Hi Team,
Recall that a couple of weeks ago I asked if any list members had driven
their Healeys coast to coast in North America. I received five qualifying
stories, and have compiled them into an article intended for publication in
Austin-Healey Magazine.
I have asked the contributors to check their stories and give permission to
print them. One is included below to give you an idea of length, content,
etc.
I'd also like to invite other listers to send qualifying stories for
incorporation into the article. Many thanks! Enjoy.
Cheers,
Reid Trummel
Tampa, Florida
2 x BN2
2 x AN5
http://www.healey.org
http://vitesse.team.net/mailman/listinfo/ahcusa
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Coast-to-Coast in an Austin-Healey
Compiled by Reid Trummel
I recently asked a group of Austin-Healey enthusiasts if any of them had
ever driven a Healey coast-to-coast in North America. To quality as a
coast-to-coast trip, the journey had to begin in a state or province
bordering the Pacific Ocean and end in a state or province bordering the
Atlantic Ocean, or vice versa.
I've made several such trips myself, and I was curious to find out if there
were many others who have driven their Healeys on this long trip. Five
people responded with "qualifying" trip reports. Here are their stories:
John Slade, Manotick, Ontario (edalsj@igs.net)
Coast-to-coast trips: British Columbia to Nova Scotia to British Columbia to
Nova Scotia.
I spent most of my life in the Canadian Navy, whose two main locations were
in Halifax, Nova Scotia and Victoria, British Columbia. Like many
government organizations, the Navy tried to minimize certain types of
expenses, and moving expenses were in that category. As a result, bachelors
like myself tended to get fairly frequent coast-to-coast moves while married
people tended to be kept at one location.
I purchased my 1959 3000, HBT7L5564, in April 1960, in Victoria, BC, and it
remained my only car until summer 1968 when I acquired a brand new Volvo
123GT and had to sell the Healey. The reason for this was that, in the
eight years I had owned the Healey, I had taken to rallying and motorsport
in a big way. The Healey had gone on nearly every back road in Nova Scotia,
Vancouver Island and Eastern Ontario by the time I sold it. The steel sump
shield paid for itself many times over.
Back to the Healey. In December 1962 I had saved up some leave, and decided
to go home for Christmas, home being in Ottawa, Ontario. My means of
transportation was of course the Healey, so with hard top fitted, I had a
6000-mile winter round trip in five weeks.
In June of 1964 I was posted from Victoria to Halifax for a one-year course,
so I packed up everything I owned other than clothes, which were shipped in
a trunk, stuffed it into the Healey (you can get a lot of stuff into the
passenger side), and drove off to Halifax. One year later I made the return
trip to Victoria upon completion of the course.
In June 1966 I was again posted back east, this time to go to University of
Toronto for some PG. Again I packed up the Healey and drove all the way
east to Wellington, Nova Scotia where I had a small cottage, then back to
Toronto in time for the university year. That was the last long drive I
made in the Healey, though I have made that same Halifax-to-Victoria drive
five other times: .once in 1959 in a 1955 Pontiac, and two round trips in
1973/75 and again in 1980/82, both times in a BMW Bavaria. I guess I like
driving.
Barry Pate, Chapel Hill, North Carolina (jbpate@attglobal.net)
Coast-to-coast trip: California to Georgia.
Jim and Shirley Albeck, Agoura, California (bjate@postoffice.pacbell.net)
Coast-to-coast trips: California to Massachusetts to California to New York
to California to Nova Scotia to California.
Perry Small, Kailua, Hawaii (Healeyguy@aol.com)
Coast-to-coast trip: California to Maine.
John Snyder, Port Townsend, Washington (johnahsn@olypen.com)
Coast-to-coast trip: New York to Oregon.
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