And we were off, at long last, to the first physical ARTSA in 3 years, with great anticipation, excitement and… a mandate…
“Jeffrey’s bay here we come!” We could not wait to get there! My dogs; Jaco and Rudolf, my girlfriend (Benita) and I, as well as two of the Jukskei boys – Wez De Kock and his wife Vee, and – Claud Cornelissen filled the Venue. The Hyundai Venue! We marked our wheels in chalk with our initials and at each stop those whose initials were at the bottom had to take a shot.
With Wez at the wheel and Claud as the trusty navigator, DJ and bar tender, our first overnight destination was Bloemfontein. We reached our Airbnb called Bedrock and obviously we braai’d! What would a road trip be without a braai?
The alarm bell sounded, Ice cold morning air greeted us early on Wednesday morning and by 4am we were back on the road. Stopping at a few places including Gariep dam for a tequila sunrise, Colesburg for breakfast where we purchased some Northern Cape skaap choppies and skilpadjies for our braai to be that evening, after suffering a barrage of suicidal locusts we made our last stop before hitting Jeffrey’s – Middleton, a quaint little railway town to stretch our legs and wet our throats.
After a quick stop and walking the dogs we were on our way to Jeffrey’s Bay, with Jaco keeping an eye on the two front men we set off to our destination ARTSA. When we arrived in Jeffrey’s we made our stop at the first drinking hole. I noticed the Matlosana 219 Lads vehicle still dusty from their unofficial “hard way down”, I gave Hoppies a call, they were at the Dolphins pub and we waved at each other in excitement from a distance. It had started, the excitement, the fellowship, the buffalo greetings, pins and coins, seeing fellow tablers for the first time in years and catching up. It was bound to be a great conference!
Seafood at the sea was a must before going to our beach house. We unpacked, started the fire and relaxed… and what a braai we had that evening, Braai broodjies, Salad, Northern Cape Lamb chops and to top it off the best Skilpadjies I have ever tasted! Wez was shook at that moment for some reason, and after a long 2 days of traveling we rested.
Thursday, the first day and start of ARTSA, we had to take advantage of the sunrise over the beach. Dave and Dove were the first to greet us in the morning whilst Benita had some work to do and I had admin to do writing out raffle tickets for my hair shave project as the rest of the household started waking up.
And so it began ARTSA 2022. We set off to the hardcore hut to get our registrations done and get our regalia of which I took 1 of everything. The place was busy with familiar faces and very easy to get stuck there for a while just by greeting everyone. however we kept it swift and were in and out before we got caught up in that. Taking the afternoon easy and having some Mexican cuisine for lunch before headed off to the hippie beach party and the official opening of ARTSA.
From here on out it is difficult to describe in words, and also because of blurry memory, my experience, therefore I will mostly let the photos do the talking.
Friday morning we woke up later than usual, with our first hangover of the weekend and we unfortunately missed the forums. Cilliers pulled out some pipeliner skills and made us all an exquisite breakfast to start the day off with. Wez and I set off to fetch our esteemed area Chairman, Mr JC Duarte from the airport. The man in charge of our area food table, the man with the plan. Out of uncontrollable excitement for the day I hardly greeted JC when we picked him up and started enquiring about the plan for the food tables. Cool calm and collected he assured me everything is under control. It was so windy that some of the porta potties blew over with Wez commenting that he can hear someone screaming for help stuck in the fallen porta potty.
It was a great day for fellowship which became a late night as well, filled with cartwheel competitions, tattoos and a lot of alcohol as well as trying to sell raffle tickets in between which proved more difficult than I initially anticipated.
One of my favourite memories is meeting Sander van Eck, international guest and National treasurer for the Netherlands, who when we met in the loud crowd of the hard-core hut and I could not make out what his name was, he generously introduced himself as the AC/DC song “Na na na na nana na nana Sander!”
The day had arrived for our National Annual General Meeting – ARTSA, and D-day for my hair shave raffle. We put on our suits and we were ready for our meeting! There was a late motion which came from Pretoria 136 to increase the per kilometer traveling fee to R4.50 which passed along with the budget and cap fee increase. My only mandate was to vote in favor of the budget and cap fee increase.
Whilst the vote for the new national IRO was being tallied between Gerhard “Ginger Ninja” VD Berg and Louis Du Toit, I noticed that the draw for my raffle was not included under general and I approached the board. Our president Stefan Grobler had the honour of doing the draw. The winning ticket was the one and only Walter V Rooyen from Boksburg 17 who was not there and therefore forfeited to shave my hair, Second place was Hanno Redman from Sandown 150 who in turn took the right to shave my hair, and third place was Brad JvR from Sandton 121, each winning a bottle of Jameson whiskey
Right after our AGM, thirst got the best of me, maybe too many tequilas? All in our stride.
We went home played some table tennis, and fell asleep. Benita the wonderful partner that she is, struggled to, but just-just managed to pull me together, get me up, ready and presentable for the gala dinner.
Needless to say, I did not make dessert or witness the speeches. I was finished, K.O’d, Klaar.
And so came the end of our Jeffrey’s Bay ARTSA, and what a blast it was seeing everyone I have missed over the years as well as meeting new lifelong friends for the first time! We made our last trip to the beach on Sunday morning (PHOTOS 85 – 86), we had breakfast and said our goodbyes to all the Round table brothers making their way with heavy heads and hangovers before making our way back home to Pretoria.
Thank you Round Table Southern Africa for once again an Epic ARTSA, definitely one for the books!