Sinterklaastreffen 2019

The last ever St Nicks Rally to be held.  

St Nick and his Piets

I have lost count how many I have been to since my very first back in 1985.  Then we went on my MZ250ETZ. Two-up  with a cheap plastic top box with our things in.  

Back then we went practically every year and stayed in the the Hotel Polaris.

That became quite the annual event until one year the Polaris wasn't available to book and it had closed down.  

We gave the weekend trips another year but it wasn't the same and gradually the "tradition" was over. 

We revived it some years later and began going for the day and joining the run to meet St Nick at the quay, where he came in by fishing boat along with his Piets.

Eventually we started going for the ride and later to watch the ride out with St Nick.  It seemed it was getting smaller each year. 

One year I went and couldn't find the meeting place and the city was devoid of the usual throng of bikers enjoying lunch in restaurants and bars before the ride. I was Billy No-Mates that year.

So in 2019 it will be the last year the club will run the event.  They say that with dwindling support and club membership, plus changes to the way events can be run, and adding in ecological rules that ban camping in the velodrome, it is simply too difficult to continue.

This year may be the perfect opportunity for the Nikon D50 to come with me to get some photos of the last ever St Nicks.

I have already decided to go and have made an event on the Meldrews FB page.  

As long as it doesn't snow or have the Arctic temperatures like last year, I will be there.  In fact, I have already bought my £20 saver ticket with P&O.

Billy No-Mates or?