Report from 'The Day Before the Palo Alto British Car Meet':
After having worked on Friday night until 10:30, I drove the car home,
parked it, and went to bed. 4:50 a.m. Saturday morning comes awful early
but after the alarm and a quick look at the embarrassment on the front page
of the paper, I got a bucket of hot water and headed out the door. Several
months ago I'd attended my first car show in Pacific Grove. Not knowing
what to expect, my dad and I'd driven down in my 67 series V daily driver.
During the show, where I met some really great people, a spectator walked by
and mumbled "Man, that car needs a wash." Determined not to repeat that
experience, I was out at the car port with a bucket of water, washing off
the accumulation of road grime and the mysterious substances that a car
collects when it gets parked under the freeways of San Francisco. The
neighbor girl comes out to get her paper and gives me a funny look.
7:45 Karen and I are on the road. Early morning traffic is light down the
east bay, through the toll plaza and onto the Bay Bridge. The car is
running like a champ, steady 60mph and I'm the slowest thing on the road.
Minor details, we've had no breakfast, and we're almost out of gas. Figure
to wait till we're through San Francisco and closer to Palo Alto. Really
low on gas, realized we've not any cash money on us (spent my last 2 dollar
bills at the bridge) and need to find a bank. Pick an off ramp and go into
some town or another. Can't find any gas in this place anywhere, now we're
lost. Giving up any hope of joining the International Company of Real Men,
I break down and ask directions.
On the road again with a full tank of gas, but no food, we're wondering why
we haven't seen any other British Cars around when I see one coming up fast
in the rear view. Honk and wave, no response as a pristine Lotus Elan
flashes by. Find a Bank on the way to the Elk's Club parking lot. The
site of a bunch of LBC's and a bunch of smiling frantically waiving people
tell me I'm in the wrong lane, but I cut across three lanes of early morning
traffic anyway and make it in. There's one other Alpine. A nice blue
Series V crewed by a nice couple. As soon as I can get over and find them
we start comparing notes. Karen and the female of the other crew about how
silly men are standing around parking lots talking about cars, and us guys
about what modifications or statuses of various components of our cars. He
picked his up with a totally trashed interior, after an engine fire, and
with several crunched fenders. When he went to look at it, he told the
lady, "If you can get it to run, I'll buy it." She did, and he did. He's
done almost all the work himself, swears by Rick of SS, and his Alpine had
come a very long way and was looking pretty good.
We walk around and talk to folks and do the looking at cars thing. You know
what I really appreciate about being around British car people? There's
none of this "I know a guy who has a really cool Tiger" business like I get
at every other stop light. We're here to look at what everyone's got. This
is a pretty hodge podge bunch with no marquee standing out. Several Jensen
Healy's, nice, very early, white MG, a silver Bentley, two Triumph TR4's
both same British racing green. One of the TR4's has a lot of garage dust
on it, I shouldn't have gotten up so early, this is a very non-judgmental
group. The Lotus Elan that'd zipped by us earlier shows up. No-one is in
charge, but a few people do know the route. Some of look at maps. More
cars trickle in, a few more Jensen Healy's. In addition to the LBC's we've
got a Miata, a Fiat, a Geo and one vehicle that says Reliant, but only has
three tires. All together about 20 cars. We find out that our leader is
lost, but is on his way.
We finally get all together, maps are distributed, and we start out. We get
separated from the other Alpine at the first light. Karen has decided she's
going to drive, so I'm navigating. Fortunately this consists of watching
the red Jensen Healy in front of me and trying to hold on. Karen likes to
drive and in no time is chaffing at the slow pace being set, I on the other
hand, think we are going quite fast enough thank you very much and would
really wish she'd back off the nice car in front. At the first major
connection, we see the other group of LBC's associate with BritCar go by.
We apparently lose half our group to them, as after we make the next turn,
the first half of the group, including the other Alpine, are gone. We wind
through that back roads of Palo Alto. Lots of money in Palo Alto, and most
of it tasteless. Lots of Ranchita this and Casita that on the names of the
drives. Lots of Range Rovers, Mercedes, and Blondes. We skirt around some
horse paddocks, by a fat farm, through a few herds of shirtless running
boys, this at last got Karen's attention off the car in front of her, if for
all the wrong reasons. We make it out of Palo Alto soon and start climbing
up and down little tiny roads in and out of redwood trees and clearings,
turn here, switchback there. These are the types of roads that make these
cars fun. Karen yips every time she can make the tires squeal. The Jensen
in front is doing a creditable job and the TR4 behind is laboring hard and
keeping up. Far to the back of the pack I notice the Bentley seeming to be
keeping pace effortlessly as all the rest of us do all the work. All too
soon we reach Alice's Restaurant. This is a major cross roads and a
perennially favorite stop off for all the weekend motorcyclists enjoying the
same roads. A car from the first group we'd gotten separated from is there
and is steaming over (one of those pointy nose Triumphs). Although there
is a pack of Harleys in the parking lot, we take it over. The Harleys leave
in a huff after a bit, riddance. It is an unplanned stop. Some of the
BritCar drivers passing by mistake us for their group and the parking lot
swells with a lot of different cars. Another Alpine shows up, SII crewed by
another couple. He'd gotten his in pieces and boxes and had put it all
together, all without even having owned and Alpine before. It was in
fabulous shape and was fully tricked out, wood dash, leather seats, CD
player, the works. He tells me the other group had two Alpines and two
Tigers. He's another disciple of Rick at SS. I really gotta meet Rick
soon, he's a god. This fellow has a pusher electric fan, stock radiator, no
cooling problems. We discuss how to install a thermostatically controlled
fan as my three core is great while moving, but the four blade is not enough
when in traffic. We discuss the flex blade fans and their bolt on/off
properties. Karen goes to the market and brings back a muffin, breakfast
finally, I'd totally forgotten. I see a Tiger, but it parks across the
street. Coming from a different direction is a car club of Datsun 1600
Roadsters. They want to visit Alice's also. Several troups of Harleys and
various crotch rockets pass through, a few stop. We all intermingle. This
is one crazy happening juncture or a little bit.
The BritCar folks head on their way. Our overheater is cooled enough, and
we start out again leaving Alice's to the tender mercies of the motorcycles
and the Datsuns. Karen mentions that she has always had a soft spot for
those other LJC's and wonders why they never really took off. We wind the
way down the mountain to San Gregorio. Nice redwood forest again, bigger
trees, nice stream that the road parallels until we reach the bottom. We're
behind the other TR4 this time. He's got a terrible sound in his nice shiny
new stainless steel exhaust system, but he skips right along. The other TR4
is still behind us and we're following two Morgans. For all they look
older, these Morgans can motivate when they want to. Karen does all she can
to convince them they want to. I hold onto my hat. San Gregorio is a
sleepy little town of apparently one building that houses the general store
and bar. We all manage to make this one. Some of our party visit the bar
and start the Bloody Mary's. This is a hardy bunch. The rest of us stretch
our legs, wander around, and watch the goings on in the cow pasture across
the street, we discuss whether or not to report the bull's activities to Ken
Starr, but decide its much too nice a day to worry about it. Every once in
a while an LBC that we don't know, but that obviously belongs to the BritCar
group buzzes on by.
(my first attempt to post failed, so I've broken this up to try and pass our
electronic censors).
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Tue Sep 05 2000 - 10:15:59 CDT