August 18, 2012 – After a lazy brunch we wandered through the lovingly restored and modified vintage cars and hot rods at the Park Royal Village in West Vancouver. Well over 150 amazing machines were on display in the closed off Village, and a live band was playing equally vintage music. We were happy to enjoy the display of mechanical muscle since we’d accidentally missed the Burrard Yacht Club Classic Car & Boat Show earlier.
I love vintage cars, though I can’t say I have the same level of enthusiasm for vintage bikes. They just don’t really interest me all that much. Maybe it’s because I’ve been exposed to older cars my entire life, and have always been around muscle car enthusiasts, and although I was always exposed to motorcycles, they just weren’t as much of a fixture as the car culture was. My brother rebuilt a few cars when we still lived at home, one was a really fun Camaro Z28 (and although I wasn’t allowed to drive it – I did sometimes). Kirk has a 1968 Firebird for a long time, but we couldn’t really afford to do the restoration so we let that go eventually, but it was a lot of fun the years we owned it. I didn’t drive either one very much, mainly because I enjoyed them a ‘little’ too much! 😉 Kirk often says I’m a strange woman, if for no other reason than the fact that I love the sound of a powerful old engine. I’ll stop mid sentence and spin when I hear what I know is a muscle car from somewhere between the 1940’s through to the late 1980’s. I just love muscle cars and hot rods, they just have a ‘sound’ that thrills me, always has, in a way no motorcycle engine ever will! Thus, it was safer and cheaper to just enjoy being a passenger.
There was a 1972 GMC Sierra pickup truck at the show. That brought back memories on two fronts. When I met Kirk, he had an 80’s model, beautifully done and with a lift and huge tires. My brother hated when he came to pick me up in the winter if the snow hadn’t been shovelled yet, those tires packed it down and made it hard to clear. Fun truck to drive though!
And the second, earlier memory, was from when I was growing up. We had a 1968 maroon coloured one that carried us and our camper around the Province. Before the camper came along, all four of us, and the dog, managed to fill the bench seat. My brother and I were separated by Mom, and I always had to sit on the hump because I was the littlest. The dog got car sick if she was on the floor, so she too managed to squish onto that seat. Those were some darned cozy rides to the cabin and to the grandparents in the Shuswap. When Mom & Dad bought the camper, I would usually ride in it. I loved to lay in the top bunk, over the roof of the truck, and read my books. Dad had walkie talkies so we could stay in touch, and he always told me to close the curtain if I saw police. Of course in hindsight, that would most certainly have drawn attention to the fact that a person was riding illegally in there. Later we sold the camper and bought a trailer (or maybe that was when the camper was parked out at the cabin, I can’t remember), and Derek or I would ride in the back of the truck, ‘protected’ by the canopy. It was usually me and the dog, again , so I could hang out and read and there would be no sibling wars.
Lots of great cars today – Chevelles Beaumonts Model Ts, a GTO, various Ford, Chev, & GMC pickups, A Dodge Dart, Camaros – the list was endless. We couldn’t figure out exactly what this car was originally, all it said was 1940 Ford convertible. Pretty fabulous car though.
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