Vintage Tuesday! Backstreet bug,

Backstreet Bug.

Drive by Shootings #18

From the Static Files... Danish Army Bus

Week in review: Bus City 2011 - A report on a report

So, most of you who follow us on Twitter or Facebook already know this, But Big Blue did not make it to Bus City 2011 last weekend. How, you ask, can a bus miss the event that the bus puts on? Must have broken down finally, correct? Nope. Big Blue was fine. It was Oak, our sturdy son who last Monday celebrated his 6 month birthday, that broke down last weekend. He started running funny (fever) on Thursday and then started making odd sounds in corners (whimpers). We took him to the shop (pediatrician) Friday just before the planned departure to Bus City 2011 only to find that he wasn't fit enough to make the trip. His front axle was bent (ear infection) and it was making a terrible noise (crying!).

So we live through other people's pictures. There is a great write up on Elementhis, and we stole these pictures from his post (but do yourself a favor and read his post)

A special thanks to Schoolhouse Canyon Park, a family run campground in Sonoma county along the Russian River, for giving us space, making us feel welcome and making it so easy to organize that we didn't even have to show up to have it go off without a hitch!

Oh, and Big Blue's Bus City 2012 is already on the calendar. Same location, same weekend:

Oh, and the campers at Train Spotting 3 will be getting a little something special from Big Blue!

Oh, nothing shines like new powder coated wheels!

A few weeks back, while my mom and dad were visiting from Michigan, I took the day off and we headed over the Richmond Bridge to... Richmond. I had a load of items that needed to be cleaned and powder coated, so I brought them to Poly Engineering. This was the place I had Big Blue's bumpers and wheels powder coated on 2007. They did a decent job then, but the place has cleaned up and is under new management now. Talk to Wayne, the new manager. They really have there stuff together and the work they did this time was awesome! If you need powder coating in the Bay Area, try these guys first.

FYI - my 5 wheels cost $65 each.

Nothing like an early morning in Richmond!

And nothing quite like seeing this stuff!

Here's a before picture to give you and idea of the clean up:

Forgive the blurry picture, but I wanted to show how clean this place is. That oven on the right is big enough to powder coat a car frame. On the left, you can see the frame of a military truck of some sort (Wayne couldn't remember what) that had been powder coated. Tempting!

VW bug as VW bug parts hauler...

So the next big step on the '56 is to get the transaxle back from the guy working on it in the East Bay. Once we get that in, we have a rolling '56 bug!

July 1959 - Small Car Parade

Another scan from the Kayo Books stack...

Vintage Tuesday - Witness

Witness.

Little Blue: Commuter car continues...

At J. Lohr Winery in San Jose

At Amapola Creek Winery in Sonoma

From the Static Files... Novocaine for your soul.

1... to the odd VWs that just happen to swing by Bus City

Each of the past 2 Bus City campouts, we've have random VWs stop by. The first year this interesting Vanagon, registered as a '74 bus, swung by to discuss his vehicle:

And then in 2010, we had this thing show up. As you can see, it drew quite a crowd. The owner seemed an awesome kind of crazy. Just the type of people we like...

So who and what will show up this year? We are on our way to find out...

Week in Review - More VW folks from the WWW!

Just a quick WIR as we are out the door today to go to Bus City 2011. Yeah!

First off, go here and VOTE FOR our friends BodesWell. Don't go any further without doing that.

Early this week, some volks from Barcelona commented on a post and it turns out they have their own blog that is worth checking out. So, I offer you Kamerfalia77:

Another blog we found out about from our buddies down at GoWesty is "Little Van That Could". It seems that we caught them at the end of one adventure, but the promise of another is strong and we look forward to seeing more of them and their adventures:

And, here's a California VW guy we follow on Twitter - Timm Eubanks. He's a photographer by trade. And when he's not tweeting about VWs, he's taking awesome photos. You can view them all at his site, http://timmeubanks.wordpress.com/, but here's one worth your time:

The above photo is (C)Timm Eubanks. You can tell him how much you like it on Twitter at @oldvw.

And, last but not least, thanks to HotVWs for sending us some cool items to give away at Bus City.

2... Remembering the deadheads that joined us for Bus City 2009 (originally posted here on 4-15-10)

Please note: this is a repost from 4-15-10.

Have you, dear VW bus owner, ever come upon another VW bus at a campground? What if you came upon 13 other buses at a campground? That's what happened to these random dead-following folks last year when they pulled into Casini Ranch for a spot to camp and stumbled upon Bus City 2009!

On Saturday morning, we decided to go get firewood. On our way back, we took the long way through the campground and found another bus! Peter leaned out the window and invited them down with the rest of us. They were curious, because the folks at the gate had asked, "so you're with all the other VWs, right". They should have said yes, because they ended up driving down and spending all Saturday with us.



I don't remember much about them now. They had names that were exchanged - I believe his was Grif? Something like that. And they had a dog named... Mmmm. And he was in a band called Howlin' Wolf or something like that and, man, could he play the guitar! He busted out his guitar and played some great music for a few hours...


They had a bus. I can't recall what year. '71 maybe? And the bus was in great shape and they had wood floors.


They were on the road following The Dead who had been at Shoreline south of San Fran the night before. They were on their way to the Oregon show. They were traveling with a kayak, a dog and I'm guessing a fair amount of weed.


They would leave us toward the end of the night, in the darkness. They started up their bus and headed back to their site. No contact info exchanged. On Sunday we were headed back to jobs, they were headed to the next show...


They did take a piece of us with them. "Grif" picked a Bus City grab bag - as there were a few extras - and ended up picking the one bag with a special - the first ever made - "Big Blue is a Friend of Mine" t-shirt. He was happy to have it. And I'm glad at least a Big Blue t-shirt got to follow The Dead last summer...