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We are passionate car enthusiasts who live and breathe American classic cars, and are based in Auckland, New Zealand.
Our mission in life is to provide an environment for other like minded car aficionados to savour and enjoy their American classics, without the rules and restrictions that seem to dog other areas of everyday lives. If you are an American classic car owner who feels the same as we do, we invite you to take a small journey through our site to see if this sounds like you. If you like what you see, and want to be involved, then send in a membership application. The only hard and fast condition of membership is that prospective members must own an American classic car that is over 25 years old at the time of joining, which must be of historical interest. |
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Proud to be a Kiwi
PLEASE NOTE: American Classic Car Club members are unable to provide classic vehicles for events such as weddings, birthdays, family outings etc, as our members are not licenced to do so. Thank you for your understanding.
Kaiaua Fish & Chip Run – 20 August 2019
We arrived at BP Southern Motorway on a wet and cold Sunday morning to be surprised that 7 American classic’s and a number of daily drivers had turned up, with a total of 24 hardy members and guests braving the morning showers. The classics who braved the wet on the day were the 1947 Mercury Coupe of Steve and Bow Dickenson (on their 2nd outing as members), along with a pair of 90’s Cadillac’s belonging to Ivan and Robbie Grace, and Phil and Cindy Officer. Both were white, and they could have been twin vehicles except for the Grace car having a continental kit on the back. Also along for the ride were Allan and Frances Huljich, and Rob and Nicola Williams in their Chev Impala’s. After a mix and mingle and the driver’s brief we set off on a rural tour skirting the Hunua Ranges Regional Park, heading to the Pukorokoro Miranda Shorebird Centre. I was lead car in a Javelin and Peter jnr. was tail end Charlie in my C10 with the daily drivers in between. After about an hour or so on wet roads, with the weather improving as we headed southeast, we arrived at the Centre, and spent 30 minutes or so learning about the shore birds along the coast. Group tours are available with commentaries and accommodation if required, or you can just do a drop in and check out the displays for yourselves. We regrouped and then drove up the road to the Bayview Hotel at Kaiaua for our buffet fish and chip luncheon, where we were met by Shane and Julia Beckham, making a total of 26 people from the club, which is not a bad number considering the weather. As always this was served with salads, pasta and sauces, tea and coffee, and all were very well fed and watered, and is great value for the money. By all accounts all had a trouble free run, except for me in the Javelin. On the way home the aircon compressor seized on the Southern Motorway in the outside lane in bumper to bumper traffic. We managing to get into a work access road, and after some quick diagnosis, I disconnected the magnetic clutch on the compressor, got mobile again, and put our lives in the hands of the oncoming traffic to get back into the motorway flow. Really quite scary, but we made it. I would like to thank all who braved the weather to participate on this run. When I did the route plan the weather was sunny with wide blue skies, and awesome views. And vastly different to what was presented to us today. Overall another great outing seemingly enjoyed by all. Even on a day when the weather was against us we had a good turn out of Club members. Some other clubs would be happy to get that many attending their outings on a good day. Cheers, Peter Lee. Photos can be seen here..... 
