Sep. 7--WATERLOO -- There wasn't an entry fee for spectators or participants, no one was judged and there weren't cash prizes to be had at the University Avenue Cruise.

But no one seemed to mind.

For car enthusiasts, like Al Schaffer of Evansdale, the fun was in discovering beautifully restored cars and trucks among the hundreds parked in Spicoli's lot Sunday night.

Plenty of people were asking Schaffer about his own 1950s Chevy BelAir Nomad. He began restoring the station wagon when he bought it for $350 in 1968. Since then, the Nomad's been restored several times, with Schaffer doing everything except the paint and the windshield himself.

"It was a rare car back then," he said.

Less rare were the Mustangs, Corvettes and Camaros, shined up and displayed with their hoods up. Those were the cars that young people liked to drive up and down University Avenue a few decades ago, and the reason for the Labor Day weekend cruise, said chairman Jim Koch.

"When people get done with the Cruise, they're going to feel like, 'Man, it's 1980,'" said Koch, who noted the Cruise had likely surpassed last year's car total of 400.

All cars were welcome at the Show and Shine as well as the Cruise, with the majority from the 1940s on up on display. The only rule, seemingly, was that it had to look cool.

That's why Brian Davis of Waterloo attracted so much attention with his 1997 GMC Sonoma, an open stock 4-wheel drive truck puller that wasn't even street legal. Davis had jacked the truck up 20 feet in the air to expose the interior.

He said spectators were asking about the engine -- 481 cubic inches -- as well as the gas mileage, a funny question considering he's only driven the Sonoma at truck rallies.

"It gets about a gallon and a half to 300 feet," Davis said.

But people hold on to their old cars, as well as lovingly restore them for months or years, because they're much more than a mode of transportation, said Cruise co-chairman Chuck Held.

"Car peple like to be out with their cars," he said.

To see more of the Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.wcfcourier.com/.

Copyright (c) 2009, Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier, Iowa

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

For reprints, email tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA.

<< -- 09/08/2009>>