2020 Events

Home of the So Cal Mets

2020 Events

November 15th

Cruise to Ed Hawks Metro Shop in Los Alamitos

Sunday November 15th So Cal Metters Ken Conner, Tony Bilotti, Marcia Jones, Cindy &Bill Harris, Our President Ronnie Bauman and Judy, Chris DiTomasso, Mike Dahlberg, Matthew Gordon and Pete & Elle Brasee were welcomed to Ed Hawks Metro shop by Ed & Shawney Hawk. Ed and Shawney are old friends from the Metropolitan Club of California LTD.

Ed has been working on Metropolitans at his shop for sometime and is getting ready to move out. He invited So Cal Mets to pick through lots of metro parts he has and wants to thin out. A lot of us left with needed or wanted treasures from his stock pile.

After having a great time at Eds Met shop we headed out for a little cruise to Seal Beach and Long Beach with our final stop at The California Pizza Kitchen on PCH and 2nd Street for lunch. It was a nice day to get out with the Mets since a lot of our plans have been canceled due to................

Pulling into Eds shop

We're there

Looking through Eds treasures. Ed is the gentleman first on the left.

Hood props, window hardware, trim pieces..............

Electrical parts , gauges, and other assorted goodies!

Steering linkage, drive shafts, dashes and a project car.

A couple of Eds beautifull finished products out back

Driving down cute little Main Street in Seal Beach

More Main Street Seal Beach

Looking down Seal Beach pier at the end of Main St.

Right turn onto Ocean Ave. Heading for Alamitos Bay. Seal Beach

Pier in the background.

Driving through Alamitos Bay parking for some sightseeing

More Alamitos Bay. Sorry about the sideways picture.

The photographer and the driver are the same guy.

Nice photo stop with the Mets

Ronnie and Judy were very thoughtful and brought two kinds of

cupcakes to celebrate Ken and Marcias Birthdays both this week.

Our final stop for lunch

At the Pizza Kitchen we were all crammed into this tent to

protect us from any flying Corona Virus germs.

Yes indeed we were safe here!

I have always listed our outings and events oldest at the bottom and newest at the top. I mistakenly reversed the order of things this year. I'm going back to the original format. Older at the bottom and newest on top with the July outing. Jan-Feb-May and June outings are below in that order.

Cruise to Sherman Gardens and Library

Corona Del Mar

August 29 2020

Saturday 8-29-20 So Cal Metters took a ride to The Sherman Gardens and Library in Corona Del Mar Ca. Metters that enjoyed the day were new member Byron Robinette from Yorba Linda, Marcia Jones, Cindy Harris, Ken Conner, Tony Bilotti and Mark Weitzman. Mark met us at the Gardens driving a beautiful blue 5.0 Mustang. There's nothing wrong with his newly restored Met but it's a long way for a Met to travel. The rest of us driving Mets started out from Marcias house in Fountain Valley. We took Pacific Coast Hwy. south from Marcias to Newport Beach/Corona Del Mar to the gardens. After admiring the gardens we went to lunch at Ruby's right up PCH about a mile. We all had a great conversation with a great lunch. The Metropolitans in Ruby's parking lot got a lot of attention and that's always half the fun!

Click here to find out more about the gardens and other things about Sherman Oaks, Henry Huntington, Hollywood and other interesting history.

https://thesherman.org

Byrons-Cindys-Marcias and Tonys

Kens is next to the 'Brand X' sorry I missed it

Going in

Cindy with an interesting story

Masked Metters in the gift shop

"Hey, isn't that you behind those Foster Grants!"

The Mets at Ruby's

Click for Garden Videos

Cruise to and through Palos Verdes

July 25th 2020

Our last cruise outing was coastal and we ventured south to San Clemente. Our July cruise was also coastal but we headed north led by our member Jeff Gordan to Palos Verdes. Jeff grew up in the area and came up with a beautiful route around the Palos Verdes Peninsula. Ken led us from his house in Huntington Harbor to our meeting place with Jeff & Donna in Palos Verdes.

So Cal Metters on this ride were Jeff Gordan and his Wife Donna, Leah & John Perrotti with their little Pooch Morgan, Cindy & Bill Harris, Nancy & Patrick Halbert, Marcia Jones, Ken Conner and Tony Bilotti.

The weather was good and the scenery was great.

Through Belmont Shores/Long Beach

Going over the Vincent Thomas bridge in San Pedro

Down the bridge into San Pedro/Palos Verdes

This is where we met Jeff, Donna and Horses

Through beautiful Palos Verdes

Pulled over for a shot of the Mets with South Bay L.A. behind

Going back the way we came to Malaga Cove for lunch

Malaga Cove parking and Met admirers

Lunch at the Yellow Vase

Spotted this 'Thing' at Malaga Cove

Cindy & Bill

Nancy & Patrick

John, Leah and Morgan

Ken

Marcia

Tony

Going south through Lomita heading home down Pacific Coast Hwy.

with Long Beach in the background

Cruise to The Queen Mary

Saturday January 25th

Saturday January 25th we took a cruise to the Queen Mary in Long Beach.

Before the cruise we met at Ken & Judy Conners house in Huntington Harbor to make cruise plans for this year.

It seems every time we show up at the Conners, Judy has a game or goody bag. This time we got both! Because Chinese New Year was being celebrated that day she had little pouches with Chinese candy bars and little red envelopes with Rats and Chinese that I can't read. This is the year of the Rat in China I guess. But in all of the pouches there were two crispy Dollar bills because parking at Shoreline Village is two bucks. Then, the game was. Two of the envelopes also had coins that got you a special prize! There was a dime in mine and I got the coolest little magnets that look like they are made from old license plates that spell out MET! The Conners out do themselves every time, Thanks again!

