the music started. We'll have to get the tunes pumping round the camp fires so he can show you all his moves.

One of the huge surprises was our band. Nik had said we couldn't have Candy Apple Blue which is a jaw dropping function band which has everyone up and dancing. Guess what he lied as did they and nearly all our guests! I nearly jumped out of my skin when I heard Steven, the lead singers voice over the Mike coming from behind me. It was the icing on the cake of the most perfect of days. Our first dance would not have been the same without them.

Our First Dance - Nat King Col, Let there be love

Aaron Taylor, Best Man sings his song written about our Windy 500 Honeymoon

One of our best men and very great friend, Aaron Taylor wrote 2 songs for us one of which he played in the church and another which was all about our Honeymoon and he played it at our evening reception. I'll get him to post the words onto the blog for you all to read. If I can work out how to do it I'll put a link on to the song so you can hear it!

We had a mini Honeymoon in The Lake District at Bowness and this involved no driving and a long train journey but this was a break for Nik as he drives for a living. He'll make up for 4 days of not driving in the 23 days of driving ahead of us in less than 3 weeks time!

On our honeymoon in Bowness at Portoe restuarant