Long lost Healey returns.

[Donunder]

I've made mention several times over the years on this forum of the lovely old Healey 3000 I used to own back in the sixties and seventies. This was the car that my wife Lyn and I rode away from our wedding in, took our very young kids on interstate trips to attend Healey Club rallies, and even left parked in a dirt car park (Fish Lane for you old Brisbaneites) while we walked over the old Victoria Bridge to work in the CBD.

Here's a shot of it out the back of Wolston House, taken in 1977.



In 1976, with the arrival of our third child, family outings in the Healey came to an end. A fourth bedroom was needed so a heart-wrenching decision was made to sell the Healey to finance house extensions and install a swimming pool so as to provide entertainment for the family at home. On a very sad day just after Christmas 1979 I saw the Healey loaded onto the back of a truck and disappear down the road bound for its new home in Nowra, leaving me with a horrible sick feeling that I'd never see her again. Nothing was heard of the car for years and years. Not even the sharpest-eyed NSW Healey guys ever spotted it.

I'll let Craig take up the story ...



It is difficult to convey the depth of feeling that the return of a much loved and greatly missed car after half a lifetime's absence can bring about. They're inanimate objects after all but we who love our cars understand that this bald statement misses the point entirely. I'm so grateful to have the old girl back in my care once again and I can't thank Craig enough for planning the whole secretive business of buying the car, having it recommissioned by a Healey restoration firm in Sydney with everything that could rot perish corrode or leak being replaced or rebuilt, trucking it to Brisbane and then spending three weeks finalising the work, attending to those million and one things required to finish awakening an old car from thirty-six years of slumber in a shed, having it registered with the original rego number, and then getting us out of the house so he could slip it into the garage in readiness to lay the greatest stunning surprise on me that I will ever receive.

I was too shaken to drive the car on its "welcome home" whiz around the block. I truly felt a little out of touch with reality so I was content to let Craig do the honours.



That was yesterday. Today I renewed acquaintance with this lovely old Healey with a gentle drive around our suburb. Past memories of my time with her long ago when we were both much younger came rushing back. I'm so happy to have custody of her once again and we'll have more good fun together until at some time in the future when she'll pass safely into Craig's care.