The Goa Vintage Car and Bike Festival had great automobiles and even greater stories on display

When have you seen a 1921 Citroën, a 1976

Matador

Tempo and a 1964

Triumph

drive down the streets of Panaji together? Though we spot a bunch of vintage and

classic cars

and bikes around Goa occasionally, it’s rare to find so many at one place at one time! The recently concluded third edition of the Goa Vintage Car and Bike Festival saw over 80 vintage and classic cars and over 50 vintage bikes rally around Panaji until the Miramar circle before they parked behind Old GMC complex. Throughout the day, car collectors, restorers and automobile enthusiasts took time out to admire the exquisite beauties from different cities, and interact with others who share a common interest.
“Goans and people from outside have brought their rare cars, which has added a lot of value to the show,” says Pradeep Naik, the curator and founder of Ashvek Vintage World, Goa’s only automobile museum. He was there with his 1983 Mercedes Benz Limousine and Fiats in different colours — blue, yellow and red. Goa’s business tycoons, Suraj and

Manoj Caculo

displayed their 1921 Citroën, 1923 Fiat and 1951 Ford, while Shrinivas Dempo exhibited his 1961

Cadillac

Fleetwood and 1965 Mercedes Benz. The riot of colours and vintage designs was truly a treat to every car lover!
While a lot of the older cars and bikes are rusting themselves out of existence, here are a few people we met who are restoring and breathing a new life into them.

Eight exquisite cars from Mumbai
Mumbai-based restorer and collectors Viveck and Zita Goenka got some gorgeous drives to the festival, including the rare 1929 Mercedes Nurburg, 1936 Cord and 1973 Ford Mustang which seemed to be the crowd favourites. “My wife felt that we should get some of our nice cars to Goa because a lot of these aren’t seen here, like the Nurburg, the Cord and the Packard, which aren’t easy to spot in Goa these days. At least the last two generations haven’t seen them. So she suggested we take some seven-eight cars to Goa, because she is Goan. We picked up a random selection of cars and got them,” says Viveck.
Talking about his 1962 Mercedes Benz 220SE, he says, “This car belonged to the Chogyals, the rulers of Sikkim, and has changed a few hands before I became the lucky owner. There are just two of these in India. We restored it from complete scratch, to a very high standard today. In fact, any time we take this one to an event, the judges comment that they haven’t seen this type of restoration even in Europe. The same is the case with the Thunderbird. The Nurburg is one of the two or three survivors in the world.”

From scrap to a sturdy truck
Ryan Braganza was there with three of his cars — a 1961 Volkwagen Beetle, VW Bay Window Van and a Hindustan 14 pick-up truck. Talking about the truck which he himself has restored, he says, “The truck was gifted to me in a very bad state because it was lying along the coast and was rusted. It didn’t have a vintage look anymore. So I had to do a lot of mechanical work and work on the body as well.”

A Mumbai-Goa road trip on a 60s Vespa
Father-daughter duo Sanjeev and Sailee Bhiwandkar rode from Mumbai on their colourful 1963 Vespas — a yellow for the former and a red for the latter. They traversed the distance in 10 hours, spread across two days, and rode back along a different route within eight hours. “Both the scooters are restored by my dad. The red has been painted 18 years ago, and the yellow eight years ago. The yellow has won around 10 awards and the red has won 40! We are first-hand owners of both — the yellow was gifted by my grandfather to my grandmother, who passed it on to me, and the red one was gifted to my dad by his uncle,” Sailee tells us.
Sailee, who was the only woman biker there, has beat her own past record of riding from Mumbai to Pune and back, by riding to Goa this time. “The Vespa Spotique (red) is a 1963 limited edition four-speed, which is the only one in India. Usually a lot of people preserve these cars as an asset and do not use it. But my dad is of the belief that a bike needs to be ridden to serve its true purpose. A lot of the people transport the vehicles to Goa, but we decided to ride. Why are we maintaining the scooters so well if we won’t ride?” she asks.

A Goan

mini

that’s been passed down to the third generation
David Menezes, who was there with his 1960 Morris Mini Minor that he recently restored, tells us, “My Mini is a Mark I and one of the oldest in India. It is very special to me as it has been in the family for four generations since new. My grandfather and dad drove it daily and I try to use it almost every other day around my heritage homestay. The car is a great fit and all our guests love it. My nieces who are Gen4, love the car too, and so do my pets.”
He says he fell in love with the car when he drove around in his dads lap. Fast forward to a few years later, the car lay unused in the storeroom. “It was tucked away, waiting to be reborn,” he says about the time he decided to restore it just in time for his wedding. Talking about how he restored the legendary car which he also used as his wedding car, he says, “I’ve had a lot of people ask me what my wife Nicole thinks about my love for the Mini. Well she has begun to love it as much. After all, we did manage to fit her gown in the car. I told her we would get married only once I was done restoring the car and she couldn’t have agreed more.”

