This photo shows my first car – a Datsun 120Y. It’s shown here parked out the front of my mother’s house back in the day – at Stratford near Gloucester in New South Wales, Australia.
car
Visiting the Family Sick
This week has been a busy one and has included visiting the sick and injured members of my family. The annexed photo shows my mother, who is in a remarkable condition, considering a week prior to the photo shown she was involved in a serious car accident that clould easily have killed her. She managed to get out with just some bruising and minor abrasions. From what I understand three cars were written off in the accident, so quite amazing. The photo also shows my grandfather who now lives at a nursing home in Wallsend.
Busy Week
As seems to happen on a regular basis, life gets in the way of my Blog posting plans and schedule. This week has been particularly difficult with various family members in hospital and a serious car accident involving my mother. So again I find myself playing catch up with emails, Blog posts and the like. At the very least I am back on annual leave for another two weeks so that will help enormously.
So that is just a quick post to let readers know why my ‘extra’ daily posts seem so few and far between at the moment – hopefully they will soon become more regular.
My Second Car – Sigma
This is a photo of my second car, which turned out to be a lemon. It was bought with the insurance money from the first and died only a month of two later, in the middle of the night (December 25) while returning from a visit to my mother’s for Christmas. My grandparents drove right past me as I was trying to flag down help in the middle of the bush (middle of nowhere). It was towed away and dumped the next day.
My First Car – Datsun 120Y
This is a photo of my first car, a Datsun 120Y. This was from over 20 years ago now and this car I also lost in a car accident. I was struck from behind and the impact caused my seat to shear off and go backwards, so I was unable to see what was happening. In short, the car was no longer able to be used because of damage to the chassis. There are a lot of good memories associated with this car.
Car Accident – 22 February 2008
I didn’t actually take this photo – it was taken by my brother while I was in hospital. The car accident occurred on the 22nd February 2008. I have no memory of the accident, but have been told that I hit a tree and went over the side of a mountain. I was told that if I hadn’t been spotted by a passing vehicle I would have been dead by morning. The accident occurred towards dusk. The impact of the accident occurred on the drivers side of the car (I’m in Australia) and the photo shows clearly why my right side suffered the most injuries as a result of the accident. What happened? I have no memory of the cause of the accident or anything about it.
So this photo doubles up for both my posts today (which means there is only one).
Stroud Parade
ABOVE: View from Silo Hill
Today was the first day of my annual leave allottment (technically it starts Monday) and so I decided to get out and do something. The Stroud International Brick and Rolling Pin Throwing Competition seeemed to be the thing to do today. So I decided I would offer my mother and her husband a seat in the car and head off to Stroud. Turned out only my mother would be coming. Disappointingly the day was wet and miserable – a typical Australian winter’s day I guess. Still, we thought we would go and have a look anyway.
ABOVE: Stroud House
We arrived at Stroud just as the main street was being closed for the parade. So we got our park and headed into the centre of town to gain a reasonable vantage point, with the option of some shelter should the weather turn especially bad. We got our place easy enough. Stroud was fairly packed for the event, but not as much as I thought it may have been – the weather probably kept many away. Still, a pretty good turn out.
So off they went, a whole menagerie of marchers in the big parade. It was an odd bunch, some seemingly out of tune with the country in which they marched and the context of the town. Everyone was having a ball, particularly the kids who seemed to be the targets of the often thrown lollies and sweets that were being hurled from the floats and marching rag tag line of marchers. There were North American Indians, whip crackers, witches and wizards, some rather fat ballerina types (pictured) and many other odd characters. There were also the police (representing 150 years of police work), firemen, SES and other services – even church floats, a debutante ball float, school groups – as it went on and on for some time. There were musical groups, including a couple of groups of Scottish bands and a ukulele group.
ABOVE: The Ballerinas BELOW: Marching Police
ABOVE: Debutante Float
Having attended the march we decided to not stay as the weather was rolling in again. We took a quick trip up to Silo Hill to enjoy the view and headed back to Gloucester.
Australia: South Australia
The Big Galah – Kimba
This photo was taken at Kimba in South Australia. It is a ‘Big Galah’ obviously, with the car I was travelling in at the front.
Australia: Queensland – Illfracombe
This photo was taken during my first major trip around Australia in 1998. The small township of Illfracombe has a great display of machinery, tractors and vehicles alongside the road. This photo shows a Dodge 4, 1932 Model DM Series. There were only about 2000 of these cars ever built.
Car Crash: 22 February 2008
Over the next little while I have decided to post photos from the past, to travel back over my photos and select photos to post from the archives. Today’s photo is from almost 4 years ago,
of what remained of my car following an accident that almost killed me.
I have no memory of the accident and what happened over the hours leading up to the accident and the hours following the accident. I apparently hit a tree and went over the edge of a mountain, suffering severe injuries as a result, including brain damage (from which I have now healed). I am very thankful to God for having not only survived the accident, but also to have recovered almost completely.
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