Clifton Cove Toy Museum – 28 July 2019
Sunday morning dawned nice and dry after an awful forecast mid-week, which had predicted a wet day for our club run out to the Clifton Cove Toy Museum in Whitford, so somebody was looking after us. The meetup was at the Vector Wero Whitewater Centre at Manukau, where President Rob’s connections (nudge-nudge-wink wink) got us a guided tour of the complex and rafting rivers. Our Canadian guide explained that this is one of only 8 man-made whitewater rafting venues in the world, and this is the only one purpose built, for other than an Olympic Games, which is pretty impressive for little old NZ. We were lucky enough to witness the starting up of the small river, which quickly turned into an impressive set of rapids. A couple of interesting facts are that to power the pumps for the small river was around $200 of electricity for 1 hour, but the larger river which has a drop of 7 metres costs around $700-800 per hour, such is the volume of water pumped at about 13 cubic metres per second! As we watched a couple of rafts came down the rapids, and although an experienced instructor is on each raft, it cant be easy to steer them as one came through backwards at one stage, with all on board frantically paddling to turn it around. It looked like seriously good fun though. Then it was off for a cruise through some lovely South Auckland countryside heading toward Whitford for our tour of the Clifton Cove Toy Museum. This museum is situated on the 160 hectare farm of Bill and Kathie Mcnabney, which borders on to the waters of the Hauraki Gulf between Howick and Beachland. The museum has been the lifelong passion of Bill, who has restored most of the pedal cars and prams on display. Bill is an octogenarian who still has another huge shed of old tractors to restore, along with a shipping container of pedal cars he doesn’t have room to display, so he’s not looking like running out of anything to do in the near future. There sure was a lot to see in the museum for everyone no matter what their interest, from prams and dolls, to pedal cars and model cars, so the time quickly ran out before we had to head off to the lunch venue at Whitford Park golf course. A pre determined menu and ticket system soon had everyone dished up, and although a couple of the meals seemed to get waylaid in the system, the 40 plus club member group were fed and watered with minimum delay, before departing off into an increasingly cloudy afternoon to head home. It certainly was another great club day out to a different type of attraction than we normally frequent, but one that most members seemed to really enjoy. Ciao4now, Russell Wilson Photos of the day can be viewed here..... 
Mid-winter Christmas Lunch & Trivia Quiz – 30 June 2019
With the superb Auckland clear and sunny week continuing through to the Sunday, the club could not have asked for a better day for the annual mid-winter Christmas lunch and quiz afternoon. It certainly couldn’t have been better weather for the inaugural pre-lunch mystery cruise organised by Carl Phillips which headed up to the Helensville Railway Museum for coffee and a looksee before heading on down to Soljans Estate Winery for the midday start time. And what a stunning picture the chrome encrusted 24 American beauties made in the allocated parking area set aside for us, with many public admirers throughout the afternoon taking in the display. Once the formalities of registration and name tags were out of the way, President Rob welcomed the assembled and ran through the programme and rules, before everyone had a taste of what was to come with a name the song and artist music quiz produced by Phil Officer to limber up the brain cells before the big event after lunch. Once again a tremendous buffet lunch was provided by the great team at Soljans, washed down with a few wines (or apple, orange juice or water of course) supplied by the club, on each table. After being lulled into a false sense of camaraderie and goodwill with the delicious food and ambience, it was then into the main quiz of the day with Rob’s wicked and twisted blockbuster. And once again he didn’t disappoint with some heated and frenzied discussion amongst the teams. It was then into the deserts before Rob announced that there was a tie for the first place, so he had to ask a tiebreaker question to sort out the winner. And I have to say (as one of the team members who were tied 1st equal) that he asked one the most obscure and dumbest questions I have ever heard. Who would know that the name for a shoemaker is a cordwainer; I mean really? However the other team guessed it, and took away the prize, much to our team’s chagrin. Speaking of prizes, there were numerous ticket prize draws throughout the afternoon, with prizes donated by the club’s supporters NZ Petrolhead/Rodder, Classic Cover Insurance, and POR NZ, along with prizes supplied by the club. The afternoon finished off about 4pm with much handshaking and hugs all round, as everyone sure seemed in a jovial mood after what can only be described as an entertaining and convivial afternoon. Mind you they would have needed the positive state of mind, to battle the heavy line of continuous slow traffic that seemed to occupy the highway outside Soljans all afternoon. Russell Wilson Take a look at the day's festivities here..... |
UPCOMING ACCCA EVENTS
Sunday 18 August Run to Kaiaua Hotel for the famous fish and chip lunch. Meet at BP Papakura, Southern Motorway from 10am to depart at 10.30 for visit to Miranda Shorebird Centre en route (donation optional). Buffet lunch is $16 per head |