CAMAS — As Donna Habben stared at the 1963 Chevy Impala SS, the sun sparkling off its silver finish, something filled her eyes — love.
“I just love the ’63,” she said. “They have such sexy lines. That’s what distinguishes the ’63 from a ’64.”
She, like the roughly 160 other car enthusiasts who revved their engines at the Camas Car Show Saturday, had a special twinkle in their eyes and lilt to their voices as they told strangers their cars’ stories.
The uniting theme was love.
Habben’s car, after all, is more than just a glimmering beauty with a 454 engine and enough horsepower to keelhaul a rhino. It’s also a reminder for the Washougal resident of her partnership with her husband.
He surprised Habben with the car five years ago, handing her the keys the day before she was scheduled to have surgery. She was working at the Portland tavern she owned when she saw the unmistakable, sexy lines of the car’s hood pull up to the curb. She knew right away it was a ’63 Impala. But she didn’t know — until she ran outside — that her husband was behind the wheel.
When he told her he got it for her, she cried.
“It’s my perfect car,” she said of the vehicle she’s pampered for the past five years.
But with cars, perfection is in the eye of the beholder. There are those who lean toward American muscle cars, and others who gravitate toward European classics. For Bill and M.J. Peden of Brush Prairie, the “perfect” car was also the one of the rarest on display Saturday.
Their yellow, 1951 Allard K2 roadster hails from England, where only 119 were ever built. Today, only 50 of the cars still exist, and they’re considered prized collectibles.
Just how prized is M.J. Peden’s beloved vehicle, a labor of love that took more than a decade to fully restore? Given the choice of selling the house or the car by her husband, M.J. said she didn’t have to think twice.
“I’d sell the house,” she said.
She and her husband have poured money, sweat and hard work into restoring the little roadster. When Bill purchased it in 1993, it came in boxes. Pieces of it were missing. “It was just trashed,” Bill said.
But the mechanically inclined couple spent their spare time putting the car back together. Now, their original $13,000 investment is valued somewhere close to $110,000.
Gary Knopp, from Camas, brought his 1965 Volkswagen Camper Van to the show. Unlike many of the other cars at the show, the green camper, replete with the pop-top for sleeping, hadn’t been refurbished. It was all original, Knopp said.
But had he ever taken it camping?
“Just one time,” he said. “You never want to go too far with it. It might break down.”
Indeed, the Volkswagen Camper Van was never known as the most reliable vehicle on the road. Knopp said he bought it because his son, Alex, had always been enamored with the curvy buses.
Others are, too, Knopp said. Whenever he’s out showing it off, people of a certain age — usually in their 40s — love to peek inside it. Many people have shared memories of spending time in a Volkswagen Camper Van, Knopp said.
Carrie Schulstad, the executive director of the Downtown Camas Association, said she was very happy about the turnout Saturday. In its ninth year, the event was being held on a Saturday for the first time. Money generated from the event will go toward the association and the Treasure House.
“We didn’t know what to expect, whether we’d have more people or less people,” Schulstad said.
In the end, the numbers matched previous years, she said.
