by George Dyke
View our full Photo Gallery here.
Our original plan was to do the outing on Saturday September 24. However on the Wednesday before, the weather forecast said rain on the Saturday and fair weather on Sunday. So we went with our rain day contingency and announced that the date had changed to Sunday September 25. As it turned out Saturday was anise day, but on Sunday we hit the jackpot; warm, sunny and hardly any humidity. What a day for our drive.
We (Al and Sylvia Eberhard, Jim Sciberas, Steve Loria, Nebo Djurdjevic and my mom) met at my place and we headed east from Toronto, taking backroads it all the way from just east of the Toronto Zoo, through the Rouge River valley and then in the moraine hills north of Pickering, Oshawa and Whitby. Jim’s 2Cv has 425 cc engine and it seemed to be loosing power over 70 km/h. Not a fun way to do the trip . Rather than calling a day though, we pulled into a spot on Taunton Rd. and parked Jim’s car so he could ride with Nebo in his DS and still enjoy the trip. We stopped for lunch on Orono and met up with Barry and Anna Evans in their 2CV who came from nearby Bowmanville, and Kaye MacInnes and Angus MacDougald who drove from Verona (near Kingston) east in their SM. From there we took a meandering drive along some beautiful roads through the hills heading north east to just below Rice Lake.
We continued east to out next stop; – a wine tasting at Oak Heights Winery. (Yes there is a winery near Warkworth!) After a some sips and little rest in their lovely tasting building, which was and old barn totally renovated with a large deck on the south side overlooking the vineyards, we headed east agin for the short drive to Warkworth. There we stopped for an ice cream (Kawartha Dairies – the best!) and to do a little browsing in the local boutiques. The area was so nice that we decided to head a bit further east and enjoy the drive to Campbellford.
We took a return route that was bit further south along some different but also scenic country roads. Finally at Newcastle we said our good-byes and I went with Jim in my GS back over to Taunton Rd. to get his 2CV. As it turned out about minutes into the drive back home in his 2CV, Jim’s car gained full power and he was able motor along quite nicely the rest of the way. We think it finally burned a bunch of carbon off the plugs because Jim has only done some puttering around town all year. This was the first time he probably went over 50 km/h all summer!
All in all, we had a fantastic day. And Jim learned that he needs to get out for country drives like this in his 2CV more often!