<-prev        Ronald & Marlene Alley •1930 Model A Roadster 

Traveling cross-country
in a Model A

Ronald Alley and his wife Marlene love traveling in their 1930 Model A Roadster, taking yearly trips from their home in Culver, Oregon to the Oregon coast with the Central Oregon Old Car Club. They had made plans to travel in the car to the Model A meet in Texas in 2008, but as they went through a serene, snowy area of Oregon on the trip to the coast, they decided to travel a bit further, and tour the country in their Model A.
      Starting in mid-June of 2008, the couple began the cross-country adventure, leaving their home for Barstow, CA to meet up with the Model A Times group from Southern California. From there they followed Route 66 as much as possible, toward Addison, Texas, spending time in the Grand Canyon along the way (had to get that photo of the Model A in the redwood). Meeting up with the Model A club in Los Lunas, New Mexico. In Addison, Texas, they attended the MAFCA/MARC convention, entering the touring class and gaining 483 out of a possible 500 points for the car. Ronald calls the car “a true touring car”. While in Texas, they also visited the Texas Motor Speedway and had the thrill of driving the car around the track.
      Not exactly sure where they were headed, the couple left Addison, Texas, driving East. Marlene considers this the beginning of the “trip of a lifetime”. The next stop turned out to be Branson, Missouri, then on to a visit with their son in Nashville, Tennessee for the July 4th holiday, with a slight detour to view some property in Toccoa, Georgia.
After traveling from Nashville, the couple continued on to the Chesapeake Bay area, enjoying a trip across the 16 miles of tunnels and bridges.
      Realizing they had missed an important landmark they had both wanted to visit, the couple backtracked and visited the Shenandoah National Park. After that it was on to Washington, DC for some traditional sightseeing.
      Stopping by a friend’s home in New Jersey next, the Alleys continued on their journey, visiting sites in New York City, and traveling to Hershey, Pennsylvania to take in the usual tourist destinations, and check out all the old cars on display.
      The next destination was Lancaster, Pennsylvania, arriving on July 26th, then on to a few other stops, criss-crossing the New York, New Jersey line many times. One of the highlights of this leg of the journey was the sighting of a black bear alongside a highway in New York.
      The couple kept a guest book throughout this whole journey, having folks they met along the way sign and write note in it, as a keepsake to always remember this trip of a lifetime. The couple conversed with other travelers from throughout the world, as well as locals in each town or city they visited.
      Continuing on to Connecticut, the couple stopped at Vintage Motorcars Company to view some old cars and visit. The next stop on the journey would be Massachusetts, home of many historic sites for them to visit, as well as a tour of LeBaron Bonney in Amesbury, Massachusetts on August 1, 2008.
      The next stop was Boothbay, Maine, for a trip on the railway, and a visit to the Transportation museum and the Richards Paine Museums in Owls Head, Maine. Heading Northeast, the couple headed for Bar Harbor, Maine, and crossed over into Nova Scotia, visiting the Blake Lake Mine, the crossing back into the US into Vermont. Entering a car show in Stowe, Vermont, the car took second place.
      After stopping at Niagra Falls for a tour of both the US and Canadian sides of the falls, the next destination would be the Ford Museum, located in Dearborn, MI, followed by a ferry ride across Lake Michigan. While in Michigan, they made a necessary stop at White Glove in LaCross, to fix a faulty valve seat on the car.
      Unfortunately, this is where the car started having trouble, and ultimately, ended up having to be loaded into a UHaul and taken home to Oregon to be fixed. After being fixed, the car was loaded back into a Uhaul, traveled back to where it broke down in North Platte, NE. The journey back to Oregon, this time the way it was intended, in the Model A, took the couple through Sterling Colorado, Fort Collins, Colorado and Steamboat Springs, Colorado, and Naples, Utah, Delta, Utah, then visiting friends in Ely, Nevada. The final leg of the journey took them through Austin, Nevada and Winnemucca, Nevada. Once back into Oregon, the Model A started to act up again, but made it home without assistance.
      As Marlene says “Don’t ever say a Model A ford is too old to have fun in.”.