Weekender 2020 ~ Here we go again

Originally Posted by uksurfer

Does this mean that both days involve looking at planes?

Hi mart, not at all, there is other stuff in the melting pot. The national ride out to Cosford was really an acknowledgement to the VE Day change of bank holiday and to satisfy folk that may have been tempted to miss the weekender in favour of the VE bank holiday.i agree at present we look a bit plane centric .....

[DaveR]

Re. trip to RAF Valley PM sent to Mike

Dave

[Goofle]

I'll be along for the Saturday ride again if that's ok Mike?
I'll PM you my details shortly regarding the RAF Valley bit shortly...

(edit to say I'm hoping to be on my Monster - we shall see...)

[Joshua Brew]

Hi Mike

As i only live up the road i wont be staying at the hotel. i would like to attend one of the ride outs over the course of the weekend (the Anglesey one sounds good) and perhaps a few drinks at the hotel with you all in the evening. is there a meal planned for sat night? i could bring the better half! i shall keep my eye out for the final itinerary.

Originally Posted by DaveR

Re. trip to RAF Valley PM sent to Mike

Dave

.... Hi Dave , yes confirmation received thank you, sorry missed these posts somehow

Originally Posted by Goofle

I'll be along for the Saturday ride again if that's ok Mike?
I'll PM you my details shortly regarding the RAF Valley bit shortly...

(edit to say I'm hoping to be on my Monster - we shall see...)

Hi Ian, great stuff mate, I am sure there will be lots of people wanting to see the work on your tank....or rather the end result!

See you on the Saturday if not before,

Originally Posted by Joshua Brew

Hi Mike

As i only live up the road i wont be staying at the hotel. i would like to attend one of the ride outs over the course of the weekend (the Anglesey one sounds good) and perhaps a few drinks at the hotel with you all in the evening. is there a meal planned for sat night? i could bring the better half! i shall keep my eye out for the final itinerary.

Hi Josh,
It would be rude not to given how close you are ! Yes a meal is planned for Saturday, we can get non residents in no bother at all. Ride out to Anglesey Saturday,Cosford on Sunday......all we need is some dry weather !.....when you say better half you mean chauffeur.... I like your style

Hi Folks, this thread is intended to get the "elephant out of the room" , we are a little short of 7 weeks away from the Weekender and there is a global health issue playing out that we cannot ignore.
My preference is to take control of this before "it" takes control of us, the way to do this is eliminate risk. This is where I believe we are today, in no particular order:-

Risk 1~ Public places & Gatherings ~ We know that there will be advice shortly on what constitutes a gathering so numbers are unconfirmed but chances are high that public events will be cancelled. We have all our eggs in the RAF basket for the Weekender,RAF Valley on Angelsey for Saturday and the museum at Cosford for the Sunday Ride out. Cosford is posting on their website that it will take govt advice, I would rate this 60/40 chance of cancellation due to closing access to the public.

Risk 2 ~ Hotel! Although they are taking Govt advice Helen has confirmed that if a guest is confirmed to have the virus, the Hotel will close for a period of 14 days. We dont know who is staying or what could possibly happen so impossible to put a risk factor on this, what we do know however is that if a guest tests positive say 10 days before we are due to arrive then we have no venue, I would rate this 50/50 chance of cancellation.

Risk 3 ~ Guest speakers, we know know the govt are planning to limit exposure of the over 70 age group to the potential risk of catching the virus. Our guest speakers Peter ,Tommy rob and Phil Morris have already contacted me confirming they do not want to do the event in May. Risk 100/0 cancellation!

Risk 4 ~ us!!, statistically some of us will get this thing, whether it is before the event or knowing a friend /partner who has come into contact with someone who has it leading to self-isolation. Either way it would mean a cancellation for those individuals. Hotel staff may catch it which is a double whammy as the Hotel would then close ,Ref Risk 2 above.

We can of course continue to plan and stick to the pre-arranged date, we can have a weekender without any arranged events, as long as we have a bike and a destination hey, however we cant have a weekender without a venue. My personal opinion is given the risks above,this is too much of a chance to take and the event should be postponed.

I realise that this messes up with peoples diaries /leave requests and everything that goes with it...we seem to have been here before folks !! However I think postponing takes the risk and anxiety out of the weekend and we will once again be in control of our own destiny. Helen confirmed she had some cancellations this weekend so the threat is quite real to us all.

She has available dates in September that would accommodate us, nothing in july or August. I didnt ask about June as I think it would be too soon.

This thread is aimed specifically at the attendees for which without you there would be no weekender, the thought of not having one is sad to say the least but we must be realistic and postpone this until later in the year.

As always ,all thoughts and contributions welcome,

Mike

[Mr Gazza]

Mike, you have my utmost admiration for the way you are dealing with this. It is so sad that you have been inflicted with this situation, especially after the fiasco you had to deal with last year when the hotel went bust.
I am very happy that you have made the bold and obviously difficult decision to postpone our gathering. It is the end of an anxious time for us and our conversations over the last few days.

You have my support for this and I am sure you can count on that from the rest of the membership too.. I'm already looking forward to September.. I hope we're all through this mire by then..

Well done mate.

Hey Gary, thanks for your support as always mate, this is a difficult time for all of us,I guess we will all be affected in some way by the time it plays out.

Apologies for the duplicate thread, I wanted to make sure it caught everyones attention,Rob did tutor me on"sticky thread".... but once again my IT Skills deserted me...(some might say I never had any ! ).

I dare say we may get some folk who cannot attend later in the year, indeed I may be one of them !but the show must go on,hopefully in a healthier environment for us all.

[Grumpy]

Wise decision Mike.
Whilst the UK does not yet seen to be reporting the same level of cases as the rest Europe, it's only a matter of time until the levels rise and we have, as a country, a similar situation to most of Europe.

Moving the Weekender makes sense, although like you in a way for part of September. So if I can be there i will.

[chris yeatman]

Thanks for the heads up, probably a wise decision due to current situation. Cheers

[uksurfer]

It’s a sensible decision given the situation in the uk and the rest of the world.Hard choice but probably right considering the circumstances

See you all in September!

[rollo22]

Mike I think it is a wise decision with all the unknowns.
I will go with the majority on the new date but any time is good for me.

Duncan

Thanks for the positive reaction guys to what is an unprecedented situation.fingers crossed this thing works itself through and we are good to go as a late summer weekender