however, if you were fortunate enough to attend the Vintage Trailer Jam in Saratoga Springs this week, it would be difficult to hide your childish enthusiasm. Describing the event as unadulterated fun would be an understatement, and leave little room for adultery.  A visit to the Airstream Life weblog will cure your curiosity.

The Jam staff of volunteers shed all gestapo pretense, i.e., corporate governance, to the delight of several hundred attendees, visitors, media assembled for an inaugural event that will become a certain pilgrimage for many.  The organizers(*) were Herculean but not tireless and by Monday noon were exhausted and giddy. Like Tiger Woods, surgery, a good pain killer and eleven months of recuperation will have them back on the green of this world renowned spa, beckoning vintage aluminum disciples to worship the lord of rolling vagrancy. To imply that the attendees bordered on the fringe element would be unkind to iconoclasts. It seems so natural to be good natured in the company of oddly like-minded souls drinking some rather bizarre ‘mineral’ waters.  Good laxatives; the body is rinsed, the spirit cleansed.

Each of the four days had a scheduled happy hour and one might assume that the balance, 92 hours, were unhappy.  Not so. An example, on day two, at two p.m., in one of the premier venues for classic vehicles on the east coast, The Saratoga Auto Museum, the major organizer of the event, hereinafter referred to as the ringleader, gave a 90 minute slideshow and discussion on Camping in the National Parks.  

I really enjoyed the cars.

They arrived in a metaphorical tide, pebbles washed ashore; alternately polished and rough, as diminutive as a ten foot Eriba Puck      to a forty foot Spartan Imperial,the visual scent of  aluminum was intoxicating. Three Heinekens helped as well.  

All too soon, the wave receded. The simplicity of the weekend, free of TV, news of a beloved nation on the brink of economic collapse, an arrest of yet another ‘celebrity’ in a wet T-shirt being tossed into re-hab…..ranked between satisfaction and exhilaration. Freed from mundane pageantry; the expert presenters, unusual entertainment, and cordiality of everyone in attendance prevailed. References to gas prices were minimal as people, “seized the weekend”.

There was no serial hugfest, no tears at the end as we all drifted back to sea, content to know that it may all happen again in 360 days.

*Rich L.~ringleader

*Brett G., Steve H., Colin H.~major grunts

Tried to add more pictures, but the connection and upload time made it impossible…maybe next time.