The Steamtug Blog

We used to travel to Murwillumbah, Northern NSW for our Christmas holidays when I was in those impressionable teenage years, to stay at my Uncle’s caravan park. My cousin Steve had his car license and used to take me to the drag races at Surfer’s Paradise International Raceway and got me hooked on fast cars and booze. My dream was a Chevy Corvette and a bottle of Southern Comfort, and all these years later I can tick it off my bucket list! The Southern Comfort I got out of my system pretty early when one night Steve and I were running amok and I drank a whole bottle of that stuff in 20 minutes. I felt pretty good for the next 30 minutes after that, then crawled out to the caravan in Uncle Barry’s backyard on my hands and  knees and lay in my bunk, lifting the tent flap every hour to spew my guts up, doing this until 4pm the next day. So, that was definitely out of my system and have never looked at Southern Comfort again! But the Corvette? Well that became my obsession. I drew the chevy logo on all my school books, had the Corvette sticker on my bedhead and looked at motor head magazines of Corvettes.

Jenny Cole was right into “Hobby-Tex” which was printed artwork that you colored yourself. She had all the pens, all the colors etc and for my birthday one year, gave me the picture of the Corvette and help me to color it up. Red of course! It hung on my bedroom wall too. So many years have past since then, and now that I am living in Louisiana USA (the home of Corvette’s). I needed a car to get me around. The finance companies here refuse to lend me money for a decent car, so I decided to buy a $3000 “get me by” grocery getter. But for that money, they were all too crappy. So I thought to hell with the world, and just threw common sense to the wind and searched for a car that I would really be proud of. I found it!!! A 1956 Oldsmobile 88. It looked so cool. But it was located too far away in Atlanta Georgia. And when sitting around at my friends Sarah and William’s place while Will cooked up yet another magic BBQ while I drank his beer, I showed him the Olds suggesting we go and get her. He slapped me around the head (metaphorically) and told me it was just too crazy to be driving a 60 year old car as my daily driver and it was too far way. So I thought back to all those years ago about my Corvette. There were plenty for sale here, just a matter of finding one not too far way that would suit daily driving.

Texas Classic Cars of Dallas

Dallas was a 6 hour drive away, and they had a 1976 Corvette that had the back window shape I liked, and the original rally wheels as they came with from the factory. I would not want to drive any further than Dallas and this car was 100% original and had only done 57,000 miles in nearly 40 years. It was very clean as it had been garaged up by a collector who just drove it to the Corvette rally each year, having only done 4,000 miles in the past 10 years. It had only had 2 owners and had not been driven for 6 months. I sipped my beer and said “I’m gonna buy her” and Will just looked at me. “No, I am serious. I am going to get there somehow and buy her!”

Sarah tried to bribe the kid up the street to drive me to Dallas with me paying for his time and petrol money. He was keen, but had to work on the day I wanted to go. So I went back to work and announced to my collegues, does anyone know of somebody going to Dallas Texas next weekend. My mate Paul, who is normally very quiet, looked at me sheepishly and with some suspicion in his eyes quietly let on that he had to go to Dallas Saturday. Why did I want to know? I told him the plan and he agreed! So Paul and I left at 4am and drove to Dallas. It was a good run and with little traffic on the city roads once we reached Dallas we arrived safely with no stress.

Dave and Maris run the classic car dealership in Dallas and are great people. They got a surprise when I turned up so early and said the car was still in their warehouse. It arrived 30 minutes later and was ready for me to take a test drive. Oooh, she looked nice! And the sound of that big 350 Chev engine sounded strong, burbling with authority as it idled under me bum. “You better pump the brakes a couple of times before you use them. These old cars need the brakes pumped occasssionally” said the mechanic. Pump the brakes my arse! I never heard that before. And I took off down the road in a cloud of dust. Sure enough, first application of brakes was like standing on a plum. And the beast slowly came to a stop with my foot on the floor. I did a bit of smooching around and headed back, announcing that the brakes were completely unacceptable. They agreed to fix them and took her into the workshop and the boys started frigging around. I was not happy… I was ready to call Paul to come back and get me and just walk away. Until Dave looked at my disappointment and said “To hell with this, we just gonna git you a brand new master cylinder”. Yes… things were looking up.

Slowest Car Ever!

I finally got on the road late in the afternoon, stopping at the first servo I saw because of course, the petrol tank was empty. They call it gas here, but don’t be fooled… its liquid! A man and his little 4 year old son came out and said to his son as they passed, “What kind of car is that little Johnnie?” It’s a Corvette Daddy! “Yes, your right! It is a Corvette”. I was pretty chuffed!

Traffic in Dallas is completely mental. 6 lanes all going at walking pace! It took over 1 hour just to get back out of the city traffic with start/stop, first/second gear running with the heat of the day at it’s highest, the old lady was not happy. I shutdown the air conditioning in sympathy. If she has to be hot, then I should share her pain. It doesn’t work well anyway because the fan will not run on high. Out onto open road at last, but the temperature remained hot, but not too bad. But I decided to pull over and have a cool drink and let her cool off a bit. So I pulled up at a gas station that sells inflammable liquids, stopping around the back under a tree, got out and pulled up the bonnet. I wasn’t there 2 mintues before “old mate” pulls up in his truck and jumps out to help me. “My uncle had one of these back in the ’70s, and I got tools in the back if you need ’em”. No, its all good, just a bit warm and giving her a rest. So then he tells me the story of his life and how is a Cherokee Indian etc, etc… interesting but I was hot and thirsty.

The trip home was hot and slow. Once cooled off, she eats the miles up nicely and is really happy out on the open road, but with only a 4 speed runs about 3,000 – 3,500 rpm at 70 to 75 mph on the open road. So why is it slow? Because it has a faulty fuel gauge that always seems to read empty, and when you stop to correct this (twice in the 6 hour trip home) there is always some Bozo that jumps out of nowhere saying “Oh, that’s a cool car! Is it the one with the Rochester carbie? My brother-in-law’s second cousin had one of these!!”

Home at last!

Made it back to Lake Charles Louisiana at 1.30am. I was wondering where my mate Paul, who drove me to Dallas was. He was driving back too that night, and since my phone battery was completely dead, I had no way of telling him I was ok. He had texted me all day to check my progress. When I finally got to see him Monday morning and tell him the trip went fine, he told me about his trip back. Apparently he hit something on the road and blew both front tyres on his car. The car insurance put him up in a motel for the night, and the tow truck towing his car for repair got a flat tyre, then they sent another tow truck that caught fire, so he didn’t get his car fixed till late the next day!!! And we were worried about me getting back with a problem!! Whew!

So the next morning I woke up excited, driving around to see my friends William and Sarah to show off. Sarah came out of the house excited to see such a sleek machine, telling me she looked very sexy as she handed me a present. It was a front number plate “aussie flag”!! How cool is that!! In Louisiana, they don’t have front number plates, so often they put their footy club logo on the front. Well mine proudly shows my flag, just to confuse the locals who ask me, “Is that the Scottish flag?”

So here I am relaxing at Will and Sarah’s place, sitting here drinking a Texas beer (Shiner Bock) to celebrate my Texas car’s arrival in Louisiana, with the Corvette ticked off my bucket list. And I am drinking Southern Comfort again too!!!!! Lol…..