There’s not much that I can say about the Gathering At The Roc that doesn’t make me sound like they are a paying sponsor of my site. Truth is, they aren’t and I just love the show THAT much.
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This marked the 4th year of the GATR and somehow it gets better every year. The format has remained basically the same, people send in photos of the car that they’d like to register and then get approved or denied, they keep the show curated to fit the “Car Show For The Discerning Gentleman” theme in place and we all gather up in one of the coolest settings ever for a car show, Wooleroc.
Wooleroc was set up on 1925 as a retreat for Phillips 66 founder, Frank Phillips. The official description on their website says : “The ranch is a 3,700 acre wildlife preserve, home to many species of native and exotic wildlife, such as bison, elk and longhorn cattle. Woolaroc is also a museum with an outstanding collection of western art and artifacts, Native American material, one of the finest collections of Colt firearms in the world, and so much more.”
Let’s set the stage, on Friday all of the cars (and a ton that are not in the show) gather up at the host hotel and head out for a 75 mile reliability run. There are some official stops along the way, and it’s through some beautiful scenery, something that you just have to see, especially when it’s got 500 hot rods rolling through it. Later that day, with everyone back at the host hotel there’s a street/parking lot party with a live band, it’s a very good time and I spent most of it catching up with old friends that I haven’t seen in far too long.
Here’s our video from Friday:
Saturday all of the cars head up to Wooleroc. When you get through the gate there’s an old Phillips 66 station set up about an 1/8th of a mile in to the facility. In my part of the world you still see some of these old buildings in small towns here and there. The station was relocated to the grounds some years ago.
A little way past that you roll through a gate and across a cattle guard. Once you cross it, keep your eyes up and open because there is wildlife all around. Bison, elk, longhorn cattle, ostriches, water buffalo, and deer are all within eyeshot as you drive the beautiful grounds into the event. The bison are sometimes a few feet away from you, sometimes standing in the road blocking traffic (as we all found out on the way out on Saturday), and yes, you should stay in your cars and not try to take a selfie with them.
The amount of incredible cars and builders at this show is just jaw dropping. Starting with Jason Smith of Hot Rod Garage (one of the two guys that put on the show), on Friday it was announced that he was the Good Guys GM Iron Builder of the Year, Coby (Church) was in attendance with his 34 Ford which is this year’s Good Guys Hot Rod Of The Year, Andy Leach had the Buick which is this years Good Guys Custom Rod of the Year, Cody Walls had the E-Job which is this year’s Good Guys Custom Of The Year, Bill Ganahl of South City Hot Rods who built Coby’s coupe also built the Good Guys Truck of the Year (Early) and it just won the Grand National Truck Show’s “World’s Most Beautiful Truck” this year and that was also at the show. Plus multiple hot rod of the year contenders, and a couple of former Ridler winners. Add to that you had some of the coolest low buck and high end home built cars also in attendance. It was so great to see some very low buck builds just a few feet from some multiple million dollar builds and both getting equal amount of interest.
See the Video of the show from Saturday here:
All in all the show was amazing, I highly recommend this show to anyone who wants to see high quality cars in a truly unique setting!
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