So the month of July has been awesome… and we are only halfway through right now. The month started with working 10-11 hour days to get the cars ready for the big trip up to Boston for the Buick Nationals 2011. July 5 marked the first day of the trip, when we loaded up the trucks and pulled out for the 12 hour drive to Danvers. We made it up there before the severe weather hammered Massachusetts. As the days went by the show field started to fill up with amazing cars, the group I was with brought up a total of 4 cars. We had our 1987 Buick GNX – 1 of 547 ever made out on display for the show and friends had their cars up from the Maryland area. When Saturday came around they had around 300 cars on display ranging from the early 1900’s through present. Our car was originally ordered by a dealer in Ohio, I had the pleasure of meeting the owner of the dealership who had actually ordered our car new. For those of you have never been to a car show, we had our car in a 400 point judged class where all the cars are judged based on a standard set of categories. We were shooting to receive a BCA Gold – you would have to score between 385 and 400, which for the first time out with the car is hard to do. We had a great time showing the car and had a chance to show and talk to others about the car who shared an interest. That evening, we attended the awards dinner where we received a BCA Gold award for the GNX… turns out the car scored a perfect score with 400/400. Very hard to bring any car to a show and the judges not find a single thing wrong. Our family friend took top award with his 1931 Buick; he won the Best Pre War award which is equivalent to Best in Show. We had several more shows to travel to before school starts back up next month, most are local shows in the VA/MD area.

From July 5th through July 10th I was in Boston, MA then I traveled up Maine for a week with friends. Sunday morning I took JetBlue from Boston Logan to Portland, ME via Kennedy in NYC. Flights were great… never had an issue with JetBlue. So I arrived into Maine ahead of schedule and was ready for another great vacation. My friend Jen picked me up from the airport and we headed for Sokokis Lake/Limerick Maine. The trips served as a much needed break from Northern VA where it seems we are always running around. I was supposed to come home that Tuesday, turned out coming back home Friday the 15th. The extra days in Maine made the trip SO much better. Monday night I was thinking to myself; “I really, really don’t think I am ready to go home yet ha”. Monday night we all went down to Old Orchard Beach and spent the night between the Pier, rides and all the shops on Main Street. We hung around the house and Lake Tuesday… Wednesday we spent on the water and then one heck of an epic night. We drove back up to Portland and hit up LL Bean – the Flagship store, the World’s Largest Rotating Globe in Yarmouth, ME and back down for a quick stop at Old Orchard for food. Our last day in Maine was a blast out on the water… full moon + midnight tubing = awesome night! So the week spent in Maine turned into one of the best weeks of the year so far and I made some great friends. It was awesome to spend a week just relaxing and having fun without having to worry about when I was supposed to be at work, what needed to get done around the house and just enjoy being with friends. Friday we headed out of Maine and pointed the car towards Virginia, making it home in pretty good time.

So, I will be home for a week before I head out to Oshkosh with fellow ERAU student Eric. We leave the 24th and will be out there for a week surrounded by aviation. If you are headed out to OSH for the show, make sure to check out the Embry-Riddle booth(s) set up at the Air Show.