By TANIA PHILLIPS
Pic: Cabarita caravan enthusiasts Stephen O’Brien and Bob Taylor with a 1963 Pathfinder President by Jennison which Stephen is currently restoring.
THE clock will be turned back 51 years at Cabarita Beach over the long weekend, when a convoy of caravans pulls into town for the Cabarita Vintage Van Rally.
Not a club or an organised group, the vintage caravan owners find each other through online forums and magazines, according to Bogangar local and caravan officianado Bob Taylor.
Mr Taylor said with the Cabarita Caravan Park now all but closed down the vintage van owners had decided to send the park – established in 1962 – out in style. Up to 50 vans from the heyday of the park are expected in town over the long weekend.
He said vans would be arriving from throughout South East Queensland and Northern NSW from Friday afternoon with an additional convoy as part “Museum of the Long Weekend” heading in to town on the Monday morning for morning tea on its way to Canberra.
He said weekends like the trip to Cabarita weren’t organised events – more about someone suggesting a meeting place and all of the van owners jumping on the band wagon.
“Most of the vans date from the early ’50s to the late ’70s,” he said.
“People just love collecting them, doing them up and getting on the road with them. Some of the vans are in original condition, others done up and others are done in a theme like Betty Boop.”
Bob’s speciality are the Olympic fibreglass caravans made at Springwood in South Tweed. He’s been collecting and fixing them since 2000 and it’s a passion that is catching, with fellow Cabarita residents Stephen and Julie O’Brien seeing one of Bob’s vans for sale back in 2010 and getting the bug.
They have seven now in various states of repair according to Stephen.
“We have the caravanning bug now,” he laughed.
“I think it’s about reliving your early years and it’s about rescuing the vans and keeping them on the road.”
Stephen’s latest acquistion, a 1963 Pathfinder, came all the way from Biloela near Gladstone. The van is still being restored although the gold stripe, not orginal, may be staying.
“I’ve also bought the gold 1968 HK Premier Holden that took it around Australia twice,” Stephen said.
“It’s still Biloela though, I could only get one vehicle down here at a time.”
Bob said the vans tended to cause a sensation wherever they went and they would be a great sight to see when they pulled into town next week.
He said as well as the vintage vans, some of the owners would be dressing up in period costume in keeping with their vans.
