Monday, April 26, 2010

Parade Of Homes Road Trip, Day 2

As this olelongrooffan mentioned in this post, I was honored to be asked to judge the Parade of Homes down in MickeyMouseLand for the Metro Orlando Home Builders Association.

Well, this past Saturday was the second day of judging so this olelongrooffan hopped on that Eisenhour Interstate System and hot footed it on down there.

Now, on the rare occasion this olelongrooffan drives on the Interstate, I always set the cruise control in my oleragtop at around 79 mph and that Saturday was no different.
So, here I am ambling along Interstate 4 just west of I-95 and cruising at 10 over the speed limit and low and behold, a SMART car
blows by my oleragtop like we were sitting still! By the time I picked my trusty Polaroid up off the passenger seat and got it turned on, about 4 seconds, this is how far that SMART car was ahead of me.

So much for fuel economy and the automobile designed for urban driving.

So, anyway, I arrived and spent a few hours looking at some really nice homes and returned to the Association offices and got in the oleragtop for the ride home to the Birthplace of Speed and the Taj Mahal.

Now those of you Counting Along With Me will know that, as I mentioned, this olelongrooffan rarely travels on the Interstate, after all, as TheGoodAttorney says to me, "How can you find the World's Largest Frying Pan if your doing 80 down the Interstate?" And, of course, thejeepjunkie tries to berate me by telling me, and anyone else who will listen, "Yeah, olelongroof is the only guy I know who can take a three hour trip and turn it into a seven hour trip."

Yep, that's me. And I ain't changing.

So, anyway, this olelongrooffan pulled out of that Association parking lot at around a Japanese dentist appointment, you know tooth hurty, and headed up Highway 17-92 towards home without an Interstate in sight.

Well, as I passed through the urban intersection of of State Road 436 and 17-92 in Casselberry, this olelongrooffan catches sight of a 3' x 5' sign advertising a car show today in Lake Lloyd Park.

The only Lake Lloyd this olelongrooffan is aware of is Lake Lloyd at the Daytona International Speedway and this olelongrooffan thought it odd that they would advertise a car show in Daytona Beach down here in Casselberry.

So, this olelongrooffan pulled to the curb and got out my trusty rural road atlas for the State of Florida (they publish them for most states and are $20 at WallyWorld).

Yeah, I love this thing. You can't navigate urban areas with it but it shows every rural road in the state. Dirt trails in the National Forests, every county road whether dirt or paved. It refers to the Interstates, not with the national designation, but with the State Road number!

But, more importantly, it labels nearly every significant body of water, whether rural or urban. And sure enough, in downtown Casselberry, Florida, adjacent to the city municipal offices is Lake Lloyd!

Yes, those of you who have been Counting Along With Me for a while will remember this is the atlas who sacrificed its cover for use as a funnel during this adventure.

But the best part is that park is just ahead on the east side of 17-92 directly adjacent to the road this olelongrooffan is traveling upon!!

Yeah, somebody someplace is watching over me!!

So, just a few blocks up the road, I spot an "Event Parking" sign and follow it to the field where the spectators were directed to park. After giving the Boy Scout a buck donation, the oleragtop came to stop and this olelongrooffan headed over to that park to see what could be seen.

The first automobile this olelongrooffan saw was a fairly rare one and in pristine condition.
It was a 1966 Lincoln Continental four door convertible.
And she was opened up like one of the stars of Larry Flynt's magazines
happily displaying all her charms for all of us to see.
Yeah, but this one has alot more class and wide whites to boot!
And this olelongrooffan thought it was one of the best in shows and, appropriately enough, parked in the same slot as this olelongrooffan is old!

The next one I spotted was this beautiful and rare 1941 orphaned Oldsmobile.
The reason this car is rare is that during the 1941 model production year, all U.S. automotive manufacturing was halted and those plants were converted to the production of military equipment for World War 2.
And this one has an even rarer Hydramatic!
I have finally learned to get an image of the information placard so this olelongrooffan can remember What I Saw Today!
Parked next to it was a 1940 Buick Club Coupe.
It was bright red and in excellent condition.

Parked next to it was a Mustang Shelby Replica. At least the owner had enough mojo to call it out as a replica as opposed to the guy I saw last month with the "recreated" Yenko.
It was a nice ride, though the roof is to short for this olelongrooffan, TheKenMan would totally hoon it!

I did like this early 60's GMC in near original condition. Maybe a repaint but that was it.
And the roof is plenty long enough for me with this ride!
And if I remember correctly, it was a 3100, signifying a one ton chassis.

Next door was this well done El Camino.
It was nothing like this one though. Incidentally, this olelongrooffan recently spotted the subject of that post painted this same shade of red.

And, of course, this image was gotten just for thejeepjunkie and the Bus.
It was on the front of this old military flat fender.
And, just to let you know, this is how these things were worked on back in the day.
While there were plenty of run of the mill tri-5 street rods and Corvettes, this olelongrooffan had to get a couple of images of this Mark Macguire-like steroided out 57 Chevy tudor post.
I mean, this guy must have over a hundred grand in this thing. Plus, I bet it gets about 4 mpg.
The shoes on the rear end of this thing are nearly a foot wide!
And the interior? There is not one stock piece left in it.
But, different strokes for different folks, I guess.
When this olelongrooffan was a mere teenager, I thought this body style Bow Tie Nova was the coolest car around.
But now, this olelongrooffan likes longroofs and ragtops and I thought this one was especially nice.
It is a 1957, also orphaned, Oldsmobile.
And while it has been restored, it has a cool retro looking battery! (thanks to TheKenMan is due here.)
I just love this real work of art coming out of Harley Earle's design studio of the mid-50's.
And this interior is just the way this olelongrooffan likes them.

Bone Stock.
The other Best In Show at this one.

On the way out, I spotted this 1960 Bow Tie Impala and
got an artsy fartsy image of its massive horizontal rear wing.
And its partner on the driver's side.
Can you Counters read that license plate in the image above? "MY 60". Pretty clever.
And the last image taken at that stumbled upon Casselberry Car Show.

Man, sometimes things just work out great for this olelongrooffan.

So this olelongrooffan got back on 17-92 and, after checking my trusty atlas, turned east on SR 415 to catch County Road 4192 for the trip up to the home of The World's Most Famous Beach.

On the way up 4192, Nature called and this olelongrooffan turned on some anonomous dirt road and had a talk with Mother Nature.

On the way back out, I spotted this old Mustang for sale outside a home similar to the one the pilot of the boat in this post lived.
And on the corner of that dirt road and 4192 was this Kubota for sale and this olelongrooffan thought I would get an image of it should thejeepjunkie want to do some horse trading in the future.

Now Counters, this olelongrooffan has this to say about that.

Even though I am "celebrating" two years of unemployment this week, by having the honor of judging those nice homes down in MickeyMouseLand, and then by finding this car show and that old Kubota, things are pretty good for this olelongrooffan.

And that lets this olelongrooffan

Celebrate Life.

2 comments:

Horse-farmer said...

Thanks for the memories.....

glad the car show had some "originals"

tom

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the show ,very nice . But a 6 volt battery has 3 caps ,1 for each 2 volt cell . I think all GM products were 12 volt by 1957.