One Elle Of A Coffee

One Elle Of A Coffee and Brisbane’s Best Address

The Cars and Coffee morning on 15th October at Café Elle was advertised as a 7.30am start. Obviously no one bothered to read this. If you want to park in front of the café, get there at 4am, if you arrive at 5am you probably will be somewhere in the car park, 6am you’ll find a spot out on the street and at 7am, forget it, you will be parking in the next suburb. Cars and coffee mornings are so popular sometimes the queue for coffee is out the door, but let me assure it was well worth the wait with Café Elle serving an excellent brew.

We go for coffee, a chat and to look at the cars, but even more interesting is checking out the drivers and sometimes their passengers. There were more late model BMWs and Audis than you could poke a stick at and in my opinion, they all looked the same and a bit boring. (some may say that of 911s). As for the drivers predominantly with Middle Eastern or Oriental heritage who have yet to find the volume knob on their car radios. There was a smattering of Euro hot hatches bearing Renault, Skoda or VW badges driven by young males wearing baseball caps. The pick being an immaculately original Mk 1 Golf GTI. VW numbers were bolstered by an Oval Window Beetle and Kombi, both beautifully restored and parked side by side attracting many admirers.

Our neighbours from down the road in Stuttgart with the 3 pointed star were well represented with everything from the latest AMG’s to an unrestored ’68 250SE with 50 year old patina and either it’s overly complicated hydraulic suspension had given up the ghost or it was on air bags as it was sitting bang on the ground with about 10 degrees negative camber on the rear wheels.

The humble Transit Van has been the go to vehicle for delivering goods. However Ferraris and Lamborghinis seem to have found a niche in the logistics market. Transporting botox and silicon, carefully packaged and strapped into the passenger seat. Of more interest from Italy were two De Tomaso Panteras, with typically 70’s wedge design from the Ghia Design Studio and sitting just behind the driver’s seat a very agricultural American Ford V8. Some believe there is no substitute for cubic inches.

Although advertised as a Euro Event some must have been oblivious to Brexit, with a few of England’s finest gate crashing the party. A number of McLarens were on display and a very rare Jensen Interceptor, again American V8 powered being the very desirable Hemi 6.3 litre from Chrysler. One bloke who was either lost or didn’t know what Euro meant turned up in his Holden, which was well worth a look. It was a unique Kingswood which could be described as a chopped panel van, or a two door station wagon or a ute with a station wagon roof grafted on the back. Either way it was well done with an amazingly clean engine bay where all the plumbing and wiring for the LSA engine was neatly hidden.

And there were plenty of Porsches and PCQ members. Representing the air cooled era were a pair of 1971 2.2 litre 911s both a credit to their owners. Ross Golding’s 911E which was The People’s Choice at our recent Concours was parked next to Greg Wilson’s equally immaculate 911T. Greg has carried out a nut and bolt restoration on a very unique car with rare features including 14 inch wheels and a 4 speed gear box. Many cars on display were from our water cooled stable including our Social Director, Rob Beaumont’s immaculate 996 and a great selection of late model GT3s, Turbos and GT4s.

For me the highlight of the morning was bumping into someone I have known for many years through work. His name is Parveen and as is often the case with work contacts, I didn’t know he was interested in cars. Nor did I know that he lives at 9-11 Porsche Crt. Warner. Sadly he is not a Porsche owner, but has a collection of Stuttgart’s second finest, five classic Mercs. I wonder if a Porsche owner would pay a premium to live at that address.

Thanks to Ryan Richani from Café Elle for putting on a great morning.

-by Bill Black