Kermit's Excellent Adventure

[larry47us]

Everyone:

I had promised a story of my most excellent adventure. Here it is. I shot a bunch of pictures along the way, and here are some of them. Unfortunately, I haven't yet figured out how to post multiple pictures in a single post, so there are going to be a bunch of entries here.

Flew into LaGuardia Sunday night, rented a car, and arrived in Norwalk, CT late. Cell phones are great - the hotel guided me into their parking lot. Next morning, we gave Mike some time to get his act together (and the car, if there was anything left to do), and got to his place about 10:30 am. He laughed, saying that he had expected me there about 7:00. Here's a picture of Mike and I just after I saw Kermit for the first time. He's a very excellent mechanic. The car is really pristine. The shop that did the final PPI said that he could easily sell the car - on his lot - for 25% more than I paid. True or not, I still am glad that I got it.

larry

[larry47us]

Spent some time going over the car with Mike and his co-worker. It was really funny. Everytime we opened or closed a door, hood or engine lid, his buddy was there with his sleeve wiping off the finger prints. Mike had just gotten married, so we took him, his wife and the buddy off to lunch. Got my first drive in the car. It ran great. Remember, this was my first drive in an early car. I was really pleased.

After lunch, we headed back to the "ranch" and I got a lesson in starting and driving the car. Mike took the car out with me as shotgun. We ran for about 1/2 hour, filled the tank, and the washer fluid bottle. Then I took over, and we put another 30 - 45 minutes on the car. I found the clutch much more user friendly than the 79 SC that I had driven earlier this month. Shifting was a bit awkward - it has a short shift kit - don't know how much that impacted.

Then we signed a few papers, and headed off into the sunset. I think that although Mike was sorry to see the car go, he was glad to be done with this deal. I can be a bit overbearing, and I think that he is glad to be done with the twice a day phone calls for the past 8 months. OK it's an exaggeration, but not by much!!!

Can't you see the smile on his face as he gets ready to say goodbye?

larry

[larry47us]

We took off to New Jersey to meet a friend for dinner. Original reservation was for 6:00 - I called to flip it to 7:00, by the time we got there it was 8:00. Not that traffic was that bad, but my normally great sense of direction was SHOT bigtime!! Judy said that I got lost more times in this car, so far, than I have in ALL of my other cars put together.

Then after dinner we were off to find a hotel. The schedule here was really fluid, as you will see, but that wasn't exactly a benefit for anyone!! Walter, my friend, suggested a hotel in Paramus. OK, but we couldn't find it, and ended up finding a place late at night in Stroud, PA. Ooops, missed New Jersey.

Spent the next day running through some small towns in PA, dropping in and out of Antique shops. Yes it was dangerous. Spent a bunch of money that was to be used for Gas on small things. I thought it was an advantage to have no room in a small car, but very small antiques are VERY EXPENSIVE!!! Yes I knew that ahead of time!!

Tuesday we spent hitting more stores and small towns. Nothing really exciting, but pretty quaint towns. Then we figured that we should hit the road, put on some miles, or we would never make it to meet the dragon. Needless to say, this was prophetic. We stopped for dinner in Frederick, MD, and then headed off for Roanoke, VA, or next night's stop. This was not to be. My alternator light went on, and stayed there. I called on Tom Bridger (Sithot) and he proved my angel in disguise during the trip. Here's the thread telling the whole story for those of you who don't know.

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/showt...0&pagenumber=1

A pelicanhead picked me up at the hotel at 9:15 am, loaned me an alternator, changed it out in my hotel parking lot in less than 45 minutes, and we were off and running by 11:00 am. WOW!!

Now we needed to put some MILES on. Drove deep into the night, past Roanoke, and flopped dead tired for the night.

The next night it was on to the Blue Ridge Parkway. I had planned on driving most of it - silly me. Some 465 miles at 35 - 40 miles an hour. That wasn't happening, not if we were going to see the Dragon the next day. We drove on it for about 4 hours. This was really the first time that I got to see how the car handled.

[larry47us]

I haven't really told you how I felt about driving the car. First of all, this was the culmination of maybe 45 years of dreams, one year of anticipation, and 6 months of total obsession!!! And I had never driven one before. I found the car really small. Smaller than I had anticipated. Not uncomfortable, just a good tight fit, like a really comfortable chair - the car hugged me. It is really responsive - I hit the gas, and it just jumped. The clutch was easy, the gearshift a PITA. It cornered well, but I didn't know how well until we started hitting the twisties on the blue ridge parkway.

Hitting the road, I found the trees had just turned to the Max color potential. We travel a lot, driving vacations. Spent lots of falls in upper Wisconsin, and the NorthEast, so colors aren't new to me, but these were just Fantastic!!! Here I fell in behind a couple of motorcycles, and we just cruised from overlook to overlook. The roads were pretty clear, and though the Limit was 35, we were hitting 40/50/60 on the road. I found that when the signs said "twisties ahead - slow to 30 MPH" I could easily hit the turns at 55 - 60 without worrying myself, or raising Judy's blood pressure.

The seats are really comfortable. I have to give Autos Intl LOTS of credit. They turned a set of 30 year old cores into some brand new seats. Judy said that they were the most comfortable seats she has ever ridden in, including the seats in my Lexus, or her Volvo. High praise!!! They hug you tightly. The houndstooth inserts keep your butt from sliding. So the car sticks to the road like it is on GLUE, and the seats keep your butt from sliding, and the belts keep your body in place. You just ride the turns like you are on a roller coaster!

[69Sman]

Larry, your car looks REALLY, REALLY nice!!!!!!!!!!

[larry47us]

My favorite Kermit shot. It's now my new desktop for the office computer.

[larry47us]

Following the bikers

[larry47us]

More Scenery

[larry47us]

Resting in the leaves

[larry47us]

This was the dilemma. Unless I wasn't going to care - that wasn't going to happen, or unless I was going to get crazed - Didn't want that to happen, I needed to figure out how to park Kermit so that I didn't have to worry too much.

After all, it's a big bad world out there!!! So I discovered that if I parked next to a curb, and was all the way over, then there was a LOT of space for the big bad SUV's to come in to rest. But I didn't worry.

This night, I pulled in with an empty space between me and the Mustang on the other side. In the morning, I found a big bad SUV in the middle. But look at the space between us!!!! I had an epiphany. This was my mode of parking from now on!!!