With mostly Austin Sevens participating (here a sample of 21) the Valom-Mesch is probably one of the smallest & better events in this part of the world. Insiders talk about the VM as the dutch Le Jog, as this trip will take you from the utmost North to the very-very South of The Netheralnds in two long days. But realistically it is two times longer...
All participants need to face this:
1. How to get to the distant Start location... Valom ? (220 km from Amsterdam) 2. How to keep the car in one piece during the next 450 km. 3. Finally, how to return home from the far south (250 km from Amsterdam). Check here our close to 1000 km route.
Despite of not being a follower of the A7 church, we were lucky enough to be tolerated with the Amilcar. With an entry fee of less than 100 Euro there is little threshold for the owner of a Poor Man's Bugatti (update: wrong quote, see comment Bob McGrath). Unfortunately the Amilcar preferred to stay at home due to rearaxle issues so we opted for the XL french Talbot that was hospitalised for some time due to severe waterpump trouble. But now the Talbot was aching again for the wide open. To everybody's surprise we managed to keep The Thing rolling the full Thursday, the Friday, the Saturday & finally also the Sunday. Four long and hot days with only a minor gearchange problem: 700 miles in total. Piece of cake for an Austin 7. With a large Talbot it's different. For starters we left a trail of plundered gas stations... Great trip. In two years once again?
(special thanks to Dirk and Dirk Jan Regter for waterpump engineering / Eric van der Heide, electrickery / photos by editor)