In honour of my birthday, Dave managed to get hold of some much sought after tickets to visit a private car collection not too far away from here. In order to respect his privacy I shall not name the person or where it is. What I expected to be a nice day out turned out to be a fabulous one. We drove the Model A to a village near to our destination, met up with some other members of Oakley Motorcycle club and the Advanced Motorist Association before cruising off to our venue.
As soon as we arrived our hosts kindly served us with drinks and biscuits. We were then taken to the first "barn" for a look at a lovely assortment of cars - an early Model T, AC Cobra, 2 classic Jaguars, a Bentley and a couple of others including a very rare Golf. There was some interesting memorabilia on the walls including a wheel from "Thrust" the world's fastest car. We were regaled with some funny stories about past experiences while we looked around and even allowed to get in and start any of the cars if we wanted to. Next stop was the Ferrari "Garage", containing six assorted Ferraris polished to within an inch of their lives, all red of course as well as a racing helmet previously belonging to Michael Schumacher.
Then we were supplied with a welcome spread of sandwiches, cake and a choice of drinks and as it was my birthday it would have been rude not to indulge in a glass of Prosecco or two. While we were there we had lots of time to talk to our host and his wife who proved to be a lovely couple and made us all feel very welcome. They are clearly proud of the cars, were not precious about them and enjoyed the company and giving enjoyment to others. Also, the ticket money went to OMC's charity East Anglian Air Ambulance.
Dave had a long chat with our host as he knows of him from years ago and was aware that he used to own a Hot Rod. He loved our Model A and admired what we do and said he doesn't have the time to do what we we do. He is 74, is still heavily involved in business but it is clearly what he likes to do. I admire him but don't envy him or his Ferraris. The important thing is we have a choice in how to spend our life and it is our duty to to enjoy it to the best of our ability.
Finally we discovered what was behind the red curtain - an immaculate Ferrari Enzo which we were all allowed to sit in.
Afterwards we cruised back home in the sunshine and then went out to Mamma Mia's for dinner. A perfect day!
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