After we filled out the calendar for 2020 everybody at the meeting except Kim Dominguez and Mark Weitzman fired up the little cars for the cruise. Marks Met is in the paint shop and Kim had to be somewhere else.

So Cal Metters on the cruise were President Ronnie Bauman and his Judy, Ken Conner and Judy, Tony Bilotti with Chris Di Tommaso, Nancy & Patrick Halbert, Mike Dahlberg and Paul VanWig driving a real nice Bugeye Sprite.

We stopped for a picture at a great spot in Huntington Harbor then we took off up Pacific Coast Highway to Second St. in Long Beach where we headed west to the Queen Mary for pictures and Shoreline village for lunch. The weather was OK. The lunch was great and the company was terrific!

Us in front of the back of the houses

Six Loyal Subjects coming out to see the Queen

At Shoreline Village

Paul--Nancy&Patrick--Tony--Mike--Judy&Ken--Ronnie&Judy Chris is hiding behind the camera : )

Cruise through Orange Park Acres

The Hilbert Museum of California Art

Lunch at the Santa Fe Train Station Ruby's

February 29th 2020

February 29th we met at Mike and Kim Dahlberg's house in Tustin for our February outing. So Cal Metters were Mike Dahlberg, Cindy Harris, Ken Conner and Tony Bilotti.

The first part of our trip was a cruise through Orange Park Acres in Orange California. Orange Park Acres is an equestrian community of huge houses on one acre lots.

After a ride through the horse property we went down the hill to the Hilbert Museum of California Art.

The Hibert Museum is an offering of Chapman University made possible through a generous grant from Mark and Janet Hilbert. You can find out more at WWW.HILBERTMUSEUM.COM

After browsing the museum we walked across the parking lot to one of our favorite Ruby's diners in the old Santa Fe Train station in Orange. The fun thing about this Diner is that there is actually a metro link depot on the patio in front. Lunch inside or out offers views of Metro Link trains picking up and dropping off passengers and freight trains wizzing by.

On our way to Orange Park Acres

This seemed like a good picture spot

And yet another KODAK moment

On our way down the hill in Orange

Our final destination- Ruby's Diner in front on the tracks and

The Hilbert Museum behind

The Museum Entrance

Inside the Museum

Offerings from past and present exhibitions

And what art museum would be complete without a painting

of 'In & Out Frys!

And then lunch at the train station

Ken, Mike and Cindy behind Cindy's Met

The car next to Mikes Met moved and Tony took the spot

Going to have another great lunch at Ruby's

So that's what we did in February. Another great time with the Mets!

Saturday May 16th

Our first cruise since February

(Virus Lockdown)

I'm going to use our Cruise Director Marcia Jones' write up on this. I couldn't have said it better.

Good afternoon Metters!

A big THANK YOU, to those who were brave enough to venture out and participate in this event. We all had a wonderful time on Saturday thanks to a great route planned by Mike Dahlberg. He actually printed out a copy of the route for each of us. Everyone was happy to get out, drive and get some fresh air. We had twists and turns that took us through many beautifully tree-lined streets and beautiful houses. There were even some people on horseback along the way who admired our cars as much as we admired their beautiful horses! A special thanks to Chris Di Tomasso who let us meet at her house and see all the 'neato' things she has inside her home. We didn't need the museum, she has one filled with all kinds of fun and interesting things, creatively displayed in every room.

We wound mostly through the streets of Orange, Santa Ana and I think there was a little Tustin in there too. We had a fun 'go round' of the circle in downtown Orange where I think we circled around about 5 times, giving us a chance to get all our Mets in the circle going around together at one time! We definitely stopped foot traffic along the streets with people looking at all of the variation of colors we had of our Mets. Participants were Ronnie Bauman, Ken Connor, Tony Bilotti, Mike Dahlberg, Chris Di Tomasso, Kim Dominguez, Nancy and Patrick Halbert, Bill and Cindy Harris, Sue, Jeff and Noodles Garrett and Marcia Jones who brought her sister Chris who is visiting from Las Vegas.

We ended the cruise with a visit to Sonic Burger in Santa Ana where we ordered food from the food choices board, right from our cars. Our order was then brought to us by car hops. At one point we had taken up all 8 parking spaces in front of the restaurant with two having to go to the other side. That didn't stop us though as at the end of the day we managed to squeeze the other two in for a group photo.

Marcia

VP/Cruise Director

Meeting at Chris's house

Going through Orange to Orange Park Acres horse property

Greetings from the Horse Riders

Through Villa Park to Old Orange

The traffic circle in old Orange Plaza-Lets get those Metros in a circle

Cruising through the beautiful Floral Park neighborhood of Santa Ana

Going down historic Main Street in Santa Ana

We all went to Sonic Drive In for lunch with carhops!

One little, two little, three Metropolitans

four little, five little, six Metropolitans

Seven little, eight little, nine Metropolitans

Ten Metropolitan Cars!

Just Sayin

June 28 2020

Cruise to San Clemente

We managed another cruise in June. We went to San Clemente for a ride and lunch.

The weather started out drizzley but was perfect by the end of the cruise. : ) Metters who braved the 'June Gloom' were Mike&Kim Dahlberg, Bill & Cindy Harris, Ken Conner, Kim Dominguez, Chris Di Tommaso and Tony Bilotti.

Chris & Tony met at Mike & Kims house in Tustin. Mike had the route and was the leader. We left Mikes house to pickup Kim Dominguez at her house in Irvine. Then we headed for Laguna Beach to meet with Ken and Bill&Cindy. We cruised through Laguna Beach and Dana Point on our way to San Clemente for lunch at the San Clemente Ruby's Diner.