SoCalSACC at SACC Nationals August 2025 Report

BY: Eric hershkowitz

SACC National Convention 2025

Road Trip

This narrative is my personal experience during our adventure to the SACC National Convention in Sacramento from Thursday, 7/31/2025 to Wednesday 8/6/2025. I have included some side-lights not directly related to the convention because I think they are amusing and contributed to our overall experience. Our plans were to caravan (in four C-1’s) to Sacramento my wife Fran and me with Bob Brown, Fred and Barbara Kokaska and Brett Botzong.

Thursday:

Perfectly laid out plans were made for a kickoff barbeque at the house prior to our Friday departure to Sacramento. We anxiously waited for our guests and looked forward to a relaxing afternoon filling our guts with good stuff. Not seeing any C-1’s coming down our street at the expected time and knowing that Bob and Fred are very prompt, I sent a text. Perfectly laid out plans turned out to neglect one minor detail…the date of our meeting. Bob and Fred had us on their itinerary for Friday, while Bret had us scheduled for Thursday. The result was that my wife, Fran, Bret and I had to eat six people’s worth of Barbeque, for which I think we did a commendable job. Desert and ample “hot air” were included.

Friday:

The two C-1’s on itinerary A, left Bakersfield at 7:30 am. We stopped in the small town of Chowchilla for gas and this is where I experienced a hot start problem that stumped me the entire trip.

Fortunately, Bret had a booster jump starter and that got us back on the road. Those with a logical mind are already thinking about a battery in its last throes of death but, as of this writing, the cause is yet to be determined for certain.

Feeling that, due to another lapse of judgement on my part, I should own one of those powerful and compact battery boosters, we made a short detour to the Costco store in Stockton in order to obtain one. Unfortunately, they did not carry that item. Fortunately, they had Costco hot dogs so we purchased those instead. I’m not sure if they would serve the same purpose but we enjoyed them with equal enthusiasm.

We ended up at our destination hotel, The Lion’s Gate in Sacramento, about 2:00 pm and enjoyed these things in the order of priority: Freshened up, found a shady area to enjoy a cold beer, took a nap and then had dinner at the Officer’s Club prior to calling it a successful day.

Saturday:

This was the first “official” day of the convention with board and membership meetings scheduled. After a complimentary hotel breakfast, we walked to the nearby California Air and Space Museum (PIC #1). This museum was very impressive and the time passed quickly. Before long, our “abandoned” caravan-ers on itinerary B, Bob and Fred and Barbara showed up in two C-1’s. After catching up, we walked back to the hotel so that they could register. Since we had previously promised barbeque (smoked tri-tip and baby back ribs) which those on itinerary B had missed, we tried to make it up to them by bringing along a lot of smoked meats. We transformed our hotel room into a kitchen and served everyone up along with adult beverages. Now we were back on plan.

We all were back at the conference room for a meet-and-greet (PIC #2), with snacks at 5:00 followed by a short walk to a Thai restaurant at 7:00. I can’t believe that any of us were still hungry but when duty calls, we eat.

Sunday:

We were all up early for a group drive to the California Auto Museum. There were 11 C-1’s on the drive and this warranted plenty of group photos in front of the museum (PIC #3). Early in the museum schedule, Jeff Reade presented a great (as always) tech session on a variety of topics. His information is always useful, direct to the point and candid with regard to his well-respected opinion. There were many questions and relevant discussions. We really appreciated Jeff taking time out of his busy schedule to generously help us with the technical aspects of our Corvettes.

Our hosts provided shuttle service from the museum to Old Town Sacramento, so we split our time perusing the large variety of classic cars (PIC #4) and walking the wooden planks of Old Town. We enjoyed a guided walking tour of the Old Sacramento underground and some of the history museum. There are a lot of things to see here and we could have easily spent more time. Our dinner was planned at the Auto Museum so we returned there and played selections from the vintage jukebox until dinner was served. As far as the jukebox was concerned, I didn’t really know any of the songs (from the 1950’s for the most part) because these were popular way, way before my time. I mean WAY before.

We enjoyed our drive back to the hotel around 6:00 pm.

Monday:

This was road tour day, with about eight C-1’s departing the hotel parking lot at 9:00 am and heading east out of Sacramento for the historic site of Sutter’s Mill, the location of the first discovery of Gold in California. Yes, there was, and still is, gold “in them thar hills”. We all found out that gold is not all that there is “in them thar hills”. There are also stock trucks. Those are trucks loaded with cattle and the trailers have perforated sides and bottoms so that the slurry of bovine byproduct can escape  onto the road like a protein-fortified chocolate milkshake ahead of an unsuspecting line of previously beautiful classic Corvettes. I think you get the picture and although I am being scientific in my description, the saying goes that “stuff” happens. This was so bad that we had to take the first turnout just to clear our windshields (PIC #5).

The mill was interesting and there were park personnel on hand to provide all manner of interesting information (PIC #7). I didn’t find any gold, however, in spite of the fact that even after the gold rush of 1848, most of the gold in this location remains.

Joining us at Sutter’s Mill was Jim Lockwood. Jim is a fuel injection specialist and a gem of a guy. He was happy to see my FI purring along and offered additional hot start and cold start advice which, as usual, was right on. My recent hot-starting issues, by the way, had nothing to do with fuel injection… so the critics of that technology need not weigh in.

We continued our pleasant drive to the Sportsman’s Hall in the town of Camino (PIC #8).

Here we had lunch and were presented a talk about this historic location and its role as a station during the Pony Express. After lunch four C-1’s and a C-8 traveled just a couple miles up the road to the Highway 50 Brewery. We sat on the large patio and enjoyed the beautiful scenery and an adult beverage…..or two….ahem (PIC #9).

Upon returning to the hotel, several of us took advantage of the wash station provided. This was awelcome luxury as, I can attest, airborne cow manure diluted with cow urine is fortunately water soluble.

We were back at the Officer’s Club for social hour at 6:00, dinner at 7:00 and a general membership meeting.

Tuesday:

Three C-1’s with Fran and myself, Bob and Fred and Barbara had another day to “kill” and decided to kill it by getting out of the valley heat and heading towards the coast. The cars certainly and demonstratively enjoyed the coastal temperatures and lack of stock trucks. The drive was refreshing with the exception of a couple gridlock areas however we arrived in Monterey in good spirits and had no difficulty finding a place to park together (PIC #10).

Bob, being very familiar with the area, guided us along the waterfront for a pleasant drive and a few nice photo opportunities (PIC #12). Further south and returning to the hot weather, we landed in Paso Robles about 5:00 pm. We took the path of least resistance and grabbed dinner at Margie’s right next to the hotel. Some of us ate reasonably well while others decided that peach cobbler and ice cream was an appropriate dinner.

•The nerve of some people!!

Wednesday:

Bob, Fred and Barbara, being San Diego bound, departed the hotel very early. Fran and I slept a little later but were still home by 10:30 am as we had a very manageable drive. I would like to thank my wife, in fact all two of the wives for tolerating valley summer heat in a non-air-conditioned Corvette and my caravan buddies for being great companions, guides and mechanical wizards, and also for not shaming me during hot-start episodes. That issue is yet to be solved as well as all of the other mechanical foibles which crop up during a road trip….one that is full of unanticipated challenges as well as successes. Besides that, plans are over-rated….laughs aren’t.