Inverell Muster 2019 News #5 - Don't get left behind - book your accommodation now! - Renault Car Club of Queensland
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Inverell Muster 2019 News #5 Don’t get left behind – book your accommodation now!
We’ve now finalised the ‘core program’ plus some of the activities for other days. There have been a couple of visits which seemed promising but ultimately weren’t possible, but fortunately, with the help of our helpers in Inverell, we’ve found even better ones to replace them with. As one door closes and another opens, as the saying goes! Details are provided later in this Newsletter, both in the preliminary program and other material. A check around the motels and caravan-park on 20 December revealed some possible double bookings, which may improve the availability of accommodation for those tardy souls who haven’t yet booked. If you haven’t booked your room yet, you’ll probably still be in luck. However, don’t leave it too long or you will miss out! Details of motels are provided later in this Newsletter. The ‘core program’ starts with registration on the afternoon of Good Friday and ends with lunch on Easter Monday. You’ll recall that we promised to organise extra events outside the ‘core program’ period in recognition of the fact that some people will have a long drive to get to Inverell. We want to make it worth their while! This however has presented a problem for us as the organisers. Inevitably when we make arrangements for any activity, we’re asked about how many people will be coming. Now for events within the ‘core program’ we’re able to give a reasonable estimate because we’ve been monitoring motel bookings. That’s not the case for events outside the ‘core program’. For those, we are really just guessing! The Muster Registration Form, which will be soon circulated to members, will ask for your firm commitment to events within the ‘core program’ and also an indication of your interest in the additional visits outside that period. For the additional events, we’re happy to accept your indication of interest on a ‘best bet’ basis. There’s no shortage of interesting things to see and do, but we need an indication of numbers before we can finalise the extra events program. Please remember that the National Transport Museum will be our base for the duration of the Muster. The NTM is less than 2km from our motels and has large areas for secure parking of trailers. We can visit the NTM at any time during the Muster and use their facilities such as showers, toilets, meeting rooms, tea and coffee making facilities. We will also have free access to the adjacent Pioneer Village. We’ll attend a ‘smoking ceremony’ at the Myall Creek Memorial site on Easter Saturday.
A preliminary program for the Muster events appears below:
Time Fri 19 Apr Time Sat 20 Apr Time Sun 21 Apr Time Mon 22 Apr
0830 0815 Assemble at NTM
0850 0845 Individual photos at NTM 0830 Assemble at NTM 0900 Assemble at NTM
0900 Assemble at NTM 0900 Town run 0920 Town run 0920 Town run
0915 Town Run 0910 Drive to Myall Ck 0930 Day run 0930 Pioneer Museum
1000 Wing Hing Long, Tingha 1000 Myall Ck visit 1000 Mystery visit 1000 Pioneer Museum
1030 Wing Hing Long, Tingha 1100 Myall Ck visit 1100 Mystery visit 1030 Pioneer Museum
1115 Wing Hing Long, Tingha 1130 Myall Ck visit 1130 Mystery visit 1100 Pioneer Museum
1145 Wing Hing Long, Tingha 11.40 Drive to Bingara Mystery visit 1130 Pioneer Museum
1200 Drive to Red Lion Tavern, 1200 Group photos at old Bingara 1200 Return to NTM 1200 Lunch @ East Bowls
Glencoe stamper
1300 Lunch – RLT, Glencoe 1230 1220 Lunch @ NTM 1230 Lunch @ East Bowls
1400 Drive to Petrol Pump 1300 Bingara RSL lunch 1300 Lunch @ NTM 1300 Lunch @ East Bowls
Museum
1410 Petrol Pump Museum 1330 Bingara RSL lunch 1330 Lunch @ NTM 1400 Day run
1400 Petrol Pump Museum 1400 Drive to The Living Classroom 1400 Swap, Show & Forum @ NTM 1430 Tractor Museum
1430 Petrol Pump Museum 1410 The Living Classroom 1430 Swap, Show & Forum @ NTM 1500 Tractor Museum
1500 Petrol Pump Museum 1500 The Living Classroom 1500 Swap, Show & Forum @ NTM 1530 Tractor Museum
1530 Petrol Pump Museum 1530 The Living Classroom 1530 Swap, Show & Forum @ NTM 1630 Tractor Museum
1600 Registration* 1600 Return to Inverell 1600 Swap, Show & Forum @ NTM 1700 Day run
1630 Registration* 1630 Return to Inverell 1630 Swap, Show & Forum @ NTM 1730 Rest
1700 Registration* 1700 Return to Inverell 1700 Swap, Show & Forum @ NTM 1800 Rest
1730 Drinks @ RSM Club 1730 Rest 1730 BBQ & video @ NTM 1830 Drinks
1800 Drinks @ RSM Club 1800 Rest 1800 BBQ & video @ NTM 1900 Drinks
1830 Dinner @ RSM Club 1830 Drinks @ RSM Club 1830 BBQ & video @ NTM 1930 Dinner
1900 Dinner @ RSM Club 1900 Dinner @ RSM Club 1900 BBQ & video @ NTM Dinner
• Registration will be available before 1600 also.
