Mario the Multipla 2021

Received this message yesterday which was lovely but then realised we hadn’t blogged for just on a year and felt really guilty! Life just got too busy with too many responsibilities and blogging unfortunately came too far down the list. But with the world getting back to a sort of ‘normal’, maybe it was a nudge to get back to regular postings.

The last thing Mario did before lockdown was Goodwood Revival 2019, in his usual role as taxi, we had had a great weekend, working hard but meeting up with old friends at our favourite weekend of the year. On the Monday after the event, I took Mario back and there unfortunately he stayed until the end of May this year. (I will get round to posting some pics from Revival).

Amazingly James went to check him over and he started straight away after 20+ months! He gave him a good check over and then we took him on a test drive. It was so good to be back on the road on a lovely sunny Sunday afternoon. It was quite a test too as James navigated us to the top of Bignor Hill, high up on the South Downs. A beautiful spot with lovely views to the sea but a very narrow bumpy semi rough road made it more like a Hill Climb than a Sunday drive. But a successful test and Mario was back in action.

The following weekend I took Mario back to his spiritual home – Goodwood. The first Breakfast Club in two years, a special day for Members only and finally allowed within the last level of Covid restrictions. We had a lovely early morning drive to the circuit and took up our place on the track. It seemed both strange and familiar to be back and slightly weird to be with all those people. A very enjoyable morning was had catching up with friends I hadn’t seen throughout the pandemic and remembering just what a stir Mario causes!

So, here we are in July 2021, things re opening up, Mario has an invite to the Goodwood Members open day in August and is already signed up for taxi duty at the Revival. We’ve been collecting interesting bits and bobs to post and so hopefully will start to get those on here asap.

For the 2019 Revival Mario had a bit of a make-over. after 20 years without a headlining, we finally got round to creating a rather special and unique one. Using my ‘Mario’ design from my Revival coat lining, I had some some rather spectacular Velvet printed at ‘Spoonflower’ and after many hours of measuring and fitting we had it quilted onto wadding and bound to create a panel which we bonded onto the inside of the roof. Amazingly it stayed in place for the 20 months he was shut away and still looked spectacular.

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Thank you for being one of the 100,000+ readers and for following Mario’s adventures.

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Catching up on 2019… Part 1

As we are so behind, here is the first part of a brief catch up of what we got up to classic motoring in 2019.

The Haslemere Classic Car Show

After the Goodwood Members Meeting it was all go organising the car show we hold in our local town. We have been running this in our community for 11 years (we are currently underway with the 12th). We have around 250 cars attend of which nearly a hundred do a 60 mile tour in the morning in our beautiful local countryside. Mario of course is in attendance, he is in fact extremely useful in transporting stuff to and from the show, including ‘Houndtooth’ our Haslemere Hound, for the discerning Gentleman driver which the humans painted as part of a community arts project.

London to Lisbon

James went off navigating on Hero’s London to Lisbon Rally in a Fiat 2300. This event starts fairly near us at Brooklands and so Jane has an opportunity to go to start and a couple of the stops on the first day before the competitors get the overnight ferry.

The Wander – Jane’s first go at navigating a ‘proper’ event

Organised by some of James’ rally chums this is a fun one day event from Petersfield to Devizes, the long way with some fairly hard challenges along the route. This was my first time at managing maps and clocks but a good time was had and I didn’t make an idiot of herself. While it would have been lovely for Mario to have made his debut it was decided that he was probably a bit slow to keep up and so ‘brother’ Regie was drafted in for the day. Great fun was had, James didn’t get cross, I didn’t cry and Regie run perfectly! We look forward to taking part again.

Part 2 at the Festival of Speed to follow shortly…

Absent without leave…

Firstly another apology, sorry we haven’t blogged since February, no real excuse, just a lack of time… but now we fully intend to get back in the flow. Over the next couple of weeks we will tell you what Mario, Regie and the humans have been up to this year in the motoring world and we have lots of interesting finds to share..

To get started though, yesterday was Halloween and popping up on social media was a fantastic Hearse, a wooden carved Cadillac from 1929, looking like something out of a Disney Cartoon, sort of a spooky version of Cinderella’s pumpkin coach. This got us thinking about the fabulous Multipla Hearse we blogged about in 2012 and so started a trawl through the internet.

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One normally thinks of a hearse as a dignified, sensible and probably boring way to make that final journey with a bit of respect but my goodness we found some weird and wacky options…

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Other types of Fiat and we think an Alfa, practical in the same style as the Multipla, pretty sensible but with a touch of Italian Bling.

An E-Type Jag for the sporty option

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Ornate carving is a popular thing…
Top: a Buick 1929
Middle: a Cunningham 1929.
Bottom group: No idea of the cars or dates below but all look like they starred in Wacky Races. I think these are probably in a Funeral Museum in the USA.

Cadillac’s from late 1930’s early 40’s

60’s space age – a huge Cadillac Fleetwood Eureka

And a Buick, found in Greece and currently undergoing restoration.

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If you thought the previous ones were ornate, now have a look at the Asian versions, mini temples decked out in gold.

For the Military funeral or just for enthusiasts the Tank Hearse.

For when you want to combine your funeral with a holiday!

No words… The end.

A look back at the Goodwood Revival 2018

Writing the blog unfortunately keeps getting put down the ever growing ‘to do’ list of tasks but finally here is a predominantly photo report on Mario’s favourite weekend of the year – being part of the Goodwood Transport Corps at the Revival. I can’t believe it was four months ago but a cold January day is the perfect time to look back on the wonderful early Autumn sunshine we experienced last September. After the torrential rain of the 2017 Revival, we had perfect conditions.

Mario was packed up with all the kit and we set off for Goodwood. As we turned into the estate, Mario stopped and wouldn’t start again! I couldn’t believe he’d disgraced himself. Luckily Regie and James weren’t far behind and a quick bit of fettling got him back up and running smoothly – phew. We went straight to see the cricket match and flypast before our briefing and sorting our accommodation before supper. Friday dawned with glorious sunshine. No new outfit this year but a few new accessories including these fab 60’s earrings. We were working all afternoon shifts so we were able to have a good look round in the morning. Highlights were cars from the movies, including The Great Escape, Bullet and Le Mans and we saw Howard from Take That who was racing his Porsche! Goodwood were celebrating British Transport and had a real steam train at the entrance with the fabulous GAG (Goodwood Actors Guild) providing the entertaining passengers and crew.Once we were on duty there was no stopping, taking guests back and forwards to the Hotel, Kennels and House. It was a long afternoon as there was the first race of the meeting which ran into the twilight and so we didn’t finish until really late.
The following morning we discovered that in all the panic of the previous evening getting people back after the end of the race, unfortunately one of Mario’s back seats had broken. The seat couldn’t have been properly locked in and so had twisted, pulling out the captive nut. The only thing to do until it could be repaired properly, was to remove the seat, not so much of a problem as we could still take 4 passengers if one sat in the front.
It was good to have the ‘taxi team’ back together. Most people have been doing it for years, so it’s always a reunion of old friends. We transport many familiar faces too, with ‘customers’ coming back year after year. It’s nice to hear people say that we’ve made their weekend.
2018 was a special year as it was the 20th anniversary of the Revival and the GRRC. There were special events held for members over the weekend. The first was a special grid walk at the start of the Rob Walker Parade. A friend and one of James’ customers had his Facel Vega (previously owned by Rob) on the Grid.  Sunday was another beautiful day. We watched the kids get ready for the Settrington Cup, this is always fun and the kids are very determined and competitive.
Not working mornings meant we had a chance to have a good look round the paddocks. There was a tinge of sadness as we had heard the news that Barry ‘Whizzo’ Williams had passed away, he was a big supporter of Goodwood and motorsport in general, at one of the early Revivals James had taken part in a display event on track with Barry.We always have a lot of fun with the Taxi fleet. Up at the house at the fuel and maintenance yard, they had dressed it as ‘Gatwick’ Airport, this is part of a fun competition between the various departments on the estate for a team photo. On Sunday there was a special anniversary parade with winners from over the years of the event. As founder members we were allowed on the grid before the parade, this was very special and the Duke made a speech thanking Members for their support over the years.

All in all, it was one of the best Revivals for a number of years, we did have to work very hard but it is much better in good weather and the shift system allowed us to have time to enjoy the event. We can’t wait to be back in 2019 – Mario already has his contract!

Better late than never… Goodwood MM76

We’ve been promising this for months but the looming Goodwood Revival meet next week reminded me that we had never shared our rather unusual experiences of the 76th Members Meeting.

Taking place back in March, the first major event of the year can obviously be a bit chilly, although we were all lured into a false sense of security with the first ’72’ MM which took place in glorious sunshine back in 2014.

On the Friday before the meeting I was invited to a special talk by the Duke of Richmond, this was exclusively for the founder members of the GRRC and was a fascinating afternoon with the Duke telling great stories about how Motorsport was brought back to Goodwood. It was a beautiful sunny day and the circuit looked magnificent under blue skies with the daffodils gently nodding in the breeze.

However this year the forecast was looking decidedly dodgy for the weekend and as we set off on Saturday morning it was grey and foreboding and very cold. Mario was booked into the Chicane Parking, partly to be on display to his always appreciative public but mainly so we have the most convenient locker, for all those extra layers of clothing and of course the picnic!

This year was going to be even more interesting for us as our friend Adam had his Lola-Chevrolet T142 taking part in the F5000 demonstration. But by mid morning when he was out for his first run, it had started to blizzard and we could hardly see him come down the startline straight from our viewpoint on the top of the pitlane.

The snow eased off after the demo and we were wrapped up exceptionally well, although I looked and felt like a Michelin Man. Taking photos was difficult in thick fur mittens and I couldn’t put my arms down to my side but I wasn’t cold. We spent the rest of the day mooching around the paddocks, watching racing and then in the evening we stayed on for some of the party which had some great entertainment and parades. By the time we came to go home though, poor Mario had a little coating of snow and it was falling lightly all the way back to Haslemere.

The following morning the alarm went at 6am, we were supposed to be at the circuit by 7.30 as Mario had a place in the Members Parade. However I pulled back the curtains to a white landscape. There was no way we were going to be able to move poor Mario and the roads were more or less blocked.

So Mario stayed safely at home. After a couple of hours talking to friends and following FaceBook we managed to get a friend who had James’ ‘truck’ to come and rescue us. Once over the first couple of hills, the snow became much lighter and we were able to get to the circuit just in time for Adam’s demo. the F5000 cars are very powerful and most opted not to go out but Adam was brave or foolish depending how you looked at it and he took to the track with about four4 others and put in a few careful laps for the crowd. The rest of the day went ahead with some good racing, especially the Edwardian Race which was exciting. 

So, considering the conditions we still managed to have a good day and got home without too much trouble although we couldn’t get Mario back to his garage for about three days.

Hopefully the weather will be kinder to us next week, when Mario will be back at Goodwood for his favourite weekend of the year, working as a taxi at the Revival… see you there.

Classic SUNday at Goodwood Breakfast Club

The sun shone brightly for the 2018 Classic Car Sunday at Goodwood Breakfast Club, the only one we’ve been eligible for this year. Armed with Mario’s pass we set off quite early (for us) and had a lovely drive down. The circuit was packed and we were parked out on the run off area at Madgwick.

There was a good collection of cars in attendance and a good variety. In my opinion it is the best theme and the most tightly controlled, so there isn’t a load of modern stuff you can see in the average supermarket carpark or a bunch of kids fawning over ‘supercars’.

Mario as usual was a star and was immediately surrounded by people, I’m amazed that after nearly twenty years of taking him to Goodwood events that there are still people that have never seen an original Multipla.

We did far too much socialising but did manage to take a few pictures of some of the cars which caught our eye – thinking about this blog they are mainly Fiats and other Italian Classics. Our two favourites of the day were a Fiat Abarth 750 Zagato, the fabulous ‘Double Bubble’ and an early Skoda Octavia, launched in 1959 this was the 8th model since Skoda’s post war nationalisation. While not fast it was well equipped for the time. This one had been brought to the Uk and undergone a restoration, it was rather lovely, only spoilt by the modern number plates.

So with a great display of classics, an impromptu air display and beautiful weather this had been one of the best Breakfast Clubs for a while. It was great to be out in Mario and we took the opportunity for a little run down to the seaside after.

Fiat Spiaggina – a 60th anniversary special

The Fiat 500 was 60 yesterday (launched on the 4th July 1958) and alongside the celebrations of Fiat 500 owners worldwide there were two new Fiat 500’s to mark the occasion.

Fiat themselves have an anniversary model. A Fiat 500C Spiaggina 58′ edition of the convertible modern 500, in baby blue and ivory with a few tweaks, stripy beach style interior and some retro wheels, cute but not that unusual although it is being limited to ‘1958’ cars, it goes on sale in September.

However it is the prototype 500 Spiaggina or Beach Buggy which is getting all the attention. A modern take on the cut down ‘topless’ Jolly Beach Cars so loved by the celebrities of the day in the late 50’s and early 60’s.

 

Based on a modern 500C, it is coach built by specialists Garage Italia, which is owned by Lapo Elkann the Grandson of Gianni Agnelli. it is fully topless with just one roof bar and with some body strengthening by Pininfarina.

The two seater is a perfect fun summer car. With a waterproofed interior, bench seat and the yacht like corked panelled boat/loading bay, even incorporating a shower!

You can actually order this car with any engine from the current 500 range be built to order but no doubt for a specialist price and whether all the quirky features will remain is another matter.

Of course the question we must ask is… any chance of a modern version of the extended 600 Multipla Spiaggina?

HCCS 2018 – hard work but a great success

I haven’t had time to post anything on here for some time… it’s all down to the classic car show we organise in our home town of Haslemere. For several months I have been involved in planning, booking entrants, sorting stalls, mapping the tour, getting advertising and sponsors, producing the programme and other advertising material so there has been little spare time for anything else. Even poor Mario has been abandoned but he didn’t sulk about it and came out on the day to help transport lots of essential stuff to the site and of course to be on display and meet his fans.

The build up started a couple of days before with collating all the material and putting together packs for the tour entrants. The day before we spent several hours, measuring and marking out the Green, we are very short of space so needed to position everything carefully on the day. Mario was loaded up with a little help from our cat Birkin and with a very special passenger but more on that later.

If you had seen the weather forecast for Sunday 27 May you would have thought that any event would have to be cancelled… I was practically in tears thinking all the hard work we had put in would go to waste but the people of Haslemere must all have been good, as despite the terrible predicted storms, the sun shone down on Lion Green and our 10th Classic Car show took place under glorious blue skies without a drop of rain.

The day started for 90 of our entrants with breakfast before they set off on a tour of around 60 miles, heading South of the town to Midhurst and then through Selham, Graffham and Fittleworth for a stop at the Stag Inn, Balls Cross where new landlords Jane & Mark Squire made them very welcome with coffee and biscuits before they continued via Wisborough Green, Alford and Shillinglee back to Lion Green. The route is devised by  James who puts his rallying experience to good use.

Back in Haslemere, we had been busy setting up over 50 quality stalls selling craft work, local produce, art and a great selection of food and drink, cream teas and entertainment from George’s Coastline Jazz Band. The tour cars arrived back and were joined by the show cars to fill the green, parked brilliantly by the local 1268 (Haslemere) Squadron ATC. We did lose some of the 230 pre-booked cars, as lots of them travel a long distance to attend and the weather elsewhere wasn’t as kind, so we weren’t as full as planned but the Green still had around 200 beautiful pre-1978 classics.

The cars made a wonderful display covering nearly 100 years of motoring, with entrants of all eras, styles and sizes from the smallest microcar to huge American cruisers. Many had been in families for years while others were new acquisitions but all were their owner’s pride and joy. Simon Dodd took this great Drone picture showing the Green filling up.

Crews are encouraged to dress in period to match their vehicles and Adrian Hardwick of Keats Estate and Letting Agents, the shows supporters, judged the entrants and choose the worthy winners. After some discussion the ‘style’ award  went to Dr David Nancekievill from Haslemere with his immaculate prize winning Daimler V8 250, beautifully attired wife Janet and some amazing period accessories.

Runners up were Alec Fry from Midhurst in an Austin A30 and Ivor Tanner from Ifold in a Riley 1.5.

We also have a ‘People’s Choice’ competition where show visitors vote for the car they would most like to take home. The overwhelming winner was Dave Melton from Haslemere in his newly restored Daimler Dart SP250 MK1, the Dart has gone from a total wreck to show standard in under a year and Dave has had the show as a target throughout the restoration. Runners up were Stewart Copps from Portsmouth in an MG PA which has undergone a family restoration over 50 years and Gary Bartlett from Winchester in his Immaculate Ford Capri MK1 1600GT.

Finally another reason why I have been so busy was our contribution to the Haslemere Hares – a community arts project which raises lots of money for local charity. The car show had sponsored a hare (in 2017 we had a Haslemere Hog) and this year I pained him. The theme was ‘the wind in your HARE’ a celebration of open top classic motoring. James started by modifying the ears so they looked like they were going back in the wind, then I hand painted his jacket, a decoupage local map bottom and ears, then original HCCS designed fabric scarf and a cloth cap. I was very pleased with the result. He will now be on display in Haslemere for the summer and then sold/auctioned.

So after all the panics and hours of work it was all over in a jiffy. Everybody seemed to have a good time and it is nice to give something back to our town and community. We never did get the threatened storms but you could see them on the horizon when we got home.

So that’s HCCS over for another year, once I’ve finished sorting all the photo’s updating the website and so on I will get back to updating the blog more regularly, we’ve still got adventures to tell about Members Meeting and the snow plus lots of exciting stuff coming up…

Thanks to Steve Flynn, Liz McDonald, Adam Simmonds, James Lynch for additional photos. All images are ©HCCS and can only be used with permission.

Sunshine for Drive-it-Day

Drive-it-Day is organised by the Federation of British Historic Vehicle Clubs to encourage owners in the UK to use their historic vehicles and celebrate the UK’s transport heritage. Local groups run their individual events under the federations banner. The day is held as close as possible to the anniversary of the Royal Automobile Club One Thousand Mile Trial which started on 23 April 1900, when 65 vehicles left Hyde Park Corner in London for an epic trip around Great Britain.

James goes to a car club MPH2 and had been asked by the club Chairman Tony, to come up with an event for the group on Drive-it-day. So on Sunday 22 April which was a lovely sunny day, we met up with the group at the Lythe Hill Hotel. After a coffee on the terrace, James sent the cars off at two minute intervals, each team was given a copy map on which a route was marked with arrows and a sheet with photos of landmarks such as signs, post boxes etc. Navigators had to guide the driver round the route through some lovely country lanes and villages, while keeping a keen eye out for the landmarks which they had to take their own photo of. The route was around 40 miles, mainly in the South Downs National Park and in the MPH2 (Midhurst, Petworth, Haslemere) area.

Once we’d set everybody on their way, we slipped off to collect Mario so he didn’t miss out on Drive-it-Day. We obviously couldn’t take part as we knew the route but had a lovely sunny ‘bobble’ along the country lanes at meet up with everyone at the halfway point.

We had a lovely lunchstop at one of our regular pubs The Stag at Balls Cross, Jane and Mark the new landlords did us proud with a reserved car park, delicious buffet lunch and glorious sunshine so we could all sit outside while James checked off the mornings photographic efforts.It was soon time for the 14 teams to leave for part two. The cars a mixture of classic and modern included several Jaguar E-types and a Mark 2, a Triumph Stag, Rolls Royce, MG, and a Sunbeam Talbot. By now everybody had got the hang of it and set off with enthusiasm.

Mario had a gentle meander back to The Lythe Hill, stopping off for a woodland photo shoot on route and to look at some cute lambs.

 Once all the cars had finished, everyone gathered for a drink on the hotel terrace and the final round up of results. All seemed to have had an enjoyable day, some with better observation than others! All of the photo’s had been spotted by at least one of the competitors so it would seem that the difficulty level was about right. One team, new members Peter and Jan won, dropping just 5 points over the whole day.

So all in all a lovely Spring outing, on route we spotted loads of other classics on the road,  some taking part in other organised events. Our classics are there to be driven and Drive-it-Day just encourages this and lets people see just how many historic vehicles are out there still and what an important part they still play in the economy.

Mario certainly enjoyed being out in the sunshine – a total contrast to his last trip out in March at the Goodwood Members Meeting. We will post about this very soon but it’s taken a while to sort the all the photos…

All aboard the Skiway…

After a few days stuck home with the snow, this popped up on social media and caught me eye and I thought it would make a perfect topical post…

Situated 6000 feet up Mount Hood in Oregon, the historic Timberline Lodge was built in 1937 as a Works Progress Administration (WPA) project to provide jobs after the Great Depression. It is famous for hosting year-round skiing and also for being used as the exterior of the ‘Overlook Hotel’ in Stanley Kubrick’s 1980 film The Shining.

While interesting it wasn’t the Hotel that caught my eye but the fact that it was once the home of the longest stretch of arial tram in the world. The Skiway ran for three miles connecting the town of Government Camp at 2,100 feet to Timberland Lodge. The ‘Cloudliner’ which ran on the route was converted from a school bus suspended from a cable supported by 38 steel towers up to 72 feet tall, which could transport 36 people seated and 14 standing. Most mountain tramways are pulled by a moving cable but unusually on the Skiway, each set of wheels was separately powered by a 185hp bottom-mounted engine and these pulled the bus up the mountain on the traction cables anchored at both ends.

When it opened a one-way fare was 75 cents, the lower terminal in Government Camp had a restaurant and snack bar, gift shop, ski shop and guest lounge. The tram entered the terminal on the building’s third floor where the loading/unloading platforms were located. At Timberline Lodge there was no terminal building and passengers had to get on and off at an open-air platform.

The project cost over $2 million to construct and opened in 1951. However it suffered mechanical problems, was slow and could only make a couple of trips an hour so by the mid 50’s when the road up the mountain was improved it made the Skiway redundant and it was deconstructed ten years after opening.

Watch a video of the Skiway in action.

 

Mario is now keeping his fingers crossed that the snow stays away and it warms up in the next couple of weeks before the Goodwood Members Meeting. We’ll be taking part in the Members Parade on Sunday morning and will be parked in the Chicane Parking on Saturday so watch this space.