New Zealand is really small, but has a lot of cool cars in it. For a person like me, I can find anything if I just look. Noramlly, I just wait for the sound of a Fazz, a Lamborghini, or a 351C, or Cheysler Hemi 265 Six pack, and you follow your nose. As a cleaner, I got to see all of them up close an personal.
Like this 2009 Lamborghini Gallardo, now on sale in TrademeNZ. Saw it outside Wains Hotel/The Mecure in 2011. Won't tell you who the former owner was, might get in trouble...
My dad was purchasing officer for a municipal power utility company. He used to drag me along to see every boat or goods train that arrived into Port Otago or Dunedin or Central Otago because he used to give word to his brother ( paint, electrical and tanery chemicals) and cousins (Orchardists) of the transfer in and out of important goods. You know, as an ex Territorial, Bank clerk and holder of the aprons at the club of set sqaures and dividers, the Masons control the world and Dad said it was just making sure he knew the state of the flock. So the Old Man asks me about how things are every now and then, and I keep him informed, because it would be rude not to. Because, "he knows people"
He had the odd supply line for electrical goods via NEC and GEC too...they got kinda critical when hydro stations were being made and serviced. For me, it ment an early diet of every Ford made in New Zealand from 1962 to 1996, which he drove home from the vehicle pool each night. Poor guy often got stuck with the 302 Cleveland Auto XY Falcon Station wagon. And he took me on made cap dashes to see every imported car that was visiable. I still go to the same places and see them on occassion.
Funniest one was in early 1979. On a tip off from a buddy, he took me at 11 pm at night to the local bakers shed, where a White 188 hp 4.9 Fairmont Ghia resided with its engine idling doiing some , well before the car was relased in New Zealand.
Dad has had to put up with a lot of crap been named Mr X (named regg Chappell, but it was poor old Trevor who followed his advice, as in Trevor Chappell, the now infamous Australian under arm bowler who beat New Zealand with a special low ball ander advice of his borther. Anyone with that name in New Zealand is considered a bit of an underarm bowler, a bad sport. So he got called Mr X .
So the Old Man has taught me how to under arm bowl in order to win a match or score a vehicle siting. Because it would be rude not to.
In the same vein in always being at the right place at the right time, the Red Maserati Merak that blew my door handles off my Explorer in Te Anau Milford Highway in 2013 was this restored car below.
Sounded like an odd fire Buick, (its an odd fire Alloy V6 based on a cut down Maserati Quad Cam V, but even without the 220 hp of the later version, it high tailed it out of site very quickly for a car that olny did 143 mph and 15.7 second quarters.. The long blonde haired and very cool dude driving pulled up for gas at the local station later on, and he had a "seat cover" in the passenger seat. She was a lot like Dirty Mary and he was like Crazy Larry. But I might of gotten that the wrong way around.
In 2015, I devaned a boring Honda Accord Euro form an Austrailan container, like I did a less boring 362 hp twin cam in line six Falcon G6 Turbo a few weeks ago....but there was a 1978 Ford Ranchero pickup on its rims. Beige with a nice 351m in it I think. But right beside it was THIS, a Pearlescent Yellow Maserati Bora 4.7 with the stainless steel roof they had. Off for restroration, probably with one of our many Aston Martin DB4GT Zagato and Jaguar C type coach builders down here.
It was this car,
but the number plate had been removed. Good idea. Why you'd devalue even an early, 310 hp, 160 mph, 0-60 in 6.5 sec and 14.5 second quarter mile car with a Boxer Berlinetta 512 number plate....everyone knows the Maserati was a better car, maybee with less peak power, but less weight, and requiring less revs to do its job. And a GT40 gearbox and Citroen brakes and a 0.32 drag factor. Then it got the 330 hp 4.9 V8 and another 17 mph for 177 mph. The Ferrari never did the 188 it claimed, nor did it ever handle as well as the Maser.
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