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Re: Another slightly off topic question - Ah, Memories
Author: almo
Date: 09-01-2008 - 01:07
My first car (that was on the road) was a '77.5 Pontiac Ventura (still called a Ventura, not Phoenix), was a cousin of the Nova. Because of all the flack about the 307 up front, my uncle and I dropped a 389 into that little monster. This car was originally my uncle's, and because he grew up in the muscle car age, gave it to me as a hobby/drive to work car. It was about 15 years old, faded red, with a white hard top. I pulled the nogahide off the roof, and a friend helped me "roll on" a new paint job. We did a fairly good job of brushing and rolling, although the paint was still wet when we went downtown that night and parked it at the Park & Ride bus station. The next project was a faux marble dashboard (no kidding), and cutting a the springs to lower it and doing the same to the seats to give it the "Lazy Boy" effect.
The school season started, and it was a hit with the gang. We all did unique things to our cars. A friend had an old Beetle that had a Porche 914 engine in it. Another was an flat front windowed GMC van with a "living room" complete with hardwood floors and a chandelier to top it off. The best was a Hearst with a waterbed, TV and Nintendo in the back. Kind of creepy.
Anyways, back to the train chasing.
I went on a road trip with a friend that ended up in Agassiz, BC, halfway between Mission and Hope. We stayed at his Grandmother's place there for a corn festival, but ended up railfanning after we realized corn isn't that interesting. We used the Lougheed Highway east of town to chase trains back and forth. Nice pacing, straight and flat. The engineers were talking on the scanner with one another about seeing my car (kind of reverse railfanning).
The car was nothing special, but ran like a tank. You could probably imagine the brake-stands that I could produce, with all that power - and not that much car weighing it down.
At the beginning of this post, I mentioned that the Ventura was my first driveable car. My other project at the time was a '58 Buick Special that I bought for $50. That would have been the ultimate to chase in, but it never got off the driveway. I got the motor running after about 15 years in storage, then sold it for $400 to someone in Kelowna, BC.
almo
The school season started, and it was a hit with the gang. We all did unique things to our cars. A friend had an old Beetle that had a Porche 914 engine in it. Another was an flat front windowed GMC van with a "living room" complete with hardwood floors and a chandelier to top it off. The best was a Hearst with a waterbed, TV and Nintendo in the back. Kind of creepy.
Anyways, back to the train chasing.
I went on a road trip with a friend that ended up in Agassiz, BC, halfway between Mission and Hope. We stayed at his Grandmother's place there for a corn festival, but ended up railfanning after we realized corn isn't that interesting. We used the Lougheed Highway east of town to chase trains back and forth. Nice pacing, straight and flat. The engineers were talking on the scanner with one another about seeing my car (kind of reverse railfanning).
The car was nothing special, but ran like a tank. You could probably imagine the brake-stands that I could produce, with all that power - and not that much car weighing it down.
At the beginning of this post, I mentioned that the Ventura was my first driveable car. My other project at the time was a '58 Buick Special that I bought for $50. That would have been the ultimate to chase in, but it never got off the driveway. I got the motor running after about 15 years in storage, then sold it for $400 to someone in Kelowna, BC.
almo
