Euro Packard Meet

Posted by Ozstatman On 2011/7/13 5:05:35

Following the return of DavidM and Veronique from their European holiday David forwarded a message about their rally experience and asked if I could load it up on his behalf together with the accompanying pictures. David hasn't cracked the code yet on loading pictures apparently, anyway I'm happy to do it for him.

Euro Packard Meet VIII June 2-5, 2011 Normandy France

We recently had the pleasure of being guests at the Euro Packard meet held in France this year. The various European Packard clubs arrange a meet every 2 years and these have been held in various parts of Europe in the past, it is 16 years since such a rally has been held in France.

The rally this year was organized by the President-Founder of the recently formed Packard Automobile Club de France, Jerome Hardy and along with his small band of helpers they did a superb job attracting entrants from France, Belgium, Holland , Austria, Switzerland , England, United States and Australia. All participants stayed in the same hotel for the duration of the rally in the village of Villadieu les Poeles. We participated with a rental car (Citroen C3) that was dubbed a "Plastic Packard". A number of the cars were driven long distances to the event while others were trailered to the start.

All speeches by Jerome were in French and English, and many of the participants spoke at least some English so conversations were not a problem.

There were 36 entrants with a 1947 limousine brought from US just for the meet,

Jerome told us that he knows of at least 100 Packards in France with about 60 of them on the road.

The Packards on the rally ranged in age from a 1920 Twin Six to 1950, it was particularly pleasing to see 8 pre 1931 Packards participating. The Packards generally performed well with only a few problems. The field was followed at all times by a volunteer mechanic and back up tilt tray truck.

We toured on back roads through small French towns and villages with very little modern traffic and visited castles & chateau's that were many hundreds of years old. The meals were magnificent French feasts with fine food, wine, ambience and camaraderie .

We visited the Northern coast of Normandy, the site of the WW2 allied invasion where a US built cemetery and monument has been built to remember those who died in the liberation of German occupied France.

Quoting from the rally book, "Packard was one of the most popular luxury automobile Marques in France from 1928 to the 50's ". These Packards were almost exclusively imported by the establishment Berbezat and thanks to a great deal of effort by Jerome, we visited the Chateau De La Bourbansais owned by the Berbezat/De Lorgeril family since 1583. The highlight of this visit was an exhibit of Packard memorabilia from the Berbezat business especially assembled for the rally by decedents of the Berbezat family. In the centre of the room was a hand written ledger giving details of all the Packards sold by Berbezat from 1937. I understand that at least one participant was able to find his car listed and learn that it had been purchased new by a famous person.

The next Packard Euro rally will be held in Belgium in 2013.

Click on this link to view the Participants Packards

Please NOTE - The attached photos were taken professionally and are the property of the photographer Xavier de Nombel and are not to be used without approval, the pictures are for sale. Contact: jerome.hardy@packardclub.fr.

Click on these links to view some superb pic's of Packards during the course of the Rally.http://www.classiccarnetwork.eu/2011PackardEuroMeet/PictureXdNLD/EuroPackardMeet-MtStMI-MichelCar.jpghttp://www.classiccarnetwork.eu/2011PackardEuroMeet/PictureXdNLD/EuroPackardMeet-MtStMI-MichelCar.jpghttp://www.classiccarnetwork.eu/2011PackardEuroMeet/PictureXdNLD/EuroPackardMeet-LFGarage-HalleuxCar.jpghttp://www.classiccarnetwork.eu/2011PackardEuroMeet/PictureXdNLD/EuroPackardMeet-Bourbansais-GeraldCar.jpghttp://www.classiccarnetwork.eu/2011PackardEuroMeet/PictureXdNLD/EuroPackardMeet-Bourbansais-GosmeCar.jpghttp://www.classiccarnetwork.eu/2011PackardEuroMeet/PictureXdNLD/EuroPackardMeet-Bourbansais-Cars.jpghttp://www.classiccarnetwork.eu/2011PackardEuroMeet/PictureXdNLD/EuroPackardMeet-Bourbansais-Lorgeril.jpghttp://www.classiccarnetwork.eu/2011PackardEuroMeet/PictureXdNLD/EuroPackardMeet-Bourbansais-Group.jpg

Looks like I'm not much better than David, thought I'd be able to put the pic's directly into the post. So Kev, if you can improve on my feeble attempt, please do so!