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By: Bob Strieter
Tours may come and tours may go, some tours just fade away you know. But the Old Cal Tour for 2007 was just a bit of heaven.
Maybe I should just stick to restoring rusty old car parts and stay away from poems of wit. I tried to talk Brad out of doing this tour report, but he insisted he wanted a few words and pictures of our tour. So you see this is not my fault.
Bud and Grace Pope, George and Marion Weber did an outstanding job of ordering up perfect touring weather. Warm days suitable for top down touring if desired with cool evenings for great socializing.
Need I mention food? Vic and Linda Groah started it all with trays of fresh fruit, home made pastries and cool drinks when on Thursday we had a short tour first to the Mooney Museum then on to the Groah's. That evening the Popes, Weber's, Ayers with help from Patty Strieter and Rachael Kendall set out one of the most impressive displays of hors d' oeuvres that would be hard to top or even equal. Dinner was supposed to be on you own this evening, but none left the motel for that purpose. As a side benefit, Ken Larson of Sonoma County brought several bottles of wine of his own making which further complimented the food.
Friday morning saw us leave the motel, head out of Visalia towards the towns of Exeter, Lemon Cove, and Lindsay. Between these picturesque towns were miles of just plain beautiful countryside. Neat farms, citrus groves, various fruit and nut trees were all part of the view as were the native Oaks spaced on the foothills. Then to add more frosting to the cake, we stopped at a fantastic antique shop. I think the owner not only enjoyed seeing our cars, as an added bonus he will be able to pay the rent this month from the purchases our group made. I saw everything from jewelry to milk cans leave the establishment.
After a great lunch stop at the Orange Blossom Cafe we had the pleasure of viewing Tom Meleo's Chevrolet collection. He has cars from 1914 up to a 1954 in his collection. He has Baby Grand's, "490's, a Royal Mail and even a 1917 V-8. Very impressive, very clean and very nice of him to be our host.
A great day ended with dinner at the Vintage Press in Visalia. The food, the service, the elegance and the ambiance did not belie the 3 star rating. It was great to see friends catching up with each other and new friendships being made. Tom Martindale presented all kinds of gifts for all sorts of reasons. Some just by raising your hand.
Saturday morning we were off again, this time to drive by some Victorian homes. There were several blocks of them, each one a gem unto itself. Our final stop was the Depot Restaurant. As you have probably figured, it was a renovated railroad station. Trophies were handed out for people's choice. Their choice for the pre-16 went to Tom Martindale's 1914 Jeffery. The choice for post-15 went to Bob Agusto's 26 Buick.
Pope had made a matted, framed trophy using a full block of very collectable US POSTAL stamps depicting various cars. He designated this as the President's choice. I pondered hard and long over this one. There was Dave Ayers 1910 Oldsmobile, Warren Record's 1910 Packard, Sam Gurnee's 1907 Stevens-Duryea the list goes on, but I finally chose Vaughn and Lynette Vartanian's 1909 Pierce-Arrow.
Don Ritchie had made up a trouble trophy and can you believe out of 34 cars, not a single break down. I must say however, when Bob Taylor opened the door to his trailer his beautiful Model A Ford roadster had a flat tire. He tried to sneak the change and had it not been for Dave Ayers dragging his floor jack across the driveway no one would have noticed. Guess who got the trouble trophy?
To me it's always sad when great tours are over, but Modesto Regional was handing out flyers for next years Old California Tour, so the saga continues. Learn to say "what a hoot" before Old Cal. '08. |
