IML: Rhododendron Festival 2005, Florence, Oregon

["Eric" <gearhead@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi All,
The ballots have been counted and the trophies issued at the 2005
Rhododendron Festival in Florence, Oregon, this past weekend (see events
page,  http://www.imperialclub.com/Events/Oregon05/index.htm ). I am pleased
to announce that our lovely host and list member, Leslie Kettenhofen, took
home the award for Best Daily Driver for her 1967 Imperial Sedan.
Congratulations, Leslie!

The day before the event, I met up with Bill Uhlman of Seattle, and his 17
lb cat on a leash, Schroeder, in his beautiful '66 Convertible here in
Portland. We followed each other taking one of the finest stretches of
banked S-curve highway thru Harrisburg, Cheshire, and down to Noti, Oregon.
If ever in the area, it's a recommended drive. Thanks go to list member Mike
Sutton for bringing this road to my attention last year on our drive down.

I had decided to miss the event this year as none of my cars were driveable
or presentable enough when suddenly a 1964 Crown Coupe shows up on
www.craigslist.com
With a few corrections to the car, I quickly made the decision to take this
newly acquired 'aircraft type seating' (when did you last have nearly 2 1/2
feet of seat bottom on a plane??) Imperial on the trip as it seemed to drive
exceptionally well. After putting on some 400 miles on the car, I only
experienced a burned out headlamp, a wiper blade rubber that disintegrated,
oh and there was that engine fire at the gas station pumps in Salem due to a
backfire through the carb. After advancing the timing a bit to fix the
dieseling and backfiring problem, and after giving my engine compartment a
thick coating of fire extinguisher powder, we were back on the road. A
previous owner had installed an aftermarket air filter cover in place of the
'flame arresting' factory housing. I could see that nothing other than the
air filter and hood pad had burn damage so a resumption of the trip was
ensued after a quick stop to purchase a fire extinguisher, just in case.

For the Rhody Show & Shine car show, the real star of the show turned out to
be Schroeder, Bill Uhlman's 17 lb convertible guard kitty. Schroeder 
garnered as
many admirers as our line up of Imperials did. This year, we were able to
line up Red (Loren's '64 Crown), White (my '64 Crown Coupe), and Blue
(Bill's '66 Convertible) Imperials, flanked by Mike Sutton's freshly sprayed
(paint, that is, not by Schroeder) Sapphire Blue '62 Crown 2-Door and 
Leslie's
Haze Green '67 Sedan. The weather held out up til the end of the show
when the ocean air became more ocean than air, and the convertibles started
putting up their tops and filing out of the show.

As in each year I've attended, Leslie and her husband, Bob, are great hosts
and line up a fun, casual string of activities. Thanks go to the
Kettenhofens, the Suttons (Linda cooked up a delicious dinner for us!),
Bill, Erik, and Loren, and all the other attendees that make this a great
time. Pictures and other perspectives of the event are due to be posted
soon.

Eric Ruud
Portland, Oregon



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