Menu
Log in


BMW Drivers Club Melbourne

An update from the President: June

29 Jun 2018 2:10 PM | Anonymous





Dear Members,

We are now a couple of months old and WOW, what a couple of months it has been!

When we first started down the road of building a new club and all the work it took to get it off the ground, we thought it would be great if in six months or a year we had 100 members, maybe a couple of years we might even make 200.  I can’t tell you how proud and grateful I am, that it only took few short weeks to welcome our 100th member and now we are well on our way to 200.  I am amazed.  Thank you for joining and we hope we can give you what you want from a club.  If there is anything you want to do, or think might be fun for us to organise, please drop us a line and you never know, we might just run with the idea.  Our door is always open, and we are always looking for ideas.  It is your club after all.

I apologise if Jo and I have been a bit hard to get in touch with through most of May and into June, we were off on holiday road tripping around Europe.  We covered 9,980km in 6 weeks touring around France, Spain, Portugal, Monaco (for a little race they have there), into Italy briefly (where I almost died, literally, but that’s another story), Switzerland, Germany (where we spent 4 days in Munich), Belgium and back into France.  There were a few other countries we popped into as well, but the bit most here would be interested in, was our visit to Munich.

When I went to the Clubs Australia AGM, just before our launch night, I met Eva from BMW Classic in Munich.  Eva works for BMW and was not only the person that was responsible for approving our new club logo, but is pretty much in charge of all the BMW Clubs in our region.  When Eva heard Jo and I were going to Europe she asked if we were coming to Munich and if we were, she would be very happy to look after us and organise some special things to do whilst we were there.  So, I quickly got on to Jo and said we had better change our itinerary to include Munich, because at that stage we weren’t planning on going there this time, and well, when BMW wants you to visit, you visit.  After a little juggling, which meant I gave up spending another day at the Nurburgring, we were able to fit in 4 days there.  I'm very glad we did!  Thank you so much Eva, for your hospitality and all your help.

We just happened to be in Munich over the weekend of the Wheels and Weisswurscht meeting at BMW Group Classic, so Eva invited us to come along too.  This is a little like our Cars and Coffee days, just a casual event where people turn up and chat and check out each other’s cars.  Except it is at the home of BMW Classic, where they have brought out a few of their cars as well and as well as coffee, there is German sausage for everyone to enjoy.  This was a great event, with a group driving up from Italy and club people from Munich and all over Germany just coming down for the drive.  Lots of nice cars and plenty you will never see on the road in Australia.  It was fantastic to be invited to the day and see some beautiful cars and meet some more people with the same passion as we have.

Eva also organised a couple of very special tours for us.  We had our very own ‘white glove’ guided tour of the BMW museum, where our guide opened bonnets and boots, unlocked doors and showed us lots of things up close that you don’t normally get too close to.

We felt like celebrities being allowed to get very close to some of BMW’s prized collection and it is always great to hear the stories about each exhibit from someone that knows all about them, instead of just wandering around and seeing things on our own.  If you are going to the museum, let us know and we can help organise a tour for you too.  So much better than just wandering around.

Our second ‘special tour’ was at BMW Classic.  We were very lucky to have Eva personally show us through the archives and then the collection itself.  The archives are amazing, all the original drawings and designs going back to the earliest models, even the original patent application document for the first roundel!  All sorts of original items and photos, we could have spent all day in there alone.  Best thing was we were allowed to open every drawer and look at everything up close and even touch some.  Just amazing.  Thank you, Eva!

After spending time in there we were taken into the original workshop building where BMW began making cars.  Here they house about a third of the BMW collection.  So many amazing vehicles, right back to the very first road going vehicle to have a BMW engine in it, a horse drawn fire brigade pump that was powered by a BMW aircraft engine.  Elvis’ freshly restored 507 is there, along with a BMW Mclaren, a couple of F1 cars, lots of different race cars and loads of classic BMWs of every type imaginable.  Must say, I was in heaven, only thing better would have been if I could have driven a few of them.  Eva mentioned that if she had more notice, she might have been able to arrange a drive as quite a few of the cars in the collection actually do get driven quite often - either loaned to special guests or driven in special events all over Europe.  It is great that they actually do get used and not just sit there gathering dust, as Eva said, they were built to be driven, so they still are!  Fantastic!

I plan to put together a slide show of our visit to Munich and all the things we saw there, as me being me, I took hundreds of photos at each of the places we visited.  Might even put one together of our whole trip, as some that followed us on facebook would know, we don’t just tour around and see a few sights.  We saw and experienced a whole lot in our 6 weeks, in 13 countries and almost 10,000km of driving.  Jo and I are a bit crazy sometimes, we jumped off a mountain in Switzerland, hiked out on a glacier at 12,000 feet altitude at -9 deg, rode the longest rodelbahn in the world, in Andorra, and the steepest as well, in Italy.  We also went to some amazing places and took in some incredibly moving moments, that will stay with me forever.  Like the last post ceremony at the Menin Gate and the Australian War Memorial at Villers Bretonneux.

Anyway, that is a bit off track, so back to the club and Melbourne now and full steam ahead.

We have a busy week ahead. We will be at Phillip Is tomorrow for the Alfa Club Sprint and some pace-car laps for our members, thanks to Neil and the Alfa Club for inviting us along. Then Sunday is our first Christmas in July event. Looking forward to that with lots of you coming along. Tuesday will also be our next monthly meeting and I, for one, am looking forward to hearing from the VFT about the benefits and opportunities available in becoming a CAMS official.  I have been a CAMS Official for nearly 20 years now and have enjoyed lots of events from the other side, so come along and see what you can get involved in too.

Look forward to catching up with you all one way or another over the coming months.

Graeme Bell | President
BMW Drivers Club Melbourne Inc.

P.O. Box 81, TYABB, VICTORIA. 3913
Incorporated in Victoria #A0102695G
BMW Drivers Club Melbourne Inc is a member of:
BMW Clubs Australia and the BMW Clubs International Council
CAMS Affiliated Motorsport Club



© 2024 BMW Drivers Club Melbourne Inc. All Rights Reserved.