irishminis.ie

Any general comments on the IMM itself, no's attending, events, how did it compare to other IMM's etc?

We only visited on the Saturday, so escaped the worst of the weather/mud/etc., but there was a lot of grumbling about the organisation (or lack of), toilets (primitive), dysfunctional ticketing/queueing systems, etc., etc. I'm sure someone will be along to elaborate further!

Julie

Have a scroll through the IMM2013 Facebook page for some feedback and photos.
No doubt, once those who attended catch up on their sleep, there will be more updates on here.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/imm2013/

Have to say really enjoyed imm, but was proberbly more prepaired than others for the rain. Yes it rained heavy Thursday and Friday and the place got muddy as there wasn't enough hard parking for cars but once the sun came out sat and sun it was great. Showers were hot and clean but the toilets were squat jobs. There were two marquise for eating and entertainment so that was no problem but some people had difficulty ordering the food which could have been simplified.

So anyway back to our trip, yesterday we did a big drive to Tours and enjoyed a good evening of food and wine. This morning we went wine tasteing ,well I did and Colin went wine drinking so I ended up doing all the driving today. So with 3 boxes of wine on board we headed for Le Mans. Visited the museum and drove the circuit. Now in Rennes for the night.

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given that: my prev IMM's were Neumarkt (Germany) and Birmingham (50th ) *and* that Scarperia di Mugello was at the end of a 1500km drive *and* i don't much like tents;

i was underwhelmed:

the signage to the event was non-existent, specially seeing as in the weeks leading up to the event there had been some last minute change of venue issues.
no provision was made on the campsite for rain. the grass was left too long which kept the ground wetter for longer. in fact it was an orchard, not a camping ground, which is ironic as there was loads of flat dry hardcore in other places on the site, but hadn't been managed as tent or mobile home pitches.

the pitches were not laid out as such. leading to "land-grab" by early arrivers...
access to to the camping "hill" was by a single tarred track.. both up and down. pedestrians and cars..

the traders area was disjointed and poorly laid out, in two sections.. again, hadn't been planned and thought out.

the catering tent had a large bbq at one end that filled the place with smoke... but as the other end was open too, the wind soon whistled through to clear the smoke. and the paper plates off the tables... and the bottles.. etc.

to get food you queued up at a single cash register to pay... then over to the other side of the tent to get mains, starters, dessert & coffee or beer.. a queue for each... so for a meal of starter, main, dessert & coffee that's 4 queues, and the one chit you were given at the till had to be produced at each counter - at one point i counted 30 ppl queuing at the cash till and no-one getting food.

the food was neither cheap nor the portions generous. the entry fee included a "breakfast" and a "meal" including a drink. for my meal i was given a small plate of pasta starter and a bread roll with a sausage in it and a 300ml bottle of water. if i had paid money for it that would have cost euro 12 - later on a coffee & ice cream was over 7 euro.

there was no central noticeboard or map of the site.. no list of events or activities.. it all just seemed to .. happen. or not. the only ppl who had their act together were the BMW ppl.

i found the toilets ok, they were the continental "squat" type which is unusual here but quite common elsewhere.

true, the rain on thursday & friday didn't help but even factoring that out, it was pretty disappointing - so many missed opportunities, why stage it at a racetrack then deny access to that track, even for a parade of cars?
the location was well away from major routes... and with a good number of junctions to navigate.. why no signage? not even gps coordinates?
with a lot of flat, mud-free usable space, why not use that for tenting instead of the hill? the weather was well forecast for at least 48 hours before the event opened.
why no organised, published list of activities?

I think the trip down in a convoy of 8, sometimes 4, (occasionally 1) minis was outstanding, lovely reoads in france, spectacular camping by the lake in Annecy, lovely lunch in Susa, magical hotel in Zoagli and the trip back was unmissable.. trully wonderful. Shame the destination was dissapointing.

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Signature awaiting top-coat and lacquer....

I'd have to agree with Keith on the bulk of his description above. The only thing it seems most of us are guilty of is not opening the event programme where allegedly (still haven't done it), there were details of the cavalcade on the track, the Mille Miglia passing by and a couple of other nuggets of info.

