Saab Car Museum Festival report

To celebrate 75 years of Saab as a car manufacturer there are several events happening. One in Trollhätten, Sweden and another in Sturgis South Dakota.

Having already experienced a trip to Trollhättan Trudi and I decided a trip to Sturgis would be a great holiday. Philip our son hoped to drive to Sweden in his 99 16v, but his plans put on hold with the arrival of his son at the very end of May.

Then there was a phone call from Sandy Bogage, the president of Saab America asking about doing a road trip to the Swedish event and would we travel with him. Trudi looked at hotel options, fully booked. She tried to pull a few favours through Norwegian and Swedish knitting friends. Everything was booked out, one or two places had just one room.

Trudi decided I should go to supervise Sandy, while she stayed home and therefore I found myself being thrown out of the car at 2am to catch the coach to London and travel on the morning Eurostar to Amsterdam. It was agreed to meet under the clock at noon, only it transpired it wasn’t actually a clock, where from Sandy and I went to collect a hire car from the airport.

Sandy wanted to explore as much as possible on his short excursion into Europe and had already landed running. Therefore to show him as much as possible we headed for the dykes and over the IJsselmeer into the National parks and later north to Denmark.

After a restful night and a morning reminding myself of continental breakfast we set off to Denmark and “Vagns Saab museum” at Nordborg. The collection consists of 2strokes, 92s to longnose and also a Saabo.

Then it went wrong. The next plan was Egeskov castle, but being misdirected to the wrong ferry we cut our losses and headed ever north to Silkenborg to visit the museum containing the “peat bog man”.

Again, it went wrong. Not planning any real fixed time schedule we arrived not booking ahead to find there was no

accommodation whatsoever available. The server in the bar found her manager, who was eating with friends and next they were searching their phones and found a place slightly out of town, which was very pleasant and an added bonus of a car museum close by with 160 vehicles from 1900-1987.

This place is well worth a visit (www. jyskautomobilmuseum.dk). Returning to our plan to see the “peat bog man”, one of the oldest preserved humans discovered. Setting off again to Aalborg for lunch we were spoilt for choice. An English bar, Irish bar and lots of local cuisine.

The Irish bar it was. Short break we continued to Frederikshavn and the ferry port, but having booked the early morning crossing and yet again accommodation was a problem we ate at a nearby restaurant and caught the night ferry.

Not sure if this was actually a mistake arriving in Gothenburg at midnight. The roadworks made directions a nightmare and the ‘Satnag’ went on verge of mental breakdown and a map was useless. Sandy just aimed to get out of town hoping the Satnag would recover and guide us more cheerfully to Trollhättan. She did. We arrived two hours later, tired and equally exhausted at the hotel.

And we were up with the lark on Friday morning, breakfast and a trip into town. I was able to identify all the various countries the nearby Saabs had also travelled from, pointing out various trim levels because of local tax reasons.

The event was celebrated fully in the town and everyone appeared to be swept along.

Meanwhile Sandy and I socialised with beer and cake. Sandy was very interested in the toppollas , one kind owner gave a indepth description of the virtues of usage. Not sure of why they never made to the States, as they use something similar on

pickup trucks. We followed the 92 parade with the Ursaab (the smell of two stroke fumes filled the square) model leading the way, then we refreshed with beer and cake.

We went to see the other Saabs visiting the event, one was very interesting a shortened BMW chassis with a SAAB 99 body shell adorning. We were told by the constructors it had to be registered as a new vehicle. More beer and cake.

Eventually Sandy had to continue with his tour of Europe setting off for Hamburg. Sunday was the best day of the weekend, the Autojumble and racing. Travelling light,

nothing was purchased. The day was cut short by heavy rain.

My plan was to find a train from there back to Amsterdam only to be warned from home train strikes were going to be a major problem to get back on time.

Joe to the rescue! Offering my services as a co- driver we drove his 96 home from the event via Venlo on the German Dutch border and onwards to the tunnel home.

Joe kindly dropped me at the train so I could still make use of my coach ticket home from Victoria station arriving in Bournemouth only two hours later than planned.