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ax40

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About ax40

  • Birthday June 1

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    http://www.solentoverlord.co.uk/blog/
  1. Bigredone and I did what we were asked to do - which was to alert the MV and re-enactor movements to the show. We also pointed out the need for showers, security, toilets and rubbish disposal facilitiies to be available. I passed all the contacts on to Portsmouth City Council (I was not being paid for any of this or for setting up a website). The arrangements we had discussed and the area set aside for MVs seem to have been changed since my involvement with the project. On behalf of Portsmouth City Council (with whom I have no connection) I can only apologise.
  2. Shame! if you had got her back up to scratch there was work all weekend at OVERLORD towing vehicles out of the ruts they had dug themselves!
  3. Much as I hate to contradict m'learned colleague I put together the temporary website without formal approval as it was obvious that PCC were way off schedule and somewhere was needed for all parties to register an interest in attending. In all other respects BIGREDONE is correct. I fear that I am unlikely to see anyone on the beaches as my budget does not permit me to travel even the short distance to Southsea - have a good time everyone!
  4. Just like to say thanks to all of you, living history, vehicle owners and traders, who braved the weather to attend and stayed with us for Saturday and Sunday despite the rain and mud. Without you guys there would be no show. Ideas are being floated for a mini event later in the year ... I want to take this opportunity to publically thank a very hardworking and dedicated team of people who went beyond the normal bounds of duty to turn a potential disaster into a workable show and a financial crisis into a manageable loss. Site services, Traffic, Arena, Admin and Finance teams all did a stonking job while I just wandered around looking pretty as chairmen are supposed to. Thanks to all the SOE members who did so much to keep the show running!
  5. It was actually 5 30 cubic metre loads of woodchip! Just as well we didn't buy it in bags from B&Q. The tractor and driver working long shifts over the four days of towing out did a magnificent job - not cheap unfortunately as those large Fendts drink fuel. The agricultural contractors, Bailey Brothers, have been good friends to the show over the years but even at "mates rates" we are heavily in debt to them
  6. The show is nothing to do with OVERLORD but I got targetted along with Big Red 1 to help with the MV side. The City Council website did not exist at that time so I spent an afternoon putting together a quick and dirty lash-up and running it as a sub-domain from the Solent Overlord site as, not having worked for 18 months, I couldn't afford anything better. I have been forwarding all emails for traders, living history and vehicles to the tourism office fao Craig Willock who has told me that he has replied to all by yesterday. The PCC site went live sometime in May, a little late in my opinion if the intention was to catch people before their own local parishes, villages, schools and organisations captured them for D Day 70. Hence the ....solentoverlord.co.uk part of it but it never has been nor was it intended to be part of the SOE remit to organise the event. That was purely down to PCC but they were taking so long to make a point of contact for vehicle owners I felt I had to do something. Web hosting would have cost around £80 for a decent service a sub-domain from the SOE site was £30. On an income of £72 a week the second option seemed the better ....
  7. And say hello to me as well. I may be doing anyone of many jobs. I'm the streesed looking one with the broom up my a... 38 BA 15 is my vehicle reg, 1954 Ferret. What's your vehicle?
  8. Hi Keith, let me expand on that answer - we withdrew that concession some years after ourselves withdrawing from the MVT. We felt that the concession was not needed as the MVT had introduced a show of their own on the same weekend as ours therefore all MVT members would be attending that one. We have to spend around £25,000 to stage the show before opening the doors to the public. Given three days of good weather we can make that back and make enough surplus to augment the money we have already pledged to our headline charity (this year the Fire Fighters) and to all the other charities and cadet forces we support. One day of bad weather is enough to turn a surplus into, at best, a break-even situation or, as in recent years of troubled weather, a substantial loss. This is a slightly worrying situation for a club of around 70 members. We already offer exhibitors free camping, free showers, clean toilets, decent on-site catering and free evening entertainment on Saturday and Sunday evenings. Many MVT members take us up on that offer and enjoy a relaxed three day event in the pleasant Hampshire countryside. But we do need to try and break even, averaged out over the years else OVERLORD will be no more - hence the £10 public admission charge which we ask MVT members to pay (as SOE members have had to pay at MVT events) in order to continue our charitable giving. I hope you will understand.