Accommodation details are set below:-
1 – Inverell RSM Club Motel (aka Club Motel) (NOT AVAILABLE - FULLY BOOKED)
58 – 62 Evans Street, Inverell
Ph: 1800 681 788, 02 6721 2438, Email: motel@inverellrsm.com.au
The manager is Noel White. This motel is next door to the Inverell RSM Club, where the official dinner will be held on Easter Saturday. It is only two short blocks walk from
the centre of Inverell.
2 - Inverell Motel (Some rooms were wrongly booked so five rooms are still available)
49 Otho Street,
Inverell
Ph: 02 6722 2077, Email: inverellmotel@bigpond.com
Room costs are generally slightly lower here, but vary with the room size and type. The manager is Mark Cunliffe and you’ll find him very friendly and helpful. This motel is
right in the centre of Inverell, with many cafes, shops, boutiques and attractions close by. It is only about 300m from the Club Motel
3 – Inverell Caravan Park
Cnr Glen Innes & Tingha Roads, Inverell
Ph: 02 6722 3036, Email: admin@inverellcaravanpark.com.au
Your friendly hosts here are Rachel and Dave Moffitt. The Inverell Caravan Park has a limited number of cabins (standard - $80 per night, Queen Bed - $120 per night),
powered caravan sites ($30 per night) and unpowered tent sites. Dogs are not allowed in the cabins.
The Inverell Caravan Park is less than 1km from centre of Inverell on the road between the motels and the NTM.
4 – Cousins Motor Inn
9 – 11 Glen Innes Road, Inverell
Ph: 02 6722 3566, Email: aoffice@cousinsmotorinn.com.au
Your contacts at Cousins are Vicki and Pam. On 20 December, some rooms were still available. Rooms reserved for Muster participants will be held only until 31 January.
After that date, rooms will be allocated to others on a ‘first come, first served’ basis.
In 2019, the dates for Easter are: Good Friday - 19 April to Easter Monday - 22 April. If you intend to arrive early &/or leave late, please remember to book for these dates
as well.
Please remember to nominate that you are a member of the Renault 4CV Register, otherwise the motels will tell you that they are
booked out.
Trailer Parking Trailer parking is available for residents at the Inverell Caravan Park. Inverell RSM Club Motel can arrange limited space available at the RSM Club next door. The RSM Club does not maintain 24 hour security for this parking area. At Inverell Motel, the limited space in a public car park in the next street is not secure. We have arranged secure trailer parking within the high-fenced grounds of the National Transport Museum (NTM) only a couple of kilometres from the centre of Inverell. The swap meet, car display and forum on Sunday afternoon will be at the NTM. Free access to the NTM on all days is included as part of your registration. Toilets and drink making facilities will be available to us during the day. We encourage those bringing their cars to Inverell on a trailer to take advantage of this secure facility. Wouldn’t it be great to see an Alpine A106 at the Muster! I don’t like our chances for that, but hopefully we’ll see some A110s, both old and new.
Forums In addition to the Swap Meeting and Car Show, we have scheduled forums on Sunday afternoon at the NTM. There will be two ‘streams’ at the forums – one to discuss matters relating to our cars and another to discuss the future direction of the Register and Musters. The Register has always conducted its affairs in a transparent, fair and ethical way. However, the Register currently does not have a Constitution that basically describes how we operate. We do not have Incorporation, a legal status which some clubs have found appropriate to separate liabilities that the club might incur from its members and office bearers. It’s all worked very well so far, but we should consider whether a more formal organisational structure would be appropriate. With this in mind, a draft Constitution will be circulated ahead of the Muster for discussion and voting. This draft Constitution is currently being developed by the Executive with some consultation with members. It will not change how we operate but, by having these matters written down, we hope that everyone will be able to know exactly what we are, particularly as membership continues to grow. We will encourage a vote of members at our general meeting to accept the draft Constitution once we have circulated it and done our best to accommodate comments that come from members. Any Constitution can be changed in the future (our draft require a 2/3 majority) if any future issues emerge that members feel need ‘adjustment’. There is also the matter of Musters. They are typically held in approximately central NSW to provide the best compromise with respect to travel distances for most members (who mainly come from Adelaide, Brisbane, Melbourne, Sydney and some country towns). In the latest edition of Fourword, Col Redmond provides a useful analysis of distances travelled by attendees of various Musters. When considering travelling distances, should weighting be given, for example, for the number of attendees from each particular area? Should we define an exact area? If we just wanted equity of travelling distance from capital cities, we’d probably end up holding all Musters in Cobar (if Perth is ignored) or Alice Springs (including Perth), which would suit nobody. We last voted on Muster location matters in 2005. Reasonable equity of travel distance is only one factor for consideration. We are attracting larger numbers to Musters, which limits us to towns in which there is sufficient accommodation. We also must think about ‘succession’. In the thirty years since the first Muster, the average age of participants has risen significantly. If we don’t take action to attract younger