Archive for News
Three for Three
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As expected and pretty much what we have been dealing with all year, Saturday’s finale at the Knights Of Columbus was rained out. Looks like that is going to be it for that group this year, schedule conflicts indicate it is not going to be rescheduled, too bad, it is a fun time and a great group of people.
However, Sunday the weather gods were smiling on us and we were able to participate at the Holyoke soldiers Home finale event. We love this place because all of the funds go into the residents activity fund accounts. 
These guys and gals put everything on the line for us, it is the least we can do to help support them now.… Attendance was a little short as this show was running the same day as the Pathfinder Regional show out in Palmer and many of our friends chose to head out that way because it was a much larger show. 
Mary Lee and I will do everything we can next season to help build attendance for this show.
Did I mention we managed a “Top Twenty” award? Makes us three for three…
The coming week, we plan on attending the Brimfield Antique & Classic Car Show at the Heart Of The Mart field on route 20 in Brimfield on Saturday the 1st and Sunday plan to attend the Wheels & Whiskers Classic Car Show at Mestek Field in Westfield, MA.
Hope to see you there.…
Rotary Show & Hadley Cruise Night
Posted by: | CommentsIt’s not often we get a stretch of 3 good days in a row, so we took advantage of all of them. The season is almost over and soon it will be time to put the “Gray Lady” down for her long Winter slumber. 
After a nice trip out to Boston on Saturday, we faced the dilema of having to choose between the Manchester On Main show, the Simsbury Fly-In and Classic Car Show or our local Chicopee Rotary Classic Car Show, sponsored by our bank the Chicopee Savings Bank. 
We opted to stay local and support the local charaties, so off to the Chicopee Rotary Show we went.
We entered the 1951 — 1961 production car division and managed a second place award! We don’t have the award yet, they had a professional photographer there taking photos and will do a photo plaque in place of a trophy, I’ll post a photo next week sometime when it is delivered. Interesting factoid, the photographer, Bud Shubach, a local pro was the same person Mary lee and I hired to do our wedding more than 32 years ago! It is a small world.… 
They also did a nice air bag deployment demonstration, using 4 different set-ups, two of them turned out to be duds!
Having a never say die attitude Monday brought another fine day, not wanting to miss it I decided to attend one of the final cruise nights of the season up in Hadley. Mary lee opted out as she was exhausted after our grueling weekend schedule. Sponsored by the Hadley Young Mens Association and held out in the farm country off route 47 near the Connecticut River, 
a great time was had by all, good food, great DJ and a nice turnout of about 60 cars. We were honored to receive the “Best Of Show” award, the only award given that night. Thank you to the Brickyard Drifters, you put on a very nice event, and while we may not be able to get back for your final show, we certaainly will see you again next season…
If the weather holds we plan on attending the season finale shows at the Knights of Columbus on Saturday and the Holyoke Soldiers Home on Sunday, see you there.
“Cadillac Day” — New England Region Cadillac/LaSalle Club Event
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Saturday dawns with a spectacular early Fall day, sunny, temps in the 50’s, great day for a road trip! We left home at 9:00AM for our trip East down the Massachusetts Turnpike, it was a great ride.… Boy, they sure don’t build cars like they used to, it was like riding on our living room couch, the “Gray Lady” attracted much attention on our 102 mile trip out. 
I’m still a little freaked out by the attention we get at 65 MPH, everything from people pulling alongside and giving us the “thumbs up”, to people rolling down their windows and trying to carry on a conversation, and this trip where a suburban pulled up on our left side, snapped some photos, moved back behind us to take some more, then finally came up our right side to take even more. My god.… folks you do understand we are hurtling down the highway at high speed, you really should be looking at where you are going!! 
Never really though about “defensive driving” until we started road tripping with this baby.….
We arrived at Cadillac Village, a huge Cadillac retailer, and today’s event sponsor at around 10:40. Our club get together was a social event primarily, just a season end get together, there was no judging or competition, just a fun time to get together and talk Caddy’s. 
Cadillac Village supplied all the food and drink along with a live band who played all day for our enjoyment, they even gifted every driver who attended with a Cadillac Village logo camp chair, what a great bunch! In attendance were some absolutely spectacular examples of vintage Cadillac and laSalles, what a treat to see all of these fine automobiles in one place. 
I’ve included just a couple photos here, but will get a full album up soon on the photo page.
We left for our return trip about 3:00PM and were safely back home around 4:30. This 200+ mile round trip is probably the longest trip the “Gray Lady” has traveled in the last 40 years, she did it with grace, style, and absolutely no issues. A very nice day!
