Well.
By 10am, 5 Suzukis had arrived and two forum members in other cars.
By 10:15 we were away. We drove out of Ringwood along Maroondah Highway to just past Chirnside Park where we took a turn off to the left. This was a less-travelled short-cut through to the Melba Highway, where we got on just prior to Yarra Glen. we followed the Melba Highway up into the blackened hills still recovering from the Black Saturday Bushfires and took a left, off the Highway at Castela.
At this point I got an SMS from Gazuga - he was making a huge effort to meet up with us, coming from Denilequin in NSW. He was hoping to meet up with us at Kilmore.
Still more climbing hills found us in Kinglake - one of the townships devastated by the fires. - Great to see the rebuilding well on the way, but still many caravans implied that the work is far from done yet! People must be still doing it tough in that area. I was amazed to see how much timber had been cut down and was being processed. - Too late for many unfortunately. we drove on through to Kinglake West and then on to Whittlesea.
The fires did not get that far, so the blackness was now behind us. At Whittlesea we headed for Wallan, where after nearly two hours of driving we stopped for a quick loo-break. A casual glance at the watch showed it was now 12:15 and theoretically we were supposed to be arriving in Lancefiled about this time... We still had some k's to cover, and so got back in the cars and bugged out. Another SMS from Gazuga to check on our progress as we were coming into Kilmore, indicated he was not far away. So at the Lancefield turn-off, we pulled over, only to get out, walk down the line of cars and find Gazuga had found us and tagged onto the end of the line!
So back into the car again, and we were off to Lancefield. We arrived about a half hour later than I had anticipated, but given we left 15 minutes later than I had planned, we were doing OK. We bundled en-masse into the Lancefield Pub and ordered lunch. Not too sure what time we got away - no-one was too fussed about the time... Holk gave his apologies but had to bug out, so took off home from there.
We took a 15 minute detour to check out a property in Lancefield that Ian thought we'd like to look at - then back on the road toward Mount Macedon. After a reasonable climb we found ourselves at the Mount Macedon Memorial Cross reserve, where, the weather had closed in a little and it was bitterly cold outside our toasty warm Suzukis... In spite of the cold we got out for a bit of a look-see and walked to the cross to take in the view.
Returning to the carpark, we all migrated to the Cafe there and bought hot coffees with which to thaw ourselves! Sitting inside, enjoying the coffees, and coonara fire, we eventually warmed up and after I dunno, half an hour maybe, we decided we'd better make more tracks. At the Cafe, several participants said they would be peeling off at different points along the route home, which was fine. Three cars completed the return trip to Ringwood, arriving after dark.
Another good, long, (if bitterly cold) day.
I've put some pics here:
http://www.tamon.org/gallery/v/members/ ... MelbAug09/
And I have some Hi-res pics of the participants Suzukis (approx 4.5Mb each x2 - driver's side & front) if you'd like me to send you a copy, PM me your email addy...
Cheers
don't know which it was exactly but boy am I glad it's gone 
.See you all in the morning.