Month: February 2004

I went to the Cleve­land Auto Show today and checked out what is going on the in the world of auto­mo­biles. Boy was it a zoo. I don’t like crowds that con­sist of myr­i­ad groups of peo­ple all going in dif­fer­ent direc­tions with atten­tions not nec­es­sar­i­ly direct­ed in the direc­tion they are direct­ing them­selves, all mov­ing at dif­fer­ent speeds. Espe­cial­ly when I want to walk slow­ly and look at things. Saw a cou­ple of cool things, includ­ing a V‑16 1000hp bat­mo­bile look­ing thing called the Cadil­lac 16. Appar­ent­ly they run about $300k and are spe­cial order items only. They prob­a­bly only get 5 miles to the gal­lon as well. The car I liked best is a Sat­urn con­cept called Curve, which I think, is due to be released next year. It is quite sharp look­ing and around $20k, or so rumor has it. I saw a Volk­swag­on Phaeton [a sweet name that I am glad has been brought back, even if by a for­eign car com­pa­ny]. It was a $104k Volk­swag­on though, which was incon­gru­ous to say the least.

Then I went down­stairs to where the clas­sic cars were. One of the first I saw was a 1961 Corvette Con­vert­ible, one year younger than my dream Corvette, but in almost all oth­er ways iden­ti­cal. There was also a sweet, Auburn Boat­tail and even a Hud­son. I think one of the rea­sons I like well main­tained and restored clas­sic auto­mo­biles is that each one is a tes­ta­ment to the love and ded­i­ca­tion their own­ers have for these works of art. Each car has its own sto­ry and they are all so much dif­fer­ent than the cook­ie-cut­ter autos of today’s man­u­fac­ture, that I can’t help but be drawn to them.

Here are some pic­tures: