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What
a weekend!
An account of the NASC’s
presence at the 2003 Classic Car Show, NEC, Birmingham.
Nov 8 – 9 2003. By -
Barry Cornes
Arriving at
the NEC around 10.00. - after a one and a half hour drive
- on Friday November 7, I was surprised to see how many companies,
clubs and other organisations had already begun work, putting
together their stands for the 2003 Classic Car Show. Upon
the arrival of the NASC equipment we quickly began to mark
out our territory and erect the club stand. Just over an hour
or so later Roy Walker and myself were on the road again,
this time in the NASC van, travelling back to Stoke On Trent
to collect the fourth vehicle to complete our display. The
owner of the vehicle, Dave Gavin, had already single-handedly
loaded his car onto the trailer, so we hooked it up and started
the trip back. By this time it was mid afternoon and the traffic
was becoming hideous, on approaching J12 of the M6 there was
a huge tailback, so we dived up the slip-road that just happened
to be handy for us, to get off that grossly overcrowded motorway.
As it turned out this option wasn’t much better, schools
were kicking out and the stop-start traffic was murderous,
especially with a sluggish Transit, towing a loaded car transporter.
Then when we landed back at the NEC, every man and his dog
was unloading vans and trailers. So the car was unloaded outside
and pushed into the hall. The set-up was eventually completed
a couple of hours later, so Dave and I set off for home.
Saturday was
the first official day of the event, so Dave and I left home
at around 08.30 and arrived at the NEC just before 10.00.
Considering the show had only opened at 09.30 there were already
lots of people thronging the halls. At our own events you
don’t usually see a vast cross section of people. However,
at this event there was an amazing array of different people.
The majority were simply “Joe Public”, your average
anonymous looking person in his jeans, T-shirt and trainers.
Then there was a completely different breed, usually dressed
in check shirts, with a neatly tied cravat, tweed trousers
- with a razor sharp crease, a tweed sports jacket and highly
polished brown brogues. These guys were usually in pairs,
either looking like father and son, or two lifelong friends
who “simply couldn’t bear to be parted”. Some
of the comments from these Horatio and Tarquin Farquharson,
or Ponsonby-Smythe types were quite amusing. I overheard one
or two special things from some of them over the weekend,
one of which was in relation to the awesome and highly modified
Hillman Husky, belonging to Dave Gavin, on our stand. One
said to the other that he thought doing “That” to
it had spoilt a perfectly good car! When I pointed out that
it was all down to personal preference, he promptly disagreed
and said that he “most strongly disapproved”. I
can’t repeat Dave’s response here, but it was along
the lines of, “**** him, the **++ing ***+, ^^^* toss
*** !!” The expletives are deleted to protect the innocent.
Another time I was
just walking past two such people as one said to the other,
“It’s a shame he has done that to what could be
a nice old truck”. This comment was about Phil Middleton’s
immaculate Chevy pick-up on the nearby NSRA stand. My reaction
as I passed was to say that it was “now an amazingly
nice old truck”; he simply muttered something under his
breath. When I told Phil about the comment, he didn’t
seem too upset, and we all had a good laugh. But I think “Tarquin”
was lucky that the hall was packed with interested bystanders!
Some reactions
were quite surprising, in a pleasant sort of way. One old
boy proceeded to tell me that he was strictly a “classics
only person”, but said that he couldn’t help but
appreciate the time and effort that had gone in to producing
such amazing vehicles. He was particularly impressed with
Mick Payne’s Ford Thames van, “so much hard work,
so well presented”. Sure testament to Mick’s van,
and the other vehicles on the NASC and NSRA stands. Many interested
parties stopped by for a chat, Roy Walker’ s Cortina
continually attracted many admiring gazes and questions throughout
the weekend. Alongside the Cortina was Dave Harries ‘Pop’,
looking as good as ever and still pulling the punters in.
One visitor to the stand presented himself as the Chairman
of the Hillman Owners Club; naturally he was interested in
Dave’s Husky. He wandered around open mouthed, muttering
things like, “amazing” and “how did you do
that”, he is obviously in to standard Hillman cars, but
his general opinion was that it was great, and despite his
own preferences he really liked it. So much so that he has
asked Dave if he can feature the car in the next Hillman Owners
Club magazine. He said, “Fifty percent of the members
won’t like it at all, but so what, many of them will
really appreciate it.” Dave was well impressed, and can’t
wait for the “fan” mail from those Hillman owners
to start arriving.
Although
the show closed at 18.30 on the Saturday we didn’t leave
till after 19.30, so that we didn’t have to queue for
ages to get out of the car park. Even then there was still
a small queue, but nothing too desperate.
A pleasant Sunday morning dawned as we headed down an eerily
quiet M6, how different this road can be without all those
bloody cars and trucks! We arrived at hall 8 just as the doors
were being opened to the public, what timing. This turned
out to be the busiest day of all, as soon as the doors opened
the place was flooded with people. Even at the chucking out
time of 17.30, it was obvious that many just didn’t want
to leave. True to form the management of the NEC decided that
we, the exhibitors, had to wait for half an hour before they
would allow us to start loading our equipment, cars and vans
for the journey home. Many irate exhibitors began sounding
their horns, at one stage your ears rang as the hall was filled
with the cacophony of sound from all manner of wailing horns.
One or two embarrassed “Jobsworths” disappeared
as they realised that everyone was becoming a little impatient.
In that half hour the stand was taken down and everything
else was packed away, we also rolled the Husky up to the door
to be the first ones out when it eventually rolled up, just
after 18.00. The chaos that follows the end of an event at
the NEC has to be seen to be believed. Everyone wants to be
first out so that they can get away before the rush. No chance.
You just get caught up in the melee of activity as everyone
struggles to beat the next. By the time we had pushed the
Husky out, winched it on the trailer and sheeted it up against
the elements, the worst of the rush was over. So off we set,
back to Stoke On Trent. Arriving back at around 20.45 we unhooked
the trailer and set Mark back on his way down the M6, to the
NEC, he had to get back before 22.00 or the place would be
locked up overnight and he wouldn’t be able to collect
our kit. I went back to Dave’s house to help unload the
Husky and push it back into the garage, eventually arriving
home around 22.00, totally knackered and ready for something
to eat, a pint and a good kip.
What a weekend!
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