What a show at Montalto!

Montalto has all the ingredients as the perfect venue for a car show with the stunning backdrop of Montalto House and the beautifully maintained gardens for visitors to admire and explore once they have feasted their eyes on the cars on display. The only ingredient that can never be guaranteed is sunshine. Thankfully, after the disappointment of last year when the weather impacted on the number of cars on show, this year the weather was more settled and despite some early cloud the sun soon broke through to create the perfect conditions for the gathering of cars spanning a range of decades.

The NIIMC presence on Sunday 23 June was strong with 16 cars on show. We had 14 Italian vehicles and 2 imposters in the form of John Crawford’s Lotus Elise and Bryan Pearson’s Lotus Europa. They were however welcome additions and added a real splash of colour to the show in bright blue and yellow respectively. The Italian collection offered a good spread of cars from different manufacturers from the 1970s onwards. The oldest club car was Alan’s Ferrari 308 (built in 1979 and first registered in 1980) but it was pleasing to see Ferrari, Fiat, Abarth, Alfa Romeo and Lancia all represented.  When was the last time you saw a Fiat 127 or a Lancia Thesis – both were there thanks to Bob and Harpo. Also a rare sight was Alan Jones’  Lancia Beta Montecarlo and that prompted many conversations regarding the style and appeal of Lancia’s from the 1970s and 1980s.

As usual our cars attracted many admiring glances and if there was an award for the best club presence I am confident we would have won.  There were many other makes and models and amongst my favourites were David Bell’s white Audi Quattro, an early Toyota Celica ST and a couple of Austin Healey – I have always been a fan of a big Healey.

The organisers limited the number of entries to the show but there was comfortably more space for another 50+ cars and I am confident that with the appeal of the venue and success of the show they could attract additional cars next year – let’s just hope for a dry day and some sunshine please!!

 

Tim Logan

Club Chairman