Tomorrow poses a dilema for us in that the Manchester Show (a 2000 car event), the Simsbury Show (an antique car & plane show) and the Chicopee Rotory Shows are all scheduled on the same date due to rain issues throughout the Summer. We really want to attend them all, but after the hectic pace of the last 2 weeks we are going to opt to just stay local. so the Chicopee Rotory Club Show is it.
See you there.….…
31st Annual Melha Shriners Vintage Auto Show
Posted by: | CommentsMary Lee and I returned from our epic adventure on the high seas on Friday. We sailed on the NCL Dawn out of Boston to the beautiful island of Bermuda. I won’t bore you with the details here, but we were upgraded to a suite prior to sailing and if you are a cruise fan and interested, you can find the full review and photos that I posted on the Cruise Critic forum here;
http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1479913
Now that we are back home, it has been a whirlwind trying to do laundry, digging through the paperwork piled high on my desk, and we still found the time to attend the Melha Shriners Vintage Auto Show today. This show was another rain date reschedule from earlier in the season and we are glad they finally got a good day to put the show on. The Shriners do so much good work for children with their vast network of hospitals. We here in Western Massachusetts are fortunate to have one of these facilities right here in Springfield.
The show had a great turnout, and I apologize for forgetting my camera, so no photos of the event today. Suffice it to say there were many great examples of classic automobiles on display to the delight of the crowds. Late in the afternoon, at the awards ceremony, we were a little disappointed to not be included in the “Top 15″, and I had just turned to my wife and said, that even though we got skunked, it was still a great day. 
The day brightened dramatically, when the very next announcement was that we were the “President’s Choice” award winner! What a great finish to a great week! We will certainly cherish this one, and look forward to supporting the Shriners again next year.
Going to be very busy this coming week and we have a full schedule for next weekend with a New England Region Cadillac/LaSalle Club event in Boston on Saturday and the 10th Annual Chicopee Rotory Club Classic Car Show on Sunday
See you there.….…..
Hurricane Irene
Posted by: | CommentsWell it’s been quite the year here in Western Massachusetts. Horrible Winter with record amounts of snowfall, collapsing roofs, school closures, major trouble all around. Then summer arrives and we are greeted by a June 1st Tornado causing a great amount of property damage, with several people killed. The summer continued with great amounts of rainfall, we had one of the wettest seasons anyone can remember and last week we experienced the fringe of the Earthquake that shook Virginia, it was a freaky experience to say the least, I can’t imagine what it really would have been like if the epicenter had been closer than the 500 miles away that it truly was.….
Yesterday we were targeted with Hurricane Irene and fortunately we escaped unscathed, we had very little winds and no more than 3″ of rain here, though just less than 20 miles away they are dealing with severe flooding, power outages and trees down. During the storm, our backyard pond was visited by this critter, 
he doesn’t look to happy. Of course the nasty weather caused us to skip the Deerfield Lions Club event in Deerfield, MA as it has for the majority of our summer weekends. When we return from Bermuda on the 9th our schedule gets chaotic, the Manchester and Simsbury, CT shows along with a local Rotory event are all scheduled on the same day due to weather reschedules. The Shriner’s show rain date is also here, so we are going to have to decide what we can and cannot do, bummer, they are all for good causes. Ahhh weel, it could be worse..
Final Buttery Brook Cruise Night?
Posted by: | CommentsDisgusted with this season’s string of weather cancellations and knowing Hurricane Irene was barreling straight for us, we decided last minute to attend the buttery Brook Cruise night. This will probably be our last one this season, they have 2 more scheduled for September 2nd and 9th but Mary Lee and I are sailing off to Bermuda from Boston on the NCL Dawn on the 2nd returning on the 9th. Got to see some old friends, who we may not get to see again until cruise nights resume around Memorial Day next year. Our friends Roy & Mary Jane won an award and qualified for the Monthly award next Friday. I wonder if they will allow us to vote by absentee ballot?
Hole In The Wall Gang Event
Posted by: | CommentsAfter debating go or no for an hour due to the weather, we took off for Vernon, CT
and Scranton Motors to attend the benefit for the Hole In The Wall Gang’s Kids Camp. The show seemed to be lightly attended, probably due to the threat of inclement weather and the fact that this was a rain day reschedule from an earlier date. 
Not a lot to report here, boring time was had by all.… 
Highlight of my day was when the dealer’s choice award was announced (Scranton Motors is a Cadillac, Buick, GMC dealer) and they chose a Corvette, huh? Kind of says it all…
Friday On Wheels — Pittsfield, MA
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This evening we traveled up into the Berkshires to Pittsfield, MA for the “Friday On Wheels” event. Great weather, great ride, really nice area of Massachusetts. North Street downtown was closed for several blocks for us to display our cars. Got there around 4:00PM and was directed to park across from the church on whose lawn the stage was setup. 
