The 2008 Annie & Steve Norman Classic Motorcar Rally is finished. I don’t know our final standing, but I can tell you it won’t be very good. Dad & I were way off our game and did not do very well. Perhaps I can blame it all on the weather! 😉 We’ll find out soon, but in the meantime here are some photos. I’ll add more soon, so check back.
Above: Dad buckles into the Navigator’s seat to start the Rally. The top is up since it is raining. 🙁
Above: The start under the archway of the Inn at Port Ludlow.
Above: Rallymaster Doug Breithaupt gives us a countdown for the start.
We roared off, only to find our odometer not working! We reset it and it started functioning, but this first leg was an odo calibration section… so we were screwed.
Above: Annie & Steve Norman’s 1964 Bentley S3 Continental.
Above: Susan & Ken Olsen’s 1973 BMW 3.0CS
Above: Adele & David Cohen’s 1939 Bentley 4.5 Liter.
Above: Dad working on route/time calculations.
Above: Michelle & Dana (inset) Swanson, in a 1991 Mistubishi Galant VR4. They do gravel rallys in this car.
At a rest stop the Navigators all get serious and try to do as much pre-calculation as possible. Meanwhile us drivers just stand around and look stupid… or in my case, take pictures. 😉
Above: Car 1, a 1958 Alfa Romeo Guilietta run by Alan Chockie & Antoinette Slavich.
Above: A lovely little blue Fiat 500. Phil Rome, the driver ended up swapping it for a Jaguar XJ6C halfway through the first day (he is local and lives in Port Townsend) as the little Fiat could not maintain speed up long hills.
The weather was just downright crappy. The forecast kept giving us a glimmer of hope, but it never really delivered. It just kept spitting rain, mist, showers, and sprinkles all day long. We finally got a sunbreak late in the day and actually dropped the top on the last segment, but it stayed up all the next day.
After lunch we visited a grade school in Port Townsend and all the kids came out to see the cars. I tilted the Jaguar’s bonnet up to give the kids a thrill.
Above: Mike & Howard Becker’s 1960 Pontiac Star Chief (another father/son team.)
Above: The interior of the BMW coupe.
Above: Duane Crandall has a look at the engine compartment of the 1969 280sl driven by his daughter Lauren. Of course once a bonnet goes up, the boys all gather to look.
Above: Red sports cars are always a hit.
After the school, we caravanned to Bergstrom Automotive in Port Townsend, a wonderful shop in an old Hudson Dealership one block off the waterfront. It is chock-full of automobilia! My dad bought a Road & Track magazine from 1960 with a road test of a 300sl roadster. They had zillions of old car mags, books, parts, signage, etc. A gearhead’s paradise! The prices seemed very reasonable too. I highly suggest a stop there if your in the area.
Above: Bergstrom Automotive.
Above: Waiting for our check-out time in Port Townsend.
