Planning an event that involves driving our Alfas in the middle of March is an iffy proposition at best, and it took a guy from Down South to ignore the potential pitfalls and come up with it. Steve Silverstein was just that guy, having lived in Tennessee and Texas in the not too distant past. And having been impressed with a recent visit to the New England Air Museum, everything easily fell into place.

Since we are an automobile club, we didn’t want to just meet at the museum, so we made it into a bit of a driving tour too. On a cool but sunny St. Patrick’s Day morning, we gathered in Sturbridge, Massachusetts. It was a good turnout – about 30 strong, although some were complaining about the after-effects of the green beer they’d consumed the night before. Most were Alfas, with a couple of Sunbeam Tigers added to the mix (we’d also invited the Connecticut, Long Island, and New Jersey AROC chapters to join us, as well as the Sunbeam Tigers East / Alpines East club).

At a brief drivers’ meeting, it was announced that there was nothing competitive about the upcoming drive, maps and directions were handed out, and we decided to try to stick together as a group. Then off we went on a tour down into Connecticut, traveling entirely on sparsely trafficked secondary roads in the northeastern corner of the state. Those of us who were so inclined got a chance to clear out our Alfas’ cobwebs on some of the open stretches of road, one result of which was that our group spread out a little. Well, OK, a lot.

After about 35 miles of being as one with our cars, we pulled into an Olive Garden restaurant in Enfield for an Italian luncheon. The Olive Garden was good, but the food took longer arriving than we had hoped, although we’d given them ample notice. Olive Garden’s motto is, "When you’re here, you’re family." Well, if they treat family like that, then ... fill in your own punch line.

After lunch, we motored the rest of the way to the museum, which was located in Windsor Locks adjacent to Bradley International Airport. The placed was packed! We were told that it was their busiest day ever, with over 2000 visitors! Still, it was easy to see everything and you could climb into the cockpits of lots of the planes. It was a very impressive museum, with lots of interesting military and commercial aviation exhibits to see. There were aircraft of every imaginable type – fighter jets, VTOLs, experimental planes, helicopters, vintage biplanes, sports racers, amphibious planes, guided missiles, and even a nuclear bomb (deactivated, one hopes). Several members of our group commented that they’d be going back to spend more time there. Check out the New England Air Museum web site and plan to take a trip there sometime (try to go on an open-cockpit day)!

We had picked up a few more event participants at the Olive Garden, and at least another couple at the museum itself (it was hard to tell), including Don Ereminas (of Connecticut’s Ereminas Imports) and his wife. A family from the New Jersey AROC chapter joined our parade in a nice black GTV6.

Our group dispersed once inside the museum, but we kept running into each other. Later, on our own schedules, we set out upon more back roads home, taking a different but equally scenic route.