members, the Register and Musters will eventually decline and fail. Those of us who are retired are more flexible with travel time. At Griffith, there was the suggestion that Muster locations could alternate between northern and southern NSW. The idea was to provide younger participants from Queensland, Victoria and South Australia with only the public holidays available, the opportunity to attend at least every second Muster. There are also a number of other issues to discuss. For instance, should Musters become annual rather than biennial events? Should Mini-Musters be held in the year between biennial Musters? The Mini-Muster held in Bathurst in 2016 was certainly a great success. Should the traditional format of Musters be changed and what else could be improved? We will not resolve all these matters in one afternoon of open discussion but we hope to develop a list of ideas and discussion points to guide the Register as time goes on. We will make a record of the discussion outcomes and circulate it to all members after the Muster. Some may result in changes in 2021 to our first Constitution. Also, Musters have changed in nature over time. Musters have grown in size and evolved from a gathering of 4CVs and their owners to include all the rear-engined models. The change has encouraged more people to come to Musters, for example driving their R8 models from WA. Some members come in other Renaults or even non-Renaults and, as we get older, more may be doing this. By becoming larger and more broadly based, something of the focus and intimacy of the early Musters has inevitably been
lost. The pace of evolution of our Musters seems to be increasing and it is appropriate to obtain ‘feed-back’ from our members on how to manage this change, if indeed we need to. In discussions at Bathurst in 2016, some of us were reminded by George Cook that Musters were always intended to be social events and we definitely want to maintain that focus. If older members no longer drive 4CVs, the last thing that we would all want is to deter them from coming. It will apply to others in due course. The draft Constitution includes a definition of ‘derivatives’ of the 4CV and gives the Executive the power to make decisions about membership of others. Discussion of these and other matters is very unlikely to change the ‘culture’ of the Register or of Musters, but it could initiate a desirable regular process of consultation with Register members by the Register Executive. And, to repeat, we are getting a steady flow of new members and some written rules are a good way of helping them understand what we are about. Disclaimer: Disclaimer: The Queensland organising team for this Muster have not been much concerned by the distance to previous Musters. A number of us have expressed a willingness to drive to Western Australia should a Muster ever be held there. The Muster location discussion is not about us. It is about setting up a long term future for the Register and our Musters. The Queensland organising team have consulted members of the Register Executive on the issue of the forums and would particularly like to acknowledge the assistance of John Waterhouse in articulating the above approach.
Does this qualify as an ‘oily rag’ car, or is it just neglected and unloved?
On Easter Saturday, we’ll visit the fascinating ‘Living Classroom’ at Bingara.
These views (and the views on the other page) give a cross sectional view
of this great history of Tingha Museum. The history is continued on the
second page
A BRIEF HISTORY
(Part 1)
Wing Hing Long was established in the late nineteenth century as one of
a number of stores servicing the tin mining communities of the Tingha
district. Tin was first found in the area in the early 1870s. The discovery
created a boom in productivity and population which peaked in the late
nineteenth century and which declined as the tin was mined out.
Here was a typical general store in rural New South Wales where you
could buy anything and everything. It was a busy place and, at this time,
the building with its new timber walls and iron gabled roof demonstrated
that the town itself had moved from the slab walls and bark rooves of a
temporary mining community to more permanent structures. This was a
store with a sound business and good prospects for the future.
In 1918, Jack Joe Lowe became the owner of the store.' Born in China in
1882, he had landed at Cooktown around 1900, and spent time in Sydney
and Gunnedah before arriving, with his wife and eldest son, in Tingha in
about 1915. J.J. Lowe was the fifth Chinese owner the property. The first
was Ah Lin, identified as a storekeeper from Inverell. He purchased the
land from George Fearby in 1881. Subsequent Chinese owners were Jock
Sing of Glen Innes (1883-1887); Ah Bow, a miner from Tingha (1887-
1899); and Charles Hing, a storekeeper from Tingha (1899-1918). It is
unclear which of these early owners built the store, but building materials
and styles suggest that it was constructed some time during the 1880s.
‘Early arrivers’can visit Wing Hing Long on Good Friday.You can meet John Ellis and see his marvellous petrol pump museum on Good Friday if you’re an ‘early arriver’!
You can enjoy lunch at the Red
Lion Tavern if you’re an ‘early
arriver’.
Activities for before and after
Easter.
We’re also planning visits to a
tractor museum, Victa lawnmower
museum, Standing Stones Park in
Glen Innes, some historic mines,
lookouts and perhaps a Scottish
Manor house! There is certainly no
shortage of interesting things to
see and do in and around Inverell.
That’s all for now, folks!
From your 2019 Inverell Muster team,
Bob Gray, Lloyd Muller & Phil Harrison,
01 January 2019You can also read
