What is cruising? Your thoughts please

I'm 19, all the kids my age drive rice burners, no cruising and half the chicks already have a tramp stamp when they turn 16.

 

the kids my age suck, all of the white rich preppy kids listen to rap thinking they are ghetto, their parents by them brand new ricers like EVOs and STIs and they think they are fast. It kind of would suck if they did cruise. Somehow we need to bring old school hot rodding back for my generation.

 

Well back in the early 70's , we filled the car up with $5 worth of Sunoco 260 , got a case of beer , put the 8 track on and hit the streets . We would drive up and down the streets looking for the girls and someone to pic on and make some money street racing . Sometimes would stop by the burger joint for a while or the bowling alley then hit the streets again . Had so damn much fun back in the day cruising up and down the streets having some good ole fun ! Those days are long gone and I have no idea what you younger crowds do now . All I ever see is the cars in the Wal mart parking lot with some shitty rap music on and waxing your cars ! WTF is that shit all about ? You haven't got the faintest idea what a Friday or Saturday night cruise was all about . If we didn't due the cruise then we were at the drive-in or the drag strips having fun ! Those were the best times and will never be the same ever again ! The 50's , 60's & 70's were the best times and we had the greatest street fighting cars there ever was !
Damn I really miss those times in history we had . Those were the best times of our life's ! Yes , sometimes is hard to explain what a good cruise really was like unless you were really there at that time !

At least I have all the greatest memories of those times in our lives !

Retro Jim

 

Mid 60s weekend nights on Broadway, Downtown Portland. During the summer I would make one road trip down to Oakland Ca. to visit Friends and cruse 14th street, I think that was it, don"t remember now, that was the 60s.

 

By the way: I met my first ex-wife, (see my avatar), at "Castles" in about '68.

 

Ol' Chuck pretty much sums it up

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When I was in Denver in the 80s, we cruised West Colfax, from Federal or Sheridan past Kipling and back. Always lots to see

 

I've got a lot of good memories of cruising in the late 50's- early 60's {58 to 63]in the Seattle area. The Rainier valley was my spot , most evenings there was allways a good turn out at the XXX on Rainier av. and Empire way. Summer time week ends ,you could
go to Seward Park. There was allways a lot of guys cruising the loop road, there were lots of places to park along the loop rd. to stop and watch the show or wax your car .
Then if you wanted some serious race action , the east bound I-90 tunnels were about a 1/4 mile long , then the shut down area was the Mercer Island floating bridge. I also did the Renton loop from time to time, or head to the Clock drive in in Tacoma.
Now days I only get one good cruise a year, that being the Kingsmen 500 poker run during there annual show in Orting Wa. , number53 coming up on Fathers day week end in 2011.

Thanks for the memories. ............Jack

 

Driving around in circles till you wonder what the hell the point is, then go home and work on your ride.

 

The cruise in Portland never changed up into the '70s as far as I know. My closest friends used to call me back here and say when ya commin' home everybody misses you when we go out cruisin'.

I used to like the ride home we always drove out Burnside up to Russian road and back into the valley. Well I liked the ride out of town but I don't think anyone really enjoyed it when I was driving. Burnside had a few kinks in it and I was usually about 3 sheets in the wind before we headed out.

Nothing has really changed son, the kind of car perhaps. The Sosch kids always had the newest cars that daddy bought and they were always pretty full of them selves. They never really liked getting run into the ground by a "Hood" in a beater made it a little hard to get a race.

As far as bringing Old School back to the younger generation that's what you are doing. Get out there and rip 'em a new one.

 

Well the kind of car has changed, so has the music, the styles and my generation doesn't cruise just plays PS3, XBox or is on facebook then ocassionally stop light races with there ricers and call every american car a "redneck car"

My 92 S10 with a 4 cyclinder out runs most of them.
We need an American Graffiti for my generation to get them into cruising.

 

I'd offer to help but when the young folks see me they think look its an old dude in a lame old car, or whatever the current verbage for that is.

Here's the deal my young friend, be a leader not a follower. Do your own thing and don't let the rest of the fish in the stream get in your way. You will almost always find someone who has wrenched with their grandad or the like and appreciate what you are doing, you may even inspire them.

There's a girl that goes to school with my grandaughter. They were talking one day and the girl found out that my girl helps with the old cars whenever her homework and grades are up to par. The other girl started turning wrenches with her grandad again. The two girls have become friends and seem to be a good influence on each other.

Now when you get one screwed together go find yourself a tuner guy and blow his damned doors off. its a good thing to do for them.