Overall we made the craic ourselves, meeting up with old friends, providing the Sunday night entertainment with the inter-club skittles etc. We certainly weren't dependent on the host club for entertainment. They were completely overwhelmed by the weather and hadn't planned for it, even though we in Ireland were putting up the long-range weather forecast on this forum 2 weeks beforehand and I didn't bring the Wolseley convertible knowing that there would be rain. There wasn't a flat patch of ground for camping, except where BMW had their base. I for one was one unhappy bunny on Thursday and Friday until the sun started to come out between the showers. As I say, we made our own fun and the road trip was excellent. I did 3078 miles in the 2 weeks!

If Ireland is successful in 2017, it wouldn't be hard to run a far more organised event than this year's!

if anything, this IMM has reinforced my view that we could host a great one in 2017

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Signature awaiting top-coat and lacquer....

Woody & Colin have just done the Loheac car museum and should be on tonight's ferry.

Sorry Billy we don't jump ship early. Have to say lohoec was one of the best musems i've ever visted, Just spent the evening in st Brieac .went into a Cave to buy some wine and fell out 2 1/2 hours later only paying only for the wine bottles we bought. Fine dinned and ended in Irish bar

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Now on board,just finished our last fine dwineing and having a pint. Short drive today so as the sun was out we headed for the beach and had some ice creams for Billy. Drive home tomorrow and sort out the photos.

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Finally the photos

Day 2 we headed towards the Alps with Keith in the lead followed by Kevin and Aidan. Other 4 cars playing catchup.



The village of Zaogli were we all stayed on day 3.


Our trusty Mini for the trip


Nice MPi at the IMM


Dave reckons we should upgrade the rear seats too.


On Saturday we headed for McDonalds but instead found the Mille Miglia, nice SLR



Joe spreading the message,IMM2017


After IMM we headed to Ferrari musem



Getting some parts for Colins new engine.



We returned to Zaogli in the sunshine.



Our Villa in Nice with two Pucks just behind the fence.


Monaco, got into the pits just after practice on Friday


The Pits!


Red Bull bar on the circuit listening to The Ministry of Sound


Sunday ,Cannes film festival red carpet primier of Zulu



Our road home through the French Alps



Stop for ice cream in the mountains.


Stop for wine in Tours in the Loire Valley


Visit Le Mans museam and race track, drove the track.


The Chapel of Motors in the Loheac museam, good call Billy.


2,900 miles later (45 mpg) time to unload.

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Great pics, looks like a cracking trip. showing the pics to herself this morning & shed be interested, so hopefully be joining in on a future trip

What was the route you took across France? I seen the map on the previous page, but looking for a bit more detail we are Heading to Europe on the bikes for our honeymoon & want to get to Italy/ Switzerland w/as little time in France as possible & the posted route looks good

We went down the same route as Keith but came back Monaco,Nice, St Ethienne, Tours, Le Mans and Roscoffe. The drive from Nice to St Ethienne accross the French Alps was spectacular. We didn't use any toll roads in France but did in Itally.

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How long did it take you to get thru France? Like the idea of no motorways, but we want to get thru' fairly quick too. shes driven round France before & I have zero interest from the parts Ive been w/work

Lads,

Those of you who stayed at Hotel Zoagli will know that we got a fantastic welcome from the owners. I would suggest that we all should give the hotel a decent review on Tripadvisor. It costs us nothing but we wouldn't have gotten the same attention from a 5-star hotel.

I did one up already: http://www.tripadvisor.ie/Hotel_Review- ... guria.html

Billy

Two days through France is easy, day and a half if you really don't want to be there.
Billy ,review sent

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some pics...



repairs....




outside, its france...




camping - no tents required!




Loire by night - Gien




On the road to Annecy




Packing them in at Zoagli




Italian Riviera by night




Approaching Switzerland




Into the mountain

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Signature awaiting top-coat and lacquer....

Great photos and great memories of an epic road trip.

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Real Clubmans have a square nose.Seriously.

Absolutely. Zoagli was brilliant. Nice to Grenoble was a fantastic Mini road.

Thats not what you said that night.

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