  9. We can offer parking on a military base, in the open, 10 miles from OVERLORD and then 10 miles to Southsea - so you will be doing 20 miles rather than 120. I would need your vehicle reg. and make and you would need some photo id - driving licence is fine - to show at the gatehouse. As for buses there is the 700 Coastliner from Portsmouth to Brighton or the rail station at Emsworth which is served by Southern so easy enough for travel to Eastbourne - one change at Brighton, £24.00 with ticket booked in advance. Only hassle is getting to either station or to bus stop, you are welcome to stay at OVERLORD until Tuesday 27th and someone should be taking stuff down that way (we have our own store on the base) and can then take you to bus or train, would have to negotiate a deal on coffees and teas with that person to get picked up several days later
  10. Several things re the Southsea Common Show: Though the main public showing will be logically over the weekend of 7-8 there are events throughout the week, from the 3rd onwards. Free camping is available from 2 to 9 June with security on site - good chance to relax before the main event and no need to rush home. If you want to get involved there will be plenty of veterans who would be delighted to get alift in your vehicle for the parades on the 3rd and 5th I've put together a quick website with as much detail as is available at the moment, applications forms for living history, vehicle exhibits and traders are on there. http://www.ddaysouthsea.solentoverlord.co.uk I've just emailed as many MVT area secretaries as I could find addresses for with details - can anyone give me contacts for IOW, Hertfordshire, North London, Shropshire and Border Counties, South Cumbria and North Lancashire and Suffolk please? Those of you who are coming to OVERLORD (all welcome!) and wish to attend Southsea without the hassle of driving a thirsty military vehicle home for the intervening few days are welcome to leave them in secure storage. We have negotiated parking on the disused runways at Thorney Island which is an active, fenced and patrolled military base about 8 miles from both OVERLORD and Southsea. It is home to 12 and 47 regiments RA Questions arising from this are best handled by using the enquiry form at http://www.ddaysouthsea.solentoverlord.co.uk/?page_id=66 OVERLORD general enquiries at http://www.solentoverlord.co.uk/blog/contact-us/everything-else/ for specific show enquiries use one of the options on the "Contact Us" tab Hope to see you at one or the other of the shows - preferably both!
  11. I left a comment last night on the developers site, he's in NZ. About ten minutes after me leaving the comment he was looking at my site. Impressive! Now the bad news - So for anyone who is running Chrome and wants to fill out a traders form please PM me via HMVF and I'll send you one you can use. The tick box on the vehicles and living history applications has been removed and replaced with a probably ungrammatical statement. You can always reach us at the SOE group on Facebook or via the contact form on the SOE website
  12. Hi Paul, application shows in logs as received February 4, 2014 18:57. It should have generated an auto-reply and then our Paul, Paul Beauchamp who has taken over from Gary Lamsdale (thanks for five years hard slog Gary!) will sort out documents and get back to you. Looks like there is a problem between the theme I have revamped the site with and the form builder plugin. I have mailed the developers of each to try and find a work around - j query is involved in there somewhere. I have no coding skills whatsoever so I'm somewhat reliant on various bits of software playing nicely together, when they don't and I shout at them to behave they take no notice Hope the weather is good for Sunday, I had an hour in the sun today and it was extremely pleasant, makes me look forward to Spring and, of course, the late May Bank holiday.
  13. Hi Paul, sorry to hear about the truck engine, hope all is well now. Website runs on Wordpress with a reasonably standard set of plugins, I'm surprised that the forms don't work too well on a Mac. It's put together on a Linux PC running Chrome as a main browser with Firefox as an alternate. I also view it from time to time on my Win 7 laptop (Chrome and IE) and viewed on my Android phone (Chrome and native browser) to check the correct working of the switcher for mobile sites Give me an hour and check the site - I'll implement a quick and dirty workaround for the check box issue.
  14. Hi Mark - all and any vehicle attending the show can be either static display - owner sat in deckchair snoozing in sun - or displayed in the arena - owner enjoying putting on a display for the crowd who are informed by the notes on the vehicle given to the commentator Heavy armour is fine, and very welcome, no restrictions on weight. The only problem we have is that the land isn't ours and the landowner is not prepared to widen the entrance gates in case it makes the site easier for travellers to get into. So the restriction is on width rather than on weight from memory we are looking at around 9 feet and a bit between posts on the main entrance - if you can wait a couple of days we will get up there and measure all three gateways to see which is widest and what the exact width is.
  15. David, Clive - thanks for filling in the forms, sitting in my inbox when I work this morning - able to read them on my phone from the warmth of my bed! I hope the process was no more painful than filling out a paper form, it's something I am developing so that we spend less on postage - quite an amount these days - and also have documents, both electronic and printed out, that are legible for the booking-in guys and for the arena team. And we look forward to seeing you in May 2014!
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