LARGEST COLLECTION OF CLASSIC JAGUARS EVER IN SPAIN
3.5.2017.- After 18 months of planning The Big One 2017 actually happened. A joint event between The Jaguar Enthusiasts Club, Spain, The Jaguar Enthusiasts Club, South of France, plus some very enthusiastic members from the JEC in the UK. The result was 100 cars, but as a result of 3 breakdowns, only 97 fabulous Jaguars cleaned and polished to “within an inch of their lives” actually made it with 201 very enthusiastic Jaguar owners. The main event involving everybody took place on Saturday 22nd April and Sunday 23rd April 2017 but many of the participants took two or three days or more to travel to and from their home to the event in Parador de León in Northern Spain.
Cars and owners came from all over Spain, France and the UK and finally congregated at the fabulous Parador de León Hotel. This is Paradors flag ship 5 star hotel, a stunning 16th Century Military Headquarters that has been converted into a glorious luxury hotel. On the way up many members from The Costa Blanca region stopped off at Segovia to take the chance of seeing this fantastic World Heritage City. Members from the UK came from as far as Plymouth, Lancashire and North Wales with some round trips of around 3,500 miles for those who took the scenic routes over many days, a special thank you to them.
Special permission had been granted by Leon Town Hall to park this outstanding collection of Big Cats on the amazing St. Marco’s square in front of the hotel. To see these wonderful cars in such a fabulous location made “an old man ” very happy, what an amazing sight. I am not going to try and mention all the cars, there were so many that deserved a special mention but, to do them justice would take up too much room in this article. If you want to see just some of them, visit our web site www.jec-spain.com and visit the Events pages and the Gallery pages where you can see examples of “just the best motors in the world”!
On the Saturday evening we all gathered for pre dinner drinks in The Cloisters accompanied by two amazing classical guitarists. This was a “Masked Affair”, something I did wonder if people would join in, I should not have worried, only four people came without a mask, some of the creations were incredible. The Grand Ball was held in one of the medieval halls. A selection of exquisite “tapas” starters then either veal, hake, pork or vegetarian options for the main course. This sumptuous meal was accompanied with some stunning local wines. Dessert and coffee was preceded by the Grand Draw, prizes consisted of 5 cash prizes starting at 500.00 Euros for the first prize. A prize was also awarded for the best mask, this was won by Andrew Honour, a very worthy winner with his classic Venetian Mask. Each table was issued with an envelope for a Charity donation, I am delighted to announce that that collection made 1,666.00 Euros, when this was added to the 548.00 Euros raised in other ways it made a total of 2,214.00 Euros which will be donated to Cancer Research UK. After the final announcements, music and dancing continued until the early hours.
Sunday started leisurely, breakfast then “meet The Mayor” at 11:00 Hrs. “Start your engines” was called at 11:30 and nearly 100 glorious Jaguars snaked through the beautiful city of Leon with the help of our own Police escort on our way to Villafranca de Bierzo, 138km away. The Big Cats cruised out of the town and into the Spanish countryside on their way to another Parador hotel in Villafranca, where a very special cocktail lunch “posh tapas” lunch had been organised in the gardens. 21 courses of exquisite local delicacies again with fabulous local wines. That brought the organised parts of the event to a close. A closing announcement was made then people made their own way back to Leon in their own time.
May I take this opportunity to offer a very special thank you to all those that attended, I know many of you travelled many hundreds of kilometres to attend this event. A very special thank you to Mike Horlor, JEC Vice Chairman for the help he provided promoting the event in the UK. Special thanks to Chris Park and Tim Sankey from JEC South of France, without their help and support The Big One would not have been such a tremendous success. As always a big thank you to Ian McMenemy, our dedicated Events Director for all his help and his hard work organising our normal events which allowed me the time to conceive and organise this event. And lastly a very special thank you to Patricia Palau in Parador Hotels who helped make the whole thing possible.
The JEC in Spain is organised by Eric Arnold and Ian McMenemy. Eric can be contacted by email or by phone on 609931647 or alternatively check out the JEC Spain website. Our Events Director, Ian McMenemy can be contacted by email.
Source: Eric Arnold
Photographs: Eric Arnold
