Inaugural BARF - 4/14/01
Although this was the first event under the auspices of "BARF," the inspiration was actually a meeting a few weeks earlier, when Pierre gave me a hand tuning up my car. Jason and Rich stopped by as well and did some work on their cars, so I figured since all our cars were tuned-up and ready to go, we should have a drive. I put a notice up on the Mira board and we got a group together for a drive. BARF was born. Even Keith from Nova Scotia was in town, so he came along for the first part of the trip over the Golden Gate bridge into Sausalito. We decided to meet in Golden Gate Park, but first we had to help Pierre extricate his car from his garage. The exhaust was off his Ferrari, blocking in his Fiat, so we had to push the car out of the driveway and up the hill. A testarossa is a heavy car. It took four of us to get it to budge an inch. To this day, I'm still not sure that Pierre wasn't riding the brake a little bit. From there, we headed over to the conservatory to meet up with Peter and Rich. After a little bit of gawking at each other's cars, we were off. First stop was Randall Brothers Motors in Novato, about 25 miles north of the city -- nothing special about the drive, just a shot up 101, a multi-lane divided highway. We looked over some of the cars that he had in his yard, including a perfectly restorable '70, and a customer's Alfa GTV. After Pierre came back from getting some octane boost for his car, we headed out to Napa to see Kelly and Eli at Wine Country Motors. We jumped on Rt. 37 East and then on 121 towards Napa at the junction next to Sears Point Raceway. Rt. 121 is a nice leisurely road meandering through southern wine country. I had never been to WCM before, but thought I had a good idea of how to get there. Well, obviously not, because I saw Peter, who was bringing up the rear, get off at an exit before I thought we should turn. We didn't have CBs, so we couldn't communicate well. Turns out he was right, but we eventually got to Kelly's after a tour of downtown Napa. Kelly made the introductions and showed us around the garage, AND even had sandwiches for us. I was blown away by the hospitality, but was soon to learn that this was merely par for the course when it comes to Kelly. After a good time checking out the digs and pouring over each other's cars, we decided to alter the route a bit. The original plan was to head up Silverado Trail to Calistoga and head over the mountain on 29 to Clear Lake and take a tour around the lake. It was a pretty hot day, upwards of 95 or so, so we decided to hear towards the coast and catch some ocean breezes. Fortunately, there's some very fine roads on the way there. We said goodbye to Kelly and Eli and headed up 29 to Trinity Road, that crosses the range separating Napa and Sonoma valleys. Heading West, Trinity Road starts out with some nice big sweepers heading up a moderate grade, but immediately after a 90 degree turn over a creek, turns into a corkscrew of a road. Unfortunately, befoe the fun started, we had to say goodbye to Troy, who had to head home. Just past the summit, we pulled over to take care of a problem with Pierre's fan. It seemed like it wasn't coming on, so he hot-wired it permanently on (I said it was hot). A couple of pictures later we headed down the west side of the mountain. I'm sure I wasn't the only one who smelled brake pads by the time we reached Rt. 12, just North of Glen Ellen. At the bottom of the hill, Rich found he was having a problem with his electricals. The ALT light had been on for a while, so we stopped to investigate. He didn't have enough power to restart the car, so he obviously had been running off the battery for a while. We pulled into a parking lot of an elementary school to figure it out. A few turns of the wrench later, we were on our way. After a little searching, we found Sonoma Mountain Road that would take us over to Santa Rosa. SMR is a little less severe than Trinity, but even more rural, so the speeds got really fun. Once in Santa Rosa, Rich discovered that his problem hadn't gone away, so we decided that we should find a garage that could charge his battery up and we'd head for home. Peter had to bow out at this point, and Rich, Piere and I stopped at a 76 in Santa Rosa to get Rich's car charged up. While waiting, Rich bled his brakes and we got a chance to shoot a few more pictures. From there, it was just a lazy shot down 101 back to the city. Rich was surprised to learn that the ol' 1500 would top 80mph just in time for a police car to slowly pass us. The speed limit through most of Marin County is 55, but everyone goes 80-85, so it was a bit disconcerting to see that cop just cruising along us. He was from Tiburon though, so he was a bit outside his jurisdiction, and didn't seem to interested in Pierre, who was setting the pace. As we approached the Golden Gate Bridge, you could start to feel the fog rolling in, and to be honest, it felt great after a hot day in the valley(s). Hopefully, everyone had as good a time as I did, and I couldn't wait for the next ride. back to past events