51st anniversary reunion for Lichfield 7th Scouts
Wednesday 7th July 1971 saw seven venture scouts of the 7th Lichfield troop leave their base in Ash Grove Lichfield, to set off on a trip around Europe in a converted 30cwt butchers van affectionately known as ‘Alison’.
Wednesday 7th July 1971 saw seven venture scouts of the 7th Lichfield troop leave their base in Ash Grove Lichfield, to set off on a trip around Europe in a converted 30cwt butchers van affectionately known as ‘Alison’.
The group, shown on the day of departure, were (from left to right), Andrew Simkins (aka Simmo), Neil Lindsay, Dave Smith, Les Wood (inside the van), Chris Davies, Tim Davies and Chris Kittle. The planning had started the previous year for a trip which would take place after everyone had taken their A levels and before we all set off to pursue our chosen careers. Originally the trip was to take in North Africa as well, but as the planning progressed we realised that would be too ambitious and we decided to stick to Europe.
The cost of the expedition would be paid for with money we earned through various jobs and sponsorships. Although it took time and hard work, we eventually had enough for us to be confident we could achieve what we planned to set out to do.
The vehicle itself was difficult. We could not afford much but needed something which could take seven of us plus all our kit and equipment to be self-sufficient for a month. After much searching, we found an old butchers van in a local garage that was going cheap, there is not much call for second hand butchers vans, and we reckoned with some clever thinking and help from the local technical college we could make it work and so we duly purchased Alison. So named after the young girl on reception at the garage.
The inside of the van was gutted and we installed benches (no seat belts of course), shelving and storage for tents, stove, provisions etc. A local window company kindly fitted a couple of side windows for free and the local technical college serviced Alison, so that she would be in tip top condition for the journey, or so we thought.
The 7th July arrived and off we set, well not quite all of us. Although Simmo turned up for the departure photograph the group left him behind. Not because of anything he had said but because he had a final exam to take. He would fly out three days later to Paris where we would pick him up. Which we duly did.
The trip started well until Sat 10th July when, about 170km south of Paris, “there was a terrible clatter and black smoke appeared from the air intake and water sprayed from the radiator.” Alison was towed to a local campsite in Appoigny and declared ‘kaput’ by the local garage.
A little thing like the engine blowing up was not going to stop a bunch of Venture Scouts who thrived on dealing with adversity. Thus, being prepared and having taken a repair manual and set of tools with them, two of the group, Dave & Simmo, started taking the engine apart. Neither of them had done anything like that before but that did not stop them trying.
It was discovered that during Alison’s service by the technical college the timing chain had not been put back correctly, this had slipped causing the cylinders to operate incorrectly and bending all eight push rods which opened and closed the valves. Having taken out motor insurance with the AA just in case of problems we set about contacting them and having all the spares flown out. This took several days as international phone calls had to be pre-booked via an operator and we only had the use of the local telephone box in the village.
Eventually Simmo and Tim hitch hiked back to Paris, picked up the spares and returned. The engine was rebuilt and after several attempts at a push start, much to everyone’s delight the engine fired! We were back in business.
Having lost a week due to the breakdown we altered the route slightly and headed off for Geneva where we visited the World Scout Headquarters. After that we travelled onto Milan, Venice and crossed into Austria on the way back north through Germany. Or at least that was the revised plan.
Approximately 100km into Austria Alison started losing power and we were forced to pull over. Again we were towed to a local garage in a village called Möllbrücke, however, unlike in Appoigny, the Pacher family who owned this garage could not have been more helpful. The problem was that although we had put the engine back together successfully and tightened everything down to the correct torques what we didn’t know was that after such a procedure you had to retighten the cylinder head again after so many kilometres. This we had not done and the whole cylinder head had warped.
The garage spent several days trying to fix Alison, the majority of the time waiting for the correct parts to show up and in the end they did get the engine running again. This included warming the engine up with oxyacetylene and benzene, the resultant flames were impressive, but it was all to no avail. Although the engine started there was no power, further diagnosis brought us to the conclusion that two cylinders were cracked. Unfortunately, Alison truly was ‘kaput’ this time.
So how to get ourselves and Alison back to Lichfield. We would travel back by train and hovercraft (over the channel) whilst Alison would be delivered back by the AA under the breakdown policy we had prepared in advance.
We left on Friday 6th august and after several changes of trains and countries, arrived back over 24 hours later on Sat 7th August. One month after departing.
Despite all its problems (or because of them) we all agreed to trip had been a success. It had brought us all together in adversity, showed us what you can do if you work as a team, made us come up with different solutions and taught us that here is always answer to a problem no matter how bad things seem at the time. Values which are at the heart of scouting.
After the summer we all went our separate ways. Simmo went to Sandhurst, joined the Royal Artillery and then the Army Air Corps, retiring as a Lt Colonel. Neil Lindsay stayed in the area and ended up as managing director of his own company. Tragically Neil passed away, totally unexpectedly, on his 55th birthday. Both Dave Smith and Tim Davies went to flying school sponsored by British Airways and retired many years later as Senior Captains having flown many times around the world. Chris Davies ran several companies of his own and is currently the owner of a successful craft brewing company in Camberley, (the beers are on Chris). Chris Kittle studied shoe design at college and moved to the USA where he forged a very successful career and became senior designer for Reebok and eventually Vice President of design for Sperry. Les Wood moved to Swindon and also ran his own company. Regrettably Les is the only one of the group that we lost contact with.
Four of the group met up for a drink ten years later in Lichfield in 1981.
1991 saw the first properly organised reunion in the George in Lichfield. Six of us (Les wood was missing) met up for a great night out. This was successfully repeated in 2001 including meeting up with our old Scout Leaders, Jim Bazeley and John Williams.
By 2011 sadly Neil was no longer with us and the George was being renovated, but the five remaining (Simmo, Dave, Chris, Tim and Chris) met up in The Cathedral Lodge hotel. Again along with Jim and John.
2021 was to be our 50th anniversary but, as with a lot of things, covid intervened, and it had to be postponed. That meant that we simply met up for a 51st anniversary, which we did back in the George on 7th July 2022. The attached photo shows us looking no different from 1971. Left to right, Simmo, Chris Kittle, Tim Davies, Dave Smith, Chris Davies and Scout Leader John Williams.
As is always the case with our reunions, because of the friendships and the bonds forged through scouting, it is as we had met just yesterday. We do realise though, that perhaps as time is passing, we might not wait ten years for the next one.