Team-BHP - Fiat Lovers Annual Meet 2006 at Goa

This is a repost from Fiat Club India Yahoo group. I have deleted many pictures due to limitation here at TBHP.

The idea:

Never underestimate the power of an idea, all good things start with an idea. An idea was popped during the Lonavala (Mumbai-Pune) meet to have our Annual meet at Goa and it clicked. Ganesh was untiring in his efforts to follow-up and ensure members genuinely interested in meeting up came out of shell (and their busy schedule) and made an effort.

Ganesh, thanks you did a good job, too bad you had to miss all the fun due to personal exigency. Manoj Vaidya too had to miss the meet due to some personal exigency but he did a good job for stay arrangements at Goa. Dr. Putcha Shantaram (we call him Dr. Shantaram with love J) structured the meet and lead the entire group very well. We owe the grand success of this meet especially to all three of you and all attendees (including families). Thanks.

Day-1 (The journey to Goa from Mumbai):

We (Shantaram, I and Patrick with families) started at 5.15 from Kharghar and it took a while before we became used too of zooming Volvos coming down on us. I even missed a turn (badly marked) to Mahad and continued for 10 KMs towards Alibaug. The Dawn was very soothing and fresh air just ensured that we were fresh for the coming excitement at Goa.

We met the lone Pune participant Ganesh (with family) at Mahad en-route Chiplun. So our first halt was at Mahad for a tea & breakfast.

We proceeded on our way after an hour and half break towards Goa. We had total of four cars from west (my wife’s GTX, Shantaram’s Uno, Ganesh’s Palio and Patrick’s Palio).

The scenic beauty on way was awesome; here are some pictures from the way

Pratapgarh view:

Chiplun view-2:

We stopped on way to have a small picnic among this picturesque way, thanks to all the ladies for home made food, we really enjoyed it.

The route to Goa from Mumbai is as follows: Mumbai -> Mahad -> Ratnagiri -> Chiplun -> Panjim. The highway is NH-17 which passes right through the Goa. We made it to Panjim by 5 pm; we took numerous pictures and relax breaks on our way to Panjim. The only irritating part of the journey was our travel from Panjim to Colva beach which took more than 2 and half hours.
We reached the resort by 8 pm and had a little quite dinner with some breezers (Raghu, was it strawberry or Cranberry? ;)). We had a quick chat on next day’s agenda and we proceeded to catch on some sleep.

Day-2 (The sightseeing):

We started off with a relaxed mood in a private coach with customized sightseeing program; we left resort at 11 after a brunch.

The tour:

After the sightseeing tour we proceeded for the Goa Cruise, it was fun with cultural programs on board and everyone clicking a picture on the front deck.

After the lovely cruise we drove to Benaulim beach for a sumptuous dinner at “Johncy’s”, the dinner was accompanied by fireworks (I shall uploads clips later).

At Johncy’s:

After the dinner we parked our beauties in a semi circle for a night picture in bright headlights of our Fiats, it was awesome to see some 15 cars together and more than 30 people cheering.

Pic-1:

Pic-2:

Cheering Fiat Lovers:

After the dinner we headed for the “carnival”, the only problem was carnival did not wait for us. The guys took turns to do a drag on my GTX, the roar was awesome. We had Cappuccinos after that at a coffee shop at 2 am! Well the creamy coffee did helped us to get a good night nap before we hit all the fun next day.

Day-3 (Adventure sports and Fiat Rally):

We started the day with a little get together on the front lawn of the Colva Residency resort where we stayed. We discussed several issues and took everyone’s interview on future direction. There were goodies worth 1500 bucks for each one which included a self retractable rear screen Fiat sun curtain (courtesy Samyak Motors, Delhi), One Fiat original accessory car perfume and a Fiat exclusive imported insulated food bag which doubles up as eating tray also (courtesy our friends at Fiat India).

Dr. Shantaram with goodies:

Fiat Sun curtain:

The members:

One good thing that happened was that ladies started understanding their spouse’s second love and passion. We got commitment from all the ladies for next meet. By the way, I added one more member to Fiat Club India…my wife, she drives a Palio GTX and now she respects her car more than before. She promised me to be an active clubber in FCI. And now she understands why I am mad about my cars…this is the best part. As an appreciation gesture all the ladies that helped made this meet a success would be part of this elite club…First FCI wives club.

After the formal meet and discussion, it was time to hit the beach! We did all the adventure sports: Para sailing, Water scooter ride, Dolphin cruise and of course we enjoyed the surf.

Hey! We finally spotted a Dolphin:

After all the adventures, we had a Fiat Rally from resort to parking lot (I shall upload clips shortly). We had many of the visiting tourists who clicked pictures of the show. It was an awesome sight with so many Fiats roaring their engines and everyone honking in rhythm. Our rallying invited local police who wanted to know if we are dragging or something but they respected our passion and we carried on with cheering. People of Goa are really fun loving and helping, on our way from Panjim to Kolva Ganesh managed to run over a stone and even before we could get out of cars to help Ganesh, a passerby removed the stone and helped Ganesh to get the car back on road.

Roaring beauties:

Honking continues:

All Beauties lined up together with Fiat Lovers:

After the rally style meet we managed to get a glimpse of the carnival:
The Carnival King and Queen:

We even had a Fiat 1100 participate in the meet! Guys, just look at this 50 years old beauty, the owner told us that he just has to charge battery and it would start, he even had original import papers for the car! Anyone interested in restoring it with me?

Palio’s Momma:

Even after 50 years, it just has rust marks, the body is still solid, and you could experience the strength just by holding its bonnet. Fiat Rocks!

After all the shopping, carnival and fun, it was time for beating retreat, we went back again to Johncy’s to get some quality food and chill out before we dispersed and headed for a sleep.

Lovers in a somber mood:

Come on! Cheer up guys we are meeting again shortly:

Goa meet has been a huge success, we already decided about our next 2 meets. It was overwhelming to see families participating for a common passion. We decided that it is time to move beyond just the web presence. We would form a core team soon and start working on an exclusive website with discussion forum. We plan to register Fiat Club India not only on the web but also as an entity, so that we represent ourselves much better. We also agreed on regional Club Leaders who would drive frequent regional meets and of course we would meet twice a year but it was sure wonderful to have started with our first “Annual Meet”

We all had a blast and our goodies would keep on reminding us of our wonderful, fun filled time at Goa. Thank you everyone who attended this meet to make it a huge success.

We meet again at Lonavala during monsoon to have a blast again. Thanks guys, it was a rejuvenating and passionate meet. It was absolute pleasure to have met and known all of you. We are friends for life. I eagerly look forward to meeting all of you (and others too who could not make it this time) on our next meet.

Cheers!
-Rishi