The Citroën Car Club Annual Rally 1997

By this time, the rain had become torrential so I went back to the XM to have a bite of lunch and 'phone my wife who said that the temperature was 25 C, the sun was shining and she was at the Church barbecue...

Halfway through my baguette and saucisson, the Tannoy crackled into life `WILL JULIAN MARSH PLEASE COME TO THE INFORMATION CENTRE?' Off I went, eating on the hoof, to be greeted byClaude Westbrook who had put out the call for me.

Right immaculate French built ID 21

We then went back to my XM where I showed him some pictures of Peter, our new baby. By this time it was 13:25 - five minutes before the allotted time for the `Virtual Section' meeting at the non-existent SeMantics Bistro so off I squelched - only to find that I was the only one there. I waited for ten minutes and eventually, Andrew Minney appeared, muttering about people virtually disappearing. Back to the XM to return a French XM brochure to him, finish my lunch and share my thermos of coffee with him.

Fabien Sabatès had asked me if I were prepared to put Citropolis flyers under the wiper blades of cars at the rally - perhaps I sounded less than enthusiastic since he had made alternative arrangements. I went up and introduced myself to Chris who was doing a brisk trade in back issues of Citropolis and co-erced Andrew Minney into signing a subscription form.

Back to the Panhards where I introduced myself to Tony Bond with whom I collaborated on the Panhard pages in the Citroën Car Club site.

A long chat then ensued with him and then a 24 Tigre appeared and I was introduced to the driver.

We talked of Panhards and the legendary Citroën-Panhards and then Chris Bailey appeared, wife and new baby in tow.

Talk about Citroëns was suspended in favour of talk about babies and how this puts one's obsessions into perspective.

One more round of the site, a few more photos taken, a brief chat with Joe Judt and Adrian Chapman and then back to the XM where I bumped into Mike Connally . We had a very interesting discussion about the Car Magazine long term test report on the Xantia Activa which was quite critical of the car's low speed ride - a criticism I have voiced regarding the XM. Mike said he thinks the problem is not the hydraulics, nor the MacPherson struts but the low profile tyres. He pointed out that late model CXs and the high performance BX variants similarly suffer whereas the DS and early model CXs have an exemplary ride at low speeds. My XM is jiggly and harsh on smooth road surfaces until you exceed 50 mph/80 kph although paradoxically, if the road surface is poor, the ride is excellent, irrespective of speed.

The homeward journey, due to congestion on the infamous M25 took much longer than the outbound journey but I still managed to get home in time to say goodnight to the children and thank them for their Father's Day presents.

Despite the rotten weather, everyone seemed to be smiling and showing their customary enthusiasm for all things connected with the double chevron. I would like to thank the members of the Rally Committee and in particular Nigel Wild for all the hard work they put in on our behalf. If the weather was not particularly good, I don't think this detracted too much from what was an excellent day out.

My one grouch concerns the location - Peterborough is well off the beaten track. Perhaps consideration could be given to moving the venue round the country as used to happen or, alternatively, perhaps a more central location could be chosen. Birmingham is generally reckoned to be the centre of England (yes, I know this isn't much help for those who live north of the border) and furthermore has good motorway connections to the rest of the country. Of course, had the Rally site been Salisbury Racecourse (some 15 miles/24 km from my home) as it used to be back in the Seventies, we would have enjoyed brilliant sunshine and temperatures in the mid twenties...