Saturday, 4 October 2014

Blackpool Steam and Vintage Vehicle Rally

A Showman's Engine and fairground organ reflected in a pool of water left over from the early morning heavy rain
The weekend of 4th and 5th October saw the debut of a new event on the rally scene, when the Blackpool Steam and Vintage Vehicle Rally was held on Blackpool South Car Park. The first day of the rally seemed to be fairly poorly attended given the amount of work that that obviously gone into the organisation of the event, which also included a travelling fair. There were a variety of exhibits, ranging from traction engines, fairground organ, steam lorry, miniature traction engines and steam lorries, tractors, commercial vehicles, military vehicles, cars, old motorcycles and static steam engines. For anybody interested in any of the above, the rally would be well worth a visit if it took place again next year. The only niggling drawback was the same affliction which has beset the Heaton Park rally for many years, the lineup of traction engines etc were all parked facing north, so although the Saturday saw plenty of sunshine, it was not possible to photograph the front of the vehicles due to the way they were parked. Obviously the organisers of the event like the ones at Heaton Park are not interested in photography!

The lineup of traction engines, rather unfortunately parked the wrong way around for photography!
A Sentinel DG8 steam lorry and traction engine
A miniature Foden steam lorry
A miniature traction engine
A miniature Foden steam tractor
A miniature Foden Steam Lorry
A miniature bus that was being used to give children rides
An immaculate John Deere tractor
Some of the preserved lorries that attended the event
Three World War Two Jeeps

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2 comments:

  1. Unknown25 October 2014 at 20:11

    Hi Alan

    Many thanks for your fantastic report on The Blackpool Steam and Vintage Vehicle Rally 2014. As the organiser of the rally, I thought I would comment on your write up. I cannot speak for Heaton Park Rally, but as an organiser, I do understand your photography problems as I was once a serious amateur photographer myself. I do hope you enjoyed the weekend and what I am trying to bring to Blackpool as an annual event. Over the weekend, I did realise the one or two problems which I hope to address next year for the 2015 rally. As an organiser, it is not always easy to organise everything which takes place on the event as sometimes making sure the event is running smoothly rather than where exhibits are parked takes precedence. Next year is now in the planning stages and we intend to move things around a little bit as we learnt a lot this year from our first rally and realise things which can be altered which we hope will make it a better rally. If you do have any comments or ideas which may help with the organisation for 2015, please do not hesitate to contact me further.
    Once again many thanks for your write up as it is articles like this and advertisement which will help make the rally bigger and better. Advertising this year was one of our biggest downfalls and we are looking for help this year with this issue.
    Kind Regards, Dave Hall (Rally Organiser)

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    1. Alan Robson25 October 2014 at 22:57

      Hi Dave,

      Thanks a lot for your feedback. I only found out about this rally about a week or so before it took place (not normally being a follower of traction engine rallies). For a first event it showed considerable promise, I just wished that I'd returned later on in the day to see the vehicles assemble at Central Pier, but although I had spoken to some of the drivers they seemed unsure about what was going to happen, so because of this ambiguity I had already left the rally well before the road run took place. I hope the lack of patronage (at least on the Saturday) won't deter you from holding the rally again, as the event showed that it had a promising future, and several local people have told me that if they'd known about it in advance they would have gone down themselves.

      Regards,
      Alan Robson

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