Today (Thursday) we are in Pleasanton near San Francisco for a the Goodguys West Coast National hot rod show that runs over the weekend with a swapmeet and display tomorrow and another show on Saturday. We traveled from Reno along some of the secondary highways, rather than the interstate, as we had a lead on some Model A parts for sale. When we turned up at the sellers place he showed us some of the stuff he had for sale which included a complete A coupe (drive away for $5500), there was a ’34 5 window that had been rodded, a collection of pickup bodies, doors, roadster bodies and numerous other parts lying around in a paddock as well. But, the really cool part was the cars that were in ‘the barn’ – a model A coupe that his grandfather had put an extended deck on during the war so he could get a greater petrol ration, ’57 Chev, ’46 Chev coupe, ’31 A pickup, ’32 Coupe. Unfortunately none of these were for sale even though they had been sitting idle for years (since 1944 for the A coupe).

We heard today that the Hogan, Martin & Rea team have set a new record on the salt with their car of 196mph. Unfortunately a couple of the other teams are out due to mechanical issues but a great effort put in by all regardless.

Getting near the end of our trip now with the goodguys event being our last scheduled stop. That pretty much means there is probably only another couple of posts of our adventures before we are back home and can share with some of you the facts and photos of the whole trip.

Cheers, Rob.

Two days have passed out on the salt and what an experience it has been. The place is quite indescribable you really have to see it to fully appreciate the scale and vastness of the place and I would imagine the eerie stillness when there aren’t hundreds of people honing all over the place.I haven’t been able to view all the kiwi teams but the Harris Family Racing (car 397) have run faster than the current record in their class – this means that they have qualified to try and break the record by backing up that run with another that must also be higher than the current record. If they do that then a new record has been created.The Kiwi-a-salt team (car 2761) has also qualified in their class to have a go at the record. These runs will be done in the first group to run tomorrow morning from 7am – so that will be another early start for us. Although we are all awake by then as the ground under the tent isn’t the softest in this part of the country.
There are plenty of amazing sights to see, the classic cars, the hotrods, the motorbikes, the race cars all buzzing around the place heading somewhere - all have a coating of salt stuck to their undersides or sprayed over them, but luckily because it isn’t wet it doesn’t seem to stick like it has done in the past.
Enjoy the pictures until I can get another update done.
Cheers, Rob.

Friday was a lazy day spent sitting by the pool and doing the laundry. Later in the afternoon we went to Summit Racing equipment who have a huge warehouse full of everything you could imagine for your car – their catalogue is 420pages and everything that is in it is in the warehouse!Every Friday evening they have a show in the carpark, apparently the numbers were down on usual probably because of Hot August Nights having just finished but there were still around 30 interesting cars turned up. We put the Oldsmobile on display and got a prize for the furthest travelled plus a pro choice award and a couple of raffle prizes – so it was a good evening.Got invited to a drag race meeting being held on Saturday that is on the way to Bonneville it will be interesting to see how the Americans do it.
Well, the drag racing was a non event. It seems that it is on but not starting till 5pm – we didn’t learn this until we got to the track and found it pretty much deserted. The track is in the middle of nowhere but close to the airforce base that was used in the film Top Gun. At least it was an opportunity to put the Oldsmobile on the starting line! Saturday night was spent in Winnemucca which is on the way to the salt flats. We were told of a rod run at the ‘Flying A Garage’ which is currently a workshop and small museum focusing on the 50’s, 60’s and 70s hot rods, customs and race cars with a two storey museum proper being built and ready for opening in 2009. This place was amazing – apart from the beers and BBQ going for all those who turned up it houses historic salt flat race cars, most of the Ed Roth cars and equipment he used while building custom hotrods, historic drag race cars plus the 40 or so people passing through who turned up for the evening and displayed their own hot rods etc in the car park. There are over 200 historic cars in the collection with most of them in storage, but these photos show some of those that were on display for us. Very cool place and recommended if you are ever in Winnemucca, it will be even better when the museum proper opens next year.

Sunday had us up early and on the road for Wendover which is where I am now posting this update. We had a couple of issue with the Oldsmobile getting here – run out of gas and trouble with flat battery but have made it OK and set up our tent in the camping ground. Not like a camping ground back home – not a blade of grass to be seen anywhere!This will be our base for the next couple of days as it about 10mi to the salt and there is no camping out there. It will be another early start tomorrow to watch the first runs of Speed Week as the salt is opened at dawn (about 5am) and obviously it’s cooler then as well.So, once we’ve been out tomorrow and seen what it’s all about I’ll post and update along with some more photos - till then, Rob.

Two of Ed Roths creations.

Jude got a ride back to the motel with the old feller in this black roadster - nice people all round.