LIHU‘E — If it was round, rolls and could transport someone, it was probably on display Saturday at the All Wheels Expo at the Vidinha Stadium parking lot. “I think I’ll go look for a new car,” said Placido Valenciano,
LIHU‘E — If it was round, rolls and could transport someone, it was probably on display Saturday at the All Wheels Expo at the Vidinha Stadium parking lot.
“I think I’ll go look for a new car,” said Placido Valenciano, a Kaua‘i Interscholastic Federation football official who arrived ahead of the football game he was officiating.
“I came early because I knew the car show was going on, so now I’ll go look for something new before the game.”
John Gillespie of King Auto Center had a new set of wheels.
“This is the 2013 Dodge Dart,” Gillespie said. “It just came in Friday and we cleaned it up so we could get it in the show.”
The Dodge Dart is the resurrection of the popular car sold back in the muscle car era. It is now available in a wide range of five different models with three different engine choices and accessories, filling the niche left by the departure of the Neon.
Priced from the launching point of other gas sippers, domestic or imported, the Dart is just now starting its shipping, and the pair that was on display Saturday shows motorists what American auto manufacturers can do with compacts.
Ed Justus of the event organizing committee said there were three football games taking place starting at 3 p.m., assuring an almost guaranteed attendance for the event which featured four bands, three emcees and at least a dozen competitors vying for the Best in Show.
“You have to learn how to do the bicycles before you can move on to that kind of cars,” Wendy Van Giesen of Specialty Balloons told a pair of Special Olympics Kaua‘i athletes who boasted their Bicycling Skills 123 certificates.
The Special Olympics athletes, hosting their pre-registration for Aug. 26’s The Ride this weekend at Kukui Grove Center, were participating in the bicycle rodeo hosted by State Farm Insurance with help from the Key Club of Kaua‘i High School members and Tommy Noyes of the Kaua‘i Path.
But activity was not limited to bicycles, specialty cars, trucks and skateboards. Members of the Garden Island Renegade Rollerz, an all-woman roller derby program, had its members skating around, cruising and inspecting the food vendors in search of lunch.
“We recently won the Best of the Islands bout on the Big Island,” said Miss-Ile. “We have another Best of the Islands bout coming up in O‘ahu and maybe in October, we’ll host a Neighbor Island team. This is GIRR’s third anniversary so we have to do something special.”
Koby Smith, 3, did not have to utter a word as he gazed at the vehicles. The awed expression in his face did all the speaking.
“He’s already asking for a Junior Dragster,” said Kerrilyn Villa of the Garden Isle Racing Association, host of the monthly drag race series, while browsing through the fleet of parked motorcycles. “He’s even got the shirt for drag racing.”
J.C. Crouch, manager of the Kaua‘i Harley-Davidson, said they recently acquired the Kawasaki line of motorcycles and all-terrain vehicles when Garden Island Motorsports closed recently.
“We’re having some of the Harleys on display this weekend when the Special Olympics Kaua‘i does their pre-registration for The Ride,” Crouch said. “And the highway is better so people have an easier time to come visit the showroom.”
Justus said the idea for the All Wheels Expo started in 2010 when Talk Story Bookstore hosted a free “Blast from the Past: Rockin’ Fifties Festival” with 50s themed music, games, classic cars and motorcycles.
Due to the success of that event, his wife Cynthia suggested growing the event to “everything wheels.”
Through the help of the auto dealerships, the car clubs, motorcycle enthusiasts, the Kaua‘i United Way, Melinda Uohara, Garden Island Security, 420AirBrush, Kaua‘i Kustom Sounds, Grove Farm, Mark Nellis and many others, the result was a wheeled extravaganza.
• Dennis Fujimoto, photographer and staff writer, can be reached at 245-3681 (ext. 253) or dfujimoto@ thegardenisland.com.
