Love the story Rob, here's an adventure from 56 years ago. It’s late summer 1966, my buddy (Bill) and I both 20 years old, have just ended 3 days at Indianapolis Raceway Park and the US Nationals. We arrived Friday in my tan/tan 63 Corvette Coupe (they didn’t call them split window yet) and after the Nationals we planned a driving trip to California on Route 66 out of St. Louis. Tuesday morning we head out on State Route 40 to St. Louis, joining Route 66 sometime in the afternoon. (Now we imagined ourselves Buz and Tod from the TV series ‘Route 66’) Later that afternoon we keep trading highway places with a white 63 Chev Super Sport 327 4 speed and as we learn later the fellow’s name is Gerry Porter and stay at the same motel that evening. Porter is headed home to Tulsa and then on to Viet Nam. Wednesday morning we wake up to the factory rumble of new 66 Chevelle SS396. The driver is Porter’s long time friend. We all say goodbye and Bill and I head out on Route 66. I had removed the wheel discs at home and the black wheels on the tan 63 Vette looked sinister (for the day) and more than once we were followed by the local constabulary through some small towns. We made it to Albuquerque that night. Thursday we head out again but this time we find small sections of the newly constructed Interstate. Of course we have to try this new super highway but the Vette’s 4:11 gears had that little small block revving pretty high but that didn’t seem to bother us. Interstate 44 was not complete and eventually we had to get back on 66 which made the 327 happier. Thursday we stayed in Barstow, Calif and noticed a large contingency of muscle cars running around the streets. My 63 was equipped with 2 four barrels (aftermarket) and I had disconnected one for highway cruising. My buddy says to connect up the other 4 bbl and let’s go cruising. Wasn’t long before someone noticed our Ontario (Canada) license plate and challenged us to a run. An unsuspecting Nova got sent back to the hamburger stand. We went back to the hamburger stand and talked to a lot of gearheads that thought we were crazy driving all the way to California from Canada. Friday we arrive in LA and what else head to the beach after securing a room at Don’s Motel on PCH. Cruising around LA was a dream for the two of us Canucks and visiting several local beaches had us looking for Annette and Moon Dog.....YIKES! We cruised Sunset Strip numerous times and PCH north for about 20 miles. Saturday we drove over to Riverside where I bought a set of Keystone ET mags (dark center) and left the 4 original 63 Vette wheels at the tire shop cause we had no room to bring them home. The new wheels bulged out somewhat and we had to spend about and hour filing the inside of the fenders to achieve proper clearance. That night we went to Lions Dragstrip and saw many of the local racers and some big names of the day. Sunday we headed to Pomona but there was no racing, so we took a good tour of the grounds but were disappointed nothing was going on. Monday we headed out early on 66 and the next few days were uneventful until around OKC we started having oil pressure problems. Stops for gas produced a no oil pressure issue on start up. Diagnosis later would reveal low oil and what oil was there was foaming up. After sitting for about 10 mins the oil pressure would reappear on start up. We arrived home in Toronto Friday evening with an adventure of a lifetime ticked off the bucket list. Happy motoring – Bernie and Bill still cruising (aka Buz and Tod)
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