Bay to Birdwood Trip – Summary
The Bay to Birdwood trip was our 5th annual major road trip in classic cars. This year, we went back to aligning around a major motoring event, the Bay to Birdwood. As usual, the formula was pretty simple, 8 classic cars, touring the back roads and out of the way places in Australia. We avoided motorways entirely, and stayed on sealed roads, mostly through small towns.
The four previous trips have all been made up of classic Mercedes-Benz cars. This year, we had our first car from a different manufacturer, a C4 Corvette. There was never a requirement that the cars be a Mercedes, they just had to be classics able to stand up to thousands of kilometers of back roads.
Now with five trips under our belt, and a combined 147,800km, we’ve had our share of breakdowns. But so far, we’ve never needed the services of a tow truck. I’m sure that day will come one day, but it is testament to the build quality of these cars that we haven’t needed it so far.
The trip was a big success. The Bay to Birdwood event was a real highlight, but so were many of the interesting places we went through. The route took us through places I would never go to otherwise, and we had a great bunch of guys along for the ride.
These trips are the highlight of classic car ownership for me. These cars are far more capable than most owners give them credit for, and the experiences you have doing a trip like this make it all the better.
Our Route
A full description of the route is available here. We drove to Bathurst via the Central West and the Riverina, before spending a day in the Adelaide Hills before the event. On the way home, we followed the lower Murray, before going up the Darling, back down Cobb Highway and then followed the Lachlan Valley.
The Bay to Birdwood Event
The Bay to Birdwood was the main attraction and it really delivered. It was an amazing event and it really surpassed the expectations of everyone on the trip. The community nature of the event made it a real feel-good experience.
Getting to the start point early allowed us to see all the cars lining up for the event. It was amazing to see the breadth and depth of the cars entered. In particular the number of pre-war cars being driven along the route. These were not static display pieces.
Then the event itself showed what enthusiasm for cars there is in the City of Adelaide. Half the city was lining the route, waving to the cars, and anyone who owned a old car who hadn’t registered for the event, had it parked along the route. They were parked wherever they could fit, median strips, footpaths, parking lots of closed businesses. And you had various car clubs firing up BBQs and making a real day of it.
The Finish Festival was also a revelation, seeing even more of the cars, the people dressed in period fashion and the excellent collection in the museum in Birdwood.
Other Attractions
As well as the primary Bay to Birdwood, we saw a number of other interesting attractions along the way. The first was the Chrysler Museum in Grenfell. This was basically a private collection run by a very enthusiastic owner. He has quite an extensive collection and is very knowledgeable.
That same afternoon, we did a tour of Resto Pros near Griffith. We were all really impressed with the sort of work they were doing there. You could really see the care they were taking with the cars they were working on.
On the fourth day, we did a tour of Collectable Classic Cars, a dealer in Strathalbyn. They had a great collection and we all had a car we would have loved to take home with us. Also in Strathalbyn, we went to Gilberts Motor Museum. It was an excellent museum with a really interesting collection. We also got to see a stage of the Adelaide Rally, which was an amazing coincidence.
On the way back through Menindee, we also got to tour a private collection of cars. That was an unexpected bonus.
The Cars
We had eight cars this year, seven Mercedes-Benz and the Corvette. The Bay to Birdwood has the same criteria that we do, that the cars had to be over 30 years old. Our cars ranged from 48 years old to 32 years old.
The Drive
We all made our own way to Bathurst the day before, avoiding Sydney traffic. Day 1 started there, cruising through the Central west, and stopping at the Chrysler Museum and Resto Pros in griffith. We had a few minor car issues with the Corvette and the Petrol Blue 280CE, but nothing catastrophic.
The next morning we took the long way through the Riverina in two groups, the main group going through Jerilderee, Moulamein and Balranald. We had hoped to see Balranald Southern Cross, but it was closed. The other group went into Hay to get repairs for the Corvette and 280CE. The Corvette managed to get a new starter fitted by a friendly mechanic.
Day three had us going into South Australia, going through Renmark, Burra, Kapunda and Hanhndorf as well as other towns in the northern Adelaide Hills. On day four we didn’t drive as much. We focused mostly on attractions in the Adelaide Hills, but we did manage to drive the Angas River Scenic Drive which was pretty good.
Day 5 was the Bay to Birdwood event, and then we followed the lower Murray to Loxton to finish the day. The next day, we headed north along the newly paved Pooncarie road, following the route of the Darling river, through Pooncarie and Menindee. We eventually got to Broken Hill, and took a detour up to the Mundi-Mundi lookout, where you could see all the way back into South Australia.
Day 7 was our most remote day of driving, down the Cobb Highway. We hardly saw any other cars, going through some pretty remote towns. We finished the day with our customary succulent chinese meal. On the final day, we followed the path of the Lachlan river, managed to take out a crow and suffer a long section of roadworks.
We went our separate ways in Lithgow, where we hit some rain heading back into Sydney. We were really lucky that we only really saw rain getting in and out of Sydney. Overall, we covered about 4,350km and our fifth trip had gone just as well as last years trip to Longreach.