Two different blues bands played for us live, food vendors everywhere and a great late summer evening. 
Not sure how many cars were there but it looked like hundreds, crowds looked like they could easily number well over a thousand if not much more!
I was pleased that the ’38 LaSalle that got skunked in Agawam two weeks ago won the Berkshire Bank award, 
that car deserves to be a winner! I’m not sure who the top 20 winners were because we were so spread out they had no award ceremony for them, they just delivered them to the vehicles. 
No award for us this time, but it was a great night out. Tomorrow we are planning on the “Tuned By Tuna” show in Springfield, but the weather looks shaky and though it is a rain or shine event, we won’t be there in the rain.
Cadillac Day, Stoughton, MA
Posted by: | CommentsSaturday dawned with a heavy cloud cover but forecast was for no rain until late in the day, 
so what the heck, off we went to Long Cadillac out in Stoughton, MA for “Cadillac Day” sponsored by the New England Region Cadillac LaSalle Club. We left about 8:15AM and motored East down the Massachusetts Turnpike for the 60 mile trip, 
arriving in a little more than an hour. This was the longest trip the “Gray Lady” has taken since we have owned her, and it went without a hitch!
Upon arrival, we were invited to display in the designated 1950’s era showroom,
staged for this event. We shoe horned her in, joining a gorgeous 1958 Black Sixty Special and a beautiful 1959 Red Convertible already there. These 3 cars stuffed that room to the gills, these new buildings sure were never made for cars of this size! 
It was really cool to see her standing on the floor and imagine that this was how it used to be 53 years ago, it was a once in a lifetime photo event. Thanks to all for a fun day! Special thanks to Long Cadillac for hosting the event and even supplying lunch for all of us. Too bad they are so far away, these are the kind of people I’d want to do business with when buying a new car. 
In the market for a car, and in their market area, see these guys I’m sure you won’t be disappointed.
Attendance was somewhat dampened by the threat of rain, but there was a nice selection of cars ranging from 1930’s through the 70’s. It was great to see such a collection of vintage Cadillacs in one place. 
In my neck of the woods, we are lucky if we see 1 or 2 at a time, I’m guessing there were about 35 vehicles represented here, this was a real treat and we are already making plans to attend the Fall Cadillac Day September 17th, hosted by Cadillac Village in Norwood, MA., sponsored again by the New England Region Cadillac LaSalle Club. See you there!
Factoid of the day.…. You are probably not going to believe this, but our 125 mile round trip used only 8 gallons of fuel! A 5,000 pound car, 300 horsepower high compression motor and 15+ MPG absolutely amazing! This was our first straight highway trip of any distance and our first opportunity to check the mileage, I was expecting around 10 MPG and so was very surprised. Really looking forward to our next long haul. The only issue we experience on the highway is people coming up alongside us, rolling their window down and trying to carry on a conversation at 65MPH! What a hoot.…..
The “Crusin’ On Main Street” event in Manchester was rescheduled to next Sunday due to bad weather today. This sets up a real dilemma for us next weekend, now there are 3 events on August 14th, Manchester, CT., Vernon, CT., and the very large “Tuned By Tuna” show, right here in Springfield, MA. 
Looks like we will be staying local at the Springfield show, but we really did want to go to Manchester. Also on our schedule this week is the Berkshire Bank Foundation “Friday On Wheels” Classic Car Show in downtown Pittsfield, MA., where they close Main Street to display the cars, have 2 live blues bands scheduled and will attract hundreds of cars.
See you there.….……
Friday Night Cruise
Posted by: | CommentsLooking to change things up a little and with an eye towards shaky weather, I took a shot at attending the Agawam Cruise Night sponsored by the Valley Cruisers. The weather was marginal at best, with some large dark clouds floating around. My route to the show took me over the Memorial Bridge in downtown Springfield, and as I was navigating over the span I couldn’t help but notice the angry looking storm clouds to the southwest, it made me very nervous. This was the same bridge featured in many you tube videos when the tornado struck Springfield on June 1st.
Well, I experianced no rain, but the threat of bad weather keep many away. The event was very sparsely attended, and I felt kind of out of place as most of the attendees were club members. No awards tonight, but it was fun to get the “Gray Lady” out and roll her around a bit. Our weather has been awful and event after event have been rained out or rescheduled. Our busy upcoming weekend looks to be a washout again. We are scheduled to be in Stoughton, MA at Long Cadillac for “Cadillac Day” sponsored by the New England Region Cadillac LaSalle Club and then Sunday in Manchester, CT for the “Crusin’ On Main Street” event which can attract upwards of 2000 cars. Time will tell.
Fingers crossed.….
