7/27/09
Road trip to the 2009 FCA Meet Part I
Sam Hallowell completed the first part of the road trip by arriving at
my house in Upstate NY from Rhode Island. His car, a Ferrari 365GTC/4
performed well even though he was caught in some Sunday afternoon
traffic on the Mass Pike.
We hit the road at about 7:30 am Monday morning from Claverack, NY with
partly cloudy skies and a cool morning. We were hoping for continued
cloud cover because the Ferrari's air conditioning had decided on this
trip to stop working! Since I was used to non existent A/C in older
cars, I dressed in appropriate clothes!
The first day of driving together would be our longest at about 440
miles. We had considered taking some smaller country roads, but needed
to be in Ohio at 5pm, so I90 west was our best choice for covering
lots of ground without delay. We managed to keep the speeds to around
75-80 mph most of the way without attracting much attention in the 65
mph speed limits, but the State Police were hard at work this last week
of the month! The Ferrari ran great, and never missed a beat. 3000 rpm
kept the pace to 80 mph, and without downshifting to 4th gear, there
was
plenty of torque to pass with ease. I felt the power steering in the
C/4 made the car more sensitive to input at highway speeds, but the
trade off was fantastic low speed maneuverability in parking lots and
city streets. Once I got used the high speed sensitivity, highway
driving was very relaxed. The cabin temps were comfortable except for
when we were in bright sunshine and the midday heat started to rise.
The abililty to open the quarter windows allowed us to direct airflow
to
where we wanted, and even with all the windows open, we were able to
carry on some
conversation without losing our voices.
We arrived in Elyria OH, just west of Cleveland at about 4:30pm, and
checked into the Holiday Inn. Like clockwork, my phone started
ringing at 5 pm from the local Ferrarista waiting for our arrival. Tom
Kizer unfortunately had last minute mechanical issues with his 365GT
2+2, but drove down in a regular car from Montreal and was staying in
our hotel. General Marsh, a retired Veterinarian and long time
Ferrari collector invited us out to his shop in Elyria and offered
overnight parking for Sam's C/4. Although Sam felt safe enough parking
his car outside the hotel, we took General up on his offer to see his
shop.
About 10 minutes from the Hotel, we found General's garage to be the
envy of us all. It was not a polished painted floor type shop you often
see in magazines, but this shop had character. Everywhere you looked
you saw something interesting, from wooden boats to airplane engines.
Work benches were covered in old tools and various little projects, and
the shop contained a bunch of neat cars. The Ferraris included a 355
Spyder, a carb 308 with 29K original miles, and P3/4 replica! General
used to own a 250GTE, and a Dino 206 that was actively campaigned on
the show field in the 80s, but have all been sold to make room for
other projects. The real focus of General's attention these days was
the restoration of wooden Chris Craft boats!
Joining us at the shop were three of General's oldest friends. They
brought a late model Morgan +4 and a wonderful green Triumph TR-3. The
camaraderie of these old friends made me happy just to be part of it
that
evening. We made reservations for a local Italian restaurant and headed
out
en mass.
Jim Gerkin and his son James, a local 330GT owner, met us at the
restaurant in his Ferrari 430. (Brave Soul to own a modern Ferrari in
the Cleveland area without the support of a local Dealer!) With 9 car
guys at the table, we covered a lot of topics over great food and
drink. There were moments during the meal where I sat back marveling
at how four sets of strangers were brought together that night and you
wouldn't even know it from the jocularity we had with one another. The
common ground of old Ferraris brought us together, but it was our
enthusiasm for all things mechanical that made for such a fun evening!
Just a reminder, I'm looking for a
new Vintage Ferrari Project. If you have, or know of a restoration
project, please let me know. It would be great to restore another car
on this website! My E-mail.
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