We attended a day time concert at Southwards Theatre recently, adjacent to the world famous Southwards Car Museum. With more than 400 classic, vintage and rare cars, Southwards is the largest car museum in the southern hemisphere. A visit to the museum was not on the agenda, but several interesting cars from the collection were dotted around the entrance for us to admire.
The racy red supercharged 1930 Alfa Romeo has a top speed of 150 and took just 14 seconds to go from 0-60 MPH.
1930 Alpha Romeo
The lovely old 1904 Wolseley Tourer, with black leather seats and plenty of brass fittings has a bit of a history. It was the first car to travel from New Zealand to participate in the famous London to Brighton run. This trip didn’t happen till 1962 when the car was 58 years old!
1904 Wolseley Tourer
Listed as “New Zealand’s Oldest Surviving Car” was the 1895 Benz. It has been restored to its original specifications as supplied by the Daimler Benz museum in Stuttgart, and is one of the two remaining models of this year in the world. Originally purchased in Paris by Mr Oates of Christchurch, he then shipped it to England and toured the country, driving over 1000 miles on the trip. The car was then shipped over to his home town in New Zealand, arriving shortly before the turn of the century.
1895 Benz
The rest of the 400 cars on display were temptingly out of reach through the glass doors of the museum. For car buffs, this is well worth a visit if you are in this part of the country, there is plenty here to keep you interested for hours.
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