SCOOTER RUN TO BRIGHTON

Saturday morning was dedicated to recovery from the Friday night – some didn’t bother going to sleep at all. By mid-morning the Invasion was hanging in the carpark. There had been talk of a possible scooter run, and when it was discovered by the interstate Mods that there was a Brighton in Melbourne, this seemed the fitting destination.

There were many more Mods than there were scooters. People doubled as much as they could, but those who didn’t have scooters felt left out. After some last-minute tinkering we saddled up and were on the road by midday. A convoy of scooters (mostly Lambretta GPs) made its way to St Kilda and rode around the bay of Melbourne till we hit Brighton – it was probably the first run of Italian motor scooters in Melbourne since the 1960s!

During the Melbourne trip the movie Sawdust Caesars was being filmed. Two Sydney art school mods (Bill Posters and Benjamin Evison) had borrowed a Super 8 camera from art school and, with an $80 budget of Kodachrome film, set out to capture the Invasion. A lot of the movie was filmed from the back of a Lambretta! Lots of posing was done on the scooter run…riding across all lanes, and riding along the pier towards the camera.

On our return to the hotel, the hours of preparation began for the big night ahead – Little Murders, Division 4 and The Sets at the Crystal Ballroom, the highlight of the Invasion.