 

We used to cruise 4th Street in Santa Rosa in the early eighties. Then when they shut that down, we moved on down the highway to Petaluma and cruised the same boulevard they filmed American Graffiti on. It was always a great way to waste a few hours, checking out the girls and the cars. We cruised in everything from a '72 Chevy Luv. '65 GMC ranch truck, '81 Camaro, or a '78 GMC 3/8 ton w/454. But I would usually take my ol' '72 V8 Vega to terrorize the local hot rodders.

 

We cruised the 'Fax in Denver/Lakewood in the 80's. It was HUGE. Yeah, you would see Chevettes, Pintos, any Camaro you could imagine, but hidden amongst the steel were really great cars. I had a '63 Comet 2-dr hardtop with a healthy 289 and felt I was on the fringe of the normal.
My pal had a beautiful '65 Galaxie and Jesse had a Falcon Futura. We would park at Lakewood Fordland and watch the mayhem.

 

Oddly enough, a remnant of my cities downtown cruise scene lasted in to the late 90's when i was in high school. I got to cruise my 1957 Dodge Coronet up and down Nevada, and once it had the 392 i won the occasional race between lights. The cops didn't really care for a while, however culturally it was a joke to most of the people in the city, and when the police started to care it died. It became uncool, and every one moved out to Academy and the Fast and Furious kids took over and people started to get hurt.

 

I cruised back in 1996 with my 78 Trans Am,we'd all meet up at the Pizza hut where all the other racers and wannabe racers would hang out.b.s brag and sometimes after enough shit talking there'd be even a race or two.

 

I don't know if cruising happened the way everybody is saying it did, or if nostalgia makes people remember it more fondly than it actually happened, but if ti was anything like people say it was, I'm jealous. It was outlawed in my town my the time I got to high school, and it doesn't take long for kids to figure out something else to do on the weekends. Too bad.

 

who ya callin "old" sheeses

 

American Graffiti IS for your generation. Real close to how it was back in the '60s--at least in the Midwest---watch the movie. It's catching.

 

Umm Steve!.......shhh!

 

Down here, on the gold coast, we call that "trollin'"

 

Typical night cruising in Fort Collins, circa 2001-2004 (my high school years):

My car club (mixed group, ricers, late model muscle and a classic or two) meets up in the outskirts of the old Wal-Mart parking lot. We stand around, bullshit about cars and chicks, do a couple burn outs and show off our latest mods/ new parts. Everybody gets board so we decide to go on "a lap". We all drive in a pack up the main street, College Ave (6 lanes) to Old Town (other side of town, about 10 miles each way), sometimes going stoplight to stoplight with another hot car. We make a couple stops and chill at the known hangout spots on the way (taco bell lot, kmart lot, ect, I think there were at least 6 or 7) looking for a race or some honey who wants to go for a ride, then head back to the Wal-mart lot and start it all over. (BTW, all real racing was done outside of town, on deserted roads) Not uncommon for us to do 10-20 "laps" a night. Man, I miss those days...

 

Believe it or not there was a time when good looking chicks used to hitch hike. And this was when no bra, tank tops and hip hugger jeans (that were worn through in all the right places) were in style. So, yes, strange chicks would jump in your car.

 

We used to cruise Main st in Peoria,Il when I grew up in the 80s. We would DRIVE up and down the street and check out each others vehicles. You would stop and park ONLY to get something to eat or drink. Other than that, it was MOVING. Blocked the road and ate gas but it was AWESOME!

 

getting some pops and just driving around with no place to go. kind of wasting gas just for the sake of driving. it always helps when there is some scenery too. and places to burn your tires off and make some noise. few stops on the way

 

Damn I can't believe this thing is still alive. I don't recall any drama either. Maybe that's a good thing?

 

The way we do it is....
designate a meet place and time, then after an hour or two, we just caravan through city streets at a slower than normal pace. Afterwards we all end up at some food place and take over that parking lot for a couple of hours. Pretty simple = big fun!

 

driving any car any vintage (not allowed as much)with a bunch of people(groups of people not allowed too much)to a spot where others gathered ( not allowed much)like a drive-in / resturant -/ large parking lot( long gone,or frowned upon by owners, illegal by modern tresspassing laws)to spend a few hours or the whole evening conversing face to face (who has time or know's how now?)then do it again tomorrow and so on ..(after the first few gather the local officials move ya or ticket ya)

now criuse nights are meet, sit, stay and maybe go somewhere else ... in a small group
we are at least 3 decades away from true unhassled cruising....
Do not get me wrong I am not against it but its hard to get to be the way it was ...

heck even being without a cell phone makes a evening cruise night different...

have yet to see a cruise event cell phone free...

actally have had a humorous time listening to partial cell phone conversations go by while sitting at BTTF'S ..

 

Cruising back in the '60's was for one thing only, picking up girls and hopefully getting laid.
All the rest is bull shit.