I'm stickin' with you guys next time, my poor ol' ute struggled to keep up with the 'lead' group. I was pulling about 130kph (struggling) and getting left for dead only to find out we were beaten to the destination by a showroom condition 1600 and a certain 1200 coupe and sedan.

All in all was a good day though. The barbie was enjoyable, coupled with a few amber beverages and shootin' the proverbial about our beloved datto's. Great view from the lookout too.

Well fellers, thank you for the day.
I arrived nice & early at the Cumberland Highway meeting point & waited. OK, I had not read the details properly & got there a bit earlier than necessary. Quite a bit earlier.

As it started to approach 11am I figured that we were now running almost an hour behind & since I was driving the slowest car there, I would get going first.

After a comedy of errors I quickly ended up at the back of the field, but as a result of some red lights splitting the field, I found myself pulled up with a bunch, near Picton, who thought we were behind the leaders, only to have the first bunch pull in behind us shortly after.
We must have taken a shortcut.

Again, we set off as a group with the revheads pulling away fast, but one fellow in a restored 1600, followed by myself & Benny just cruised at a comfortable speed. In the end, it became necessary to cross to the opposite [eastern] side of the highway as we were heading north towards Sydney & were obviously on the western side. Our little group of three, tagging along so far behind that the main group couldn't be seen with field glasses, found a proper crossing point & used it, subsequently finding ourselves at the destination all by ourselves.

Waiting, ... waiting.
Eventually the main group arrived quite a few minutes behind us. They must have driven half way to Sydney to find a turnaround point, so sometimes it pays to travel at less than the speed of sound & to travel in a smaller group.
So I started out first, but was quickly running last, untill the halfway point when I was surprised to find myself in the middle, but was quickly relegated to second last [Benny was bringing up the rear.] only to finally arrive at the destination in third place without overtaking anybody at all.
Bizarre.

Still, the weather was overcast but pleasant & the light conditions were perfect for quality photography, & this was taken advantage of with several cars posed on the grass with the city of Woolongong & the South Pacific Ocean as a backdrop some thousands of feet below us.
Too bad I left the camera at home. Bugger.

The sausage sandwiches/rolls were cooked to perfection & the drinks were cold, so no complaints there & it was a very pleasant afternoon all round, followed by a great little cruise home.

Thanks again to the SDC.

EDIT
Here's a pirated example of the photography.

some pics up here

updated details :

SDC Cruise & BBQ Picnic

When? Sunday 17th Feb 2008

Where? 9:30am Meet at MacDonalds, Cabramatta on the Cumberland Highway (same location as the observation run near Krispy Kremes).

Route: Departing at Approx 10:00am, We are to head south on the Hume Hwy and taking the Cambeltown Road route right through to picton. From there we will move through to Broughton Pass and down Appin Road to Sublime Point for a BBQ. Sausage sandwiches and Cans of soft drink provided by the SDC for a gold coin donation (each).

Unofficially, from there we could either come back to Sydney via the F6, the old highway or the coast road.

see ya's there !

more info here : CRUISE