BUXTON 2010

The annual BBQ with Hervey Bay was held July 18th at Buxton - a beautiful spot on the river about halfway between our two clubs.
It's a leisurely drive down the Bruce Highway for us and we turn off 10km south of Childers and head towards the coast.

There's a pleasant park with good facilities right on the river's edge (quite near the public boat ramp). We make a rowdy lot and generally take over the tables and gas BBQ's.

Why do we do it?

The rivalry between our two clubs has become legendary fostered by two good sports - the Club President's. Both Rusty VK4JM and Wade VK4WM let the nonsense continue each year as we accuse the other team of cheating us out of the Pat Dryden Memorial Trophy.

The rivalry even extends to how many members turn up for the BBQ - WE WON... we won... we had 16 and they only had 11....

Never did man and woman compete so hard for a piece of wood and plastic.
The real competition centres around the public contest called the Harry Angel sprint. It's a 106 minute long Amateur Radio contest (106 minutes to honour the 106 years of Harry's life).
The trophy goes to the club - not with the highest score - but with the highest score AND member participation and there's a long mathematical formula used to divine the winner.
Each year the trophy is not without contention as a certain club has been known to bring in Superstars on honorary membership status in an attempt to win.... and this year we attempted an emergency meeting to alter the rules - in an attempt to multiply our final Score by the number of club member's attending the BBQ - we felt it was only fair......

This measure was shot down by the Hervey Bay club and the scores had to stand. Yes, it's terribly official... we lost.