The final part! Thanks for reading so far.
After the Novelties, it's time to have dinner. Luckily we already had the food shots so let's enjoy a few shots of the guests and the watches.
Bas brought his collection of Aquatimers and impressed many with the ingenious quick-release system of the straps and bracelets. Somehow, I didn't spot an Orange strap tonight though. Erik was wearing is Aquatimer Cousteau, the version with the engraving of many fishes on the back. We all remember the story Tonny posted about the exact number of fishes and Erik admitted that he too counted them to verify!
Erik also really liked the Miramar and Ralph enlightened us with the story why he bought it. His wife Maureen told me that the watch did nothing for her. She does appreciate beautiful watches though, but this one isn't one of them.
Since I was seated next to Giovanni, I took advantage of the opportunity and strapped the beautiful WG blue dial Portuguese Perpetual on my right wrist and Giovanni was kind enough to take this picture:
A few of the watches close to my seat: Pt Régulateur; the before-mentioned WG blue dial Portuguese Perpetual; a very special Ingenieur Automatic AMG with Carbon dial; the wonderful WG Da Vinci Perpetual with Ardoise dial and the Vintage Ingenieur Laureus:
(For the chronologically orientated readers: insert Food Shots 1 & 2 here, “Sakizuke” amuse bouche and “Zensai” appetizer)
On the opposite side of the table, Ralph was also taking pictures:
Unfortunately, I didn't catch the story that made Tonny look a bit angry, luckily it didn't last long as he's a great guy and full of jokes and anecdotes!
Michael is listening to an interesting story while Mark and Giovanni are sending watch pictures to watch buddies all over the world. Or were they working out ways to separate me from my Pisa Perpetual?
Bas was also still taking pictures and I have seen a few on Facebook already. Erik was having an interesting conversation with Sabine and Lore.
A shot of one of Marks beautiful pocket watches:
Mark, is this the one I stepped on?
I couldn't resist strapping on the Ingenieur Automatic AMG with Carbon dial:
It's quite a special watch!
(Insert Food Shot 3 here, “Tsukuri” sliced raw fish)
After the sliced raw fish, some of us got restless and we saw some interesting groups of watches appear here and there. The main dish still had to be served but we were already preparing ourselves for the famous "Table Shot".
I managed to get hold of the BP Muhammed Ali version to take a picture. This one has a modified strap with red stitching and it looks amazing. Well done Giovanni!
Then, something strange happened. I don't know how but suddenly I was wearing the new RG Portuguese Chrono! I now understand what came into Mark...
As I wrote earlier, the kitchen staff had given up on us so we had to wait a bit longer. Luckily, Mark had something nice to kill the time and asked our friend Tonny to read and translate it for us since it was in French.
Some of you may know what it is: the new version of the certificate of the IWC ledgers, the "Certificat d'Autenticité".
Tonny likes it but you can see that he is shocked by the amount they charge for it now ;-)
His wife has to calm him down:
And it works!
Finally, the main dish arrives (insert food shot 4: “Shiizakana” meat dish, Miso soup and rice. One could have also chosen the fish variation: “Shiizakana” seasonal fish dish, Miso soup and rice but I don't have a picture of it)
Magically, some Perpetuals gathered in front of me and it is just now while I write this report that I realize that the ladies Da Vinci Perpetual Quartz should have been in this picture too!
Meanwhile, the dessert has arrived as you can see in the background of the above image.
(insert food shot 4: “Mizukashi” dessert)
There was some ice cream with the dessert and since the staff was a bit overwhelmed by our presence and the watches, they were a bit late in explaining what it was. Luckily our much-traveled guest Ralph could enlighten us and told us it was "Green Tea" ice cream. I wouldn't have guessed that myself, the taste reminded me a bit of Pistachio but much more subtle. It was delicious, just like the fresh fruit that came with it.
Just because we could: another shot of six Perpetuals:
Tonny still enjoys his ice cream while Anne and Bill are chatting:
And then, at about ten to ten, which is probably one of the worst times for the position of the hour- and minute hands, we got to the moment to take the famous "Table Shot". A quick count showed that we had about 50 watches and pocket watches present. Not bad for such a small group!
Maybe some of you saw my April Fools post on Facebook and I had promised my son Thomas that I would take a picture of his Ice Watch among the IWC's so pardon me for this outsider in the middle :-)
I wasn't the only one to take Table Shots as you can clearly see:
Then, after the photo shoot when everybody was getting back their own watches, Bill and Ralph suddenly realized that they both had put their BP 5002's on the table without knowing their serial numbers by heart. If I am correct, Bill has the transitional 3 Hz version and Ralph the slow beat 2.5 Hz version. Both decided to get a long shutter speed picture and count the beats. This however, didn't work out too well and I was convinced that one could hear the difference. So, I put one to my left ear and one to my right and close my eyes to concentrate (who took those damn pictures that I already saw on Facebook!!! ;-)
While I was concentrating, Bill came up with the ultimate solution in telling who's who's watch (pardon me if this isn't correct English). The answer was so simple that we couldn't believe it was staring us in the face the whole evening! Bill's BP 5002 was still on New York Time and Ralph's was on CEST. This story will go in the annals and it had us all laughing for a very long time.
When I resolutely told which one was the slow beat, I was proven wrong so there goes my theory. Maybe in a more quiet environment and after a few test runs, it's possible to hear the difference but the circumstances weren't ideal. It was fun though!
To finalize, Anne had a goodie bag for all of us. It contained the super-sized catalog of the new Ingenieur line, a copy of Watch International and also a Top Gun coffee mug. This last item in particular is not easy to get as I was told and I am going to take very good care of it.
I am sure that I speak for all who were present when I say that we had a wonderful evening and I want to apologize for making fun of Mark. Nobody was hurt and no watch nor pocket watch either!
Thanks for taking the time to read all my stuff, I hope you enjoyed it and please let us know if and when you are in Amsterdam (or Belgium, as Sabine added) so we can organize another great GTG. My special thanks to Bill for he was the reason to organize this, to Anne and her husband Michael to join us on a Holiday and of course IWC Benelux for letting us have a look at yet another series of beautiful watches and providing us with the goodie bag!
Kind regards,
Clemens
PS: I hope the other attendees will add more pictures and don't hold back on the funny one where I am listening to the two BP's. I have done more silly things already :-)