Peugeot from the 60s
The only Peugeot at the show belonged to Rui Manuel Costa Araujo. “This car belongs to my father. It was my father’s wedding car, when he got married at 46. I am one of his seven children and decided to restore the car. There were hardly any cars in our village in the 1960s and this car would be used as an ambulance as well. It was used for all purposes in Chicalim,” he says. He restored the car in 2005 and painted it to the exact same colour it originally was. “I love driving this around because it’s very comfortable,” he adds.

The Triumph from Mumbai
A lone 1954 Triumph stood there in all its glory amid vintage Jawas, Lambrettas, Vespas, Yezdis and Mopeds. The proud owner, Jehangir Foroogh, who got it to the show tells us, “It’s a 650 cc bike originally brought from England by a Parsi gentleman. And now I, another Parsi, own it. I’ve fully restored her when I acquired it five years ago. I’ve done short trips to Khandala, Lonavala and Pune along with my group of Parsi riders.”

From Bengaluru to Goa
A group of Classic Mercedes from Bengaluru drove down for the event. Pravin Prakash was there with his 1975 Mercedes Benz W115, Avinash Mercedes Benz S123 (1984) and W201 190D (1986), Lenish Namath with his Mercedes Benz W124 250D, Manjunath Janakiram with Mercedes Benz W124 250D, Vikramaditya Desiappa with Mercedes Benz W124 300D, Shailender with his Mercedes Benz W201 190D and Azrif Rashid with his Mercedes Benz W124 E220.
“We were here the last year with a whole load of different cars. But this year we all wanted to get classic Mercedes cars. So we drove eight cars for 600 kms in one go, with our families. We have cars from 1975 to 1996. We decided to come because it’s a fun event and we feel the positivity,” says Pravin, who drove his 1975 Mercedes Benz W115, before adding, “We don’t have garage queens, we have road runners!”

Goa’s very own Matador
John Jacob was there with his rare 1976 model Matador Tempo which he acquired three years ago in very bad condition. He took three years to restore the vehicle. “I have restored it to how it was when it was brand new. It is the only Tempo in the whole of Goa, and one of the very few in the country of the same shape,” says John. He also got his 1968 Mercedes to the show.

From father to daughter
Dr Alethea Barbosa, who was there with her 1968 Volkswagen Notchback, tells us, “The car belonged to my father when we lived in Uganda. When we came to Goa in 1972, I lost my dad and I started driving the car even before I was of legal driving age. I started using it legally ever since I am 18, and since then, I am the only one driving this car. I can go from Panaji to Mapusa in 20 minutes.”

Meet the brains behind some of these restorations
Mumbai-based Allan Almeida, who hails from Carmona in South Goa has been restoring vintage and classic cars, and modifying 4x4s for a decade now! Though there are times he needs to work for more than 12 hours a day, he takes pride in some of the finest restorations that leaves his workshop to reach their owners, and eventually go on to win awards at several shows. In fact, the 1962 Mercedes 220SE and 1961 Ford Thunderbird that he’s restored has recently been awarded at Cartier Concours de Elegance vintage car show.
He works closely with vintage and classic car collector Viveck Goenka. Allan was the craftsman behind all the eight Goenka cars displayed at the venue. “It’s always good to come home and let people see the restorations we do, because we feel restorations in Goa still have a long way to go and hopefully, this will inspire people,” he says. There was a perfectly restored 1934 Packard, 1949 Cardillac Series 62 and a 1951 Chevrolet Truck among others. “The 1936 Cord has a very futuristic design and art décor for its time. These cars are regularly driven by the owner, unlike many people who treat it as an asset and don’t use it,” he says.
He works on 12-16 cars a year and most of his ground-up restorations are the only one in India. “So there isn’t a question of copying. There’s a lot of research that goes into building each car, which includes seeing pictures or travelling abroad to see the car and interacting with the owners of similar cars so that we can do a perfect job with it here. This is additional work that goes into it apart from building it. Most of the parts aren’t available in the country, so they either have to be sourced from abroad or made in-house,” he says.