Scotland Nort East Morris Minor Owners Club 25th Annual Car Rally - 14th September

As some of you will know, we invited the Scotland North East Morris Minor Club owners to our Drum Show in July as a 'guest' club.  A number of Morris Minor Owners Club members attended and thoroughly enjoyed the day and in return, we were invited to their annual show which is held at Fyvie Castle. 

For some unknown reason, this show has seemingly been under our radar and as far as I can determine, none of our members have attended past shows. We had 8 cars sign up to attend and I think to be honest, many of us expected a large display of Morris Minors and our 8 MGs, but we were in for a very pleasant surprise!

First of all, the venue - Fyvie Castle - is absolutely stunning.  Set in fabulous grounds and supposedly haunted, the earliest parts of Fyvie Castle date from the 13th century – some sources claim it was built in 1211 by William the Lion. Fyvie was the site of an open-air court held by Robert the Bruce, and Charles I lived there as a child for 4 years. The Castle has featured in a number of British television programmes, such as Living TV's Most Haunted series and STV's Castles of Scotland.

In recent years, the castle grounds have hosted a Fyvie Live music festival in the summer, which was headlined in 2011 by Beverly Knight and in 2012 by Sophie Ellis-Bextor, then following a gap of several years, by The Shires in 2017.

Despite some work that was underway in the grounds to repair a building damaged by one of the recent storms and some areas being fenced off, over 200 cars and motorcycles were assembled around the castle for the crowds to view.  There was plenty of entertainment as well, including the Fraserburgh Pipe Band, Myra McRobbie Dancers, Sandy a solo piper (one of the MMOC members) Teressa with her fun dog show (waggiest tail, owner that looks most like their pooch, bonniest puppy, etc.), Duncan with his model display and over 2OO classic cars including motorbikes, bicycles, vans, commercials and the star of the show - Morris Minors. There was also hot food, trade and craft stalls and as can be seen from the photos, the weather was very kind and fortunately the forecast rain held off for most of the day.

So to sum up, this was an absolutely fantastic show which we all enjoyed and agreed that it would become a regular fixture on our calendar.

The show was quite poignant for the organisers however, as explained below in the 'Welcome' message  in the programme:

It is a poignant day for all members as we as a club were deeply saddened by the sudden passing of our Chair Neil Barclay. Neil was dedicated to his role and worked tirelessly to make everyone feel valued. Neil loved showing his fun and cheeky side, one time that will remain memorable was when he sang "Donald far's yer troosers" at the 2O23 rally. Neil was a perfectionist who with a constant friendly smiling face gave his all and will be missed by all members and in the world of rallies. Our thoughts and support are with his widow Lesley.

Thanks to Sam Murray for some of the photos below.