GAY Multi-state Datsun Classic: a travelog

Jehannum

Puts the "pro" in procrastination
Jul 24, 2013
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Albuquerque, NM
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The wife and I decided that, instead of going to the Z national convention in San Diego this year, we'd be going to the Nostalgic Datsun Classic meet in Williams, AZ. This came from three reasons:
1) the Nostalgic Datsun people don't care if you take your toys out of the plastic and play with them (engine swaps, "stance", rust-bombs, etc).
2) the kids have never seen the Grand Canyon, so it would be a good stop-off on the way home.
3) my grandmother moved away from San Diego so we couldn't use her place in Cardiff by the Sea as a base of operations, and VRBOs were substantially more expensive in San Diego than in Williams.

Number 1 can be a drawback, in that you get participants voting in a geographical block, so in this case, the prizes all went to Phoenix-based dattos, but it's still more fun than being Hammond entering his Alfa with a hand-cranked water pump in a concours show (or when they had their drop-top 325i's critiqued by the BMW authorities).

So, with that in mind, we went ahead and booked this place for the weekend of 4 October.

The Albuquerque Z club caravanned out with the Duke City Datsuns, starting at the Route 66 Casino/Hotel

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In order (left to right): A '65 1600 Roadster, a '78 280Z, a '69 2000 Roadster, my '71 240Z, a '72 B210, a '66 411 Bluebird wagon, and another '71 240Z. Not pictured: an '83 280ZX that was trailered and the wife's Infiniti M35x chase vehicle.

The trouble with traveling with the Duke City Datsuns is that the B210 comes with a 1200cc motor, and the 411 comes with a 1300cc motor. We topped out between 62 and 65MPH, but got miles of thumbs up and cell phone pics taken. I also got 38MPG between Albuquerque and Williams.

First stop was in Holbrook.

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The kids on a petrified stump outside of our lunch stop.

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Daughter and wife

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Cell-potato pic of lunch stop

Second stop was at the meteor crater rest stop outside of Flagstaff
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Cell-potato pic of the family minus the boy, who was off pinching a loaf.

We got into Williams at about 3PM local time. I cleaned up the car (a quick clay-bar over the front fascia, Optimum No-Rinse wash and shine wash, and some quick detailer on the interior), and went to the Meet-and-Greet at a local steakhouse.

The next morning, I abandoned the wife at the house (she had some chemistry homework to finish), and went into town for the show.

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Main street, looking East.

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Winner, Z car class, license plate "24TZ"

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Manny's 280Z, mid-decoration. He left a bucket of chalk out for kids and kids-at-heart to draw all over his car with. He wrote his name/blood type over the door, so I added a gay pride flag next to it.

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Sort-of-JDM-hotness. It's a 2000GT, which means it came with an L20, an L-gata 2.0L straight 6 SOHC counterflow head with dual SU carbs, kinda like the little brother of the Ls that came in Zs here in the states. The GTR came with an S20, a DOHC, crossflow-head straight 6 with triple Mikunis (also about as rare as chickens' teeth here in the states). To make the L palatable, he swapped in an L28 with weber carbs.

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Want.

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Main street, looking West

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My 240Z and the trailered-out 280ZX

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A wide-body, VG33E-swapped 510.

Will add pics on the way home when I get them off the camera.
 
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Reactions: Mr. Argumentor
Looks like a fun meet. The hood louvers on the 510 in the last pic are interesting. Got a pic of the hood down?
Nah, the hood was up the whole time.

There were all manner of engine swaps going on. The popular one for the Roadsters was an SR20DE or DET. One came with a KA24ET (that's right, the SOHC KA, lol). The Zs had lots of different engines: a few SRs, an RB, an SBC, but most of them were hot L-gatas (either blinged out with polished bits, or carbed up with weber/mikuni/solexes).
 
So we ran up from Williams to the Grand Canyon on the way home on Sunday.

The sheer number of German and Japanese tourists there was amazing.

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The family and me.

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Getting ready to antagonize each other.

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Just to put my mother into full acrophobic shock...

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:p Had the kids climb out there.

So we took the back way (taking AZ 64 along the south rim, which drops you out on the road between Page and Flagstaff), and had much fun doing backroad driving, right until we got back in I-40E, at which point we pulled all the way back to Albuquerque (320 miles from Flagstaff).
 
You are brave. We refuse to go to the grand canyon until we can be certain the kids won't push each other over the edge. I do point it out as that crack way over there you can see from the main roads when we go to Utah though.
 
You are brave. We refuse to go to the grand canyon until we can be certain the kids won't push each other over the edge. I do point it out as that crack way over there you can see from the main roads when we go to Utah though.
How old? I was reasonably certain that they wouldn't push each other, which is why we took the photo to fuck with grandma.

The railings there (at Mather point) are fucking sturdy. The stanchions are 1 1/2" thick forged bars. Fatasses like me could line up shoulder to shoulder between the stanchions, lean on them with our full weight, and not show any deflection.
 
How old? I was reasonably certain that they wouldn't push each other, which is why we took the photo to fuck with grandma.

The railings there (at Mather point) are fucking sturdy. The stanchions are 1 1/2" thick forged bars. Fatasses like me could line up shoulder to shoulder between the stanchions, lean on them with our full weight, and not show any deflection.
10, 8, 7.