Road Trippin - Day 04

Day 4 was a pretty special day for me. We left Show Low bright and early - destination The Grand Canyon.  My parents had lived in Arizona just before I was born and they visited the Canyon while I was still in the womb. Amazingly, even though I had been to Arizona many times to visit family, I had never been to the Canyon.

Forget everything that you think that you know about the Grand Canyon. Unless you have been, there is no way that you can describe or even imagine the immensity and striking beauty.

Our trip also took us past Mormon Lake, a shallow lake with a herd of Elk grazing right in the middle.

The cars were performing flawlessly and our group pulled into the El Tovar Hotel late in the afternoon...just in time to clean up and watch the sun set over the canyon. Good times!

Vasco - a long way from Portugal!

Mormon Lake

Entering Grand Canyon National Park

My '70 S at the Grand Canyon - Vasco driving.

Me (David), Curt E and Jerod R

Alan B, Curt E, Jerod R, David C and Brian F

Road Trippin - Day 03

Ruidoso, New Mexico in darkness seemed to be a lovely little town. Sadly, we arrived at night and departed before daybreak. I would like to go back.  On the outskirts of town, we stopped at the "All-American Cafe" and feasted on the most epic breakfast burritos. We also met up with several of the Texas RGruppe members who would accompany us to California.

Our goal this day was the sleepy little high-desert town of Show Low Arizona (Pop 11,473). One of those residents is a fellow by the name of Jim Edwards who is a vintage race-car (primarily Porsche) enthusiast. Jim was kind enough to open up his collection for us and it was well worth the side trip.

That would make a dent!

911 S ...Kills Bugs Dead!

The entrance to Jim's ranch

Would you trust this group unattended around your car?

Road Trippin - Day 02

The morning arrived rather early on Day 2 - well before 7am.  But before we talk about that, lets tell a story.

As mentioned before, Curt had equipped his car as a pseudo Rallye car for this trip. With just a little effort, he created a really clever and unique look. He switched out the Fuchs for a set of steel wheels, installed factory style skid plates, installed some period rallye accessories in the interior as well as a few other details. One of the most noteworthy touches was the pair of mudflaps hanging from the rear fenders. Curt insisted that we refer to them as "European rallye stone-guards" but when he wasn't around, they were just 'mud-flaps'.

Coincidentally, the artist of the bunch, Jared, had the remainder of a roll of bright yellow decal material in his trunk. This was left over from the Luftansa livery that Jared had applied for the trip west. So, long story short, sometime during the night Jared trimmed out a pair of "Naked Ladies" for Curt's mudflaps and snuck down and attached them.

Quite a few miles passed before Curt figured out why everyone else on the road was laughing.

Gotta love those wide open spaces in the great Southwest! 

One of the stops that I insisted that we make was the Cadillac Ranch outside of Amarillo, TX. I recall seeing this row of old Cadillac's sticking out of the ground during trips out to Arizona to visit my grandparents when I was a child. I always wanted to take the walk out to the cars, when I was little, so it was a treat to finally do so as an adult.

We added another 640 miles n day 2 and the final run into Ruidoso New Mexico, from Roswell, NM was just about perfect. It was a wide open highway with the sun going down. The sunset was stunning and as the daylight faded to a final burst of dark orange I snapped probably my favorite image yet.

Road Trippin - Day 01

One of the most memorable automotive experiences of all time for me was the road trip that I took with the rest of the Midwest RGruppe to California in 2008.  My friend Vasco flew in from Lisbon Portugal and acted as co-driver and got to see the "Real America".

I haven't really had much of an opportunity to share the photos, so over the next couple of weeks I will post highlights from the trip.

Day 1 was Effingham IL - Stroud, OK...600 miles under our belt in the first day!

Scott Hansen drove down from Chicago in his '69E.

Here is Vasco settling into a groove on I-70.

Alan Brody with his '69 S Targa.

Curt Egerer's rallye influenced Targa (more on this later) and Randy Stenson's mean 2.8 liter '70 T

Jerod Rundell had a cool racing livery on his '73S for the trip.  That's me in the background.

The reward for a job well done.  Pizza and beer in the hotel parking lot. This was more difficult than it would seem due to the goofy liqueur laws in Stroud. Only one place in town sold beer and they could only sell it warm. You had to go to another store across town to buy ice and then wait for the beer to cool. I guess it's the 7-day waiting period principle. Ensuring that nobody drinks a beer without really, really contemplating their actions.

We all want to be Bob!

My good friend, the "Man in Black" Bob Tilton has a great little blog out there in the clouds somewhere.  Bob is the creative sort - the polar opposite of my pragmatic personality and his blog reflects this. I highly recommend that you check it out -http://werkcrew.com/ - plus he updates it a lot more than I do mine.  In fact, most of you who visit my blog probably went to his first, so...umm..thanks Bob ... I guess.

As different as we are personality-wise, we both seem to love the same things in early 911's. Well, for example, Bob loves his car and I love his car too. Tis a nice car, but I tend to think he takes it for granted some times.

This is Bob

This is Bob's car

And most importantly, this is bobs book.  Go to Werkcrew and buy Bob's book. Its worth it!

Yesterday, Bob posted a few photos of one of my favorite early 911's on his Blog.  So, I decided that I would mimic him and post photos that I took of the same car. Copying Bob cant do anything but drive more people here, right?  =)

Original Unrestored Scheel 300 Racing/Rally Seat FS

I recently dug these seats out of a dusty attic where they had been stashed away for many years.  The Scheel 300 was a factory option in the 911ST and RSR in the early 70's.  They were also the BMW factory race seat in the '73 CSL's.  These lightweight fiberglass buckets are in excellent condition structurally.  They are complete with sliders and tilt brackets for early Porsche 911.

The upholstery is in better than average condition when you consider that they are 35-40 years old. The vinyl on the drivers bolster is worn from where the lap belt rubs across it and the passenger seat bolster has a cigerette burn.  Otherwise the vinyl has a couple of little stains here and there, but is in pretty good condition.

The black cloth inserts are not torn or ripped, but are saggy from being exposed to a lot of heat while in that attic. They also need a good cleaning. The seats are certainly usable as-is, or new covers are available from Gerritt at NML Classics in Germany and are not terribly expensive.

Price $3,200.00