I just got this in from Robin M, our unofficial Saab Ambassador for the UK and organiser of the Swedish Day UK car show last weekend.

He just prepared this for Saab Driver magazine over there but given that most of us don’t get Saab Driver, I feel pretty sure that the wider audience will appreciate it too.

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As you know I organized a Swedish Day here in the West Country at Haynes International Motor Museum, Sparkford. The day was a fantastic success with everybody commenting on what a great day they had.

The gates to the museum opened just before 9am and we got down to getting the party tents erected. A few of the early arrivals helped and within the hour we were ready. By 10am a good dozen Saabs had turned up and we started to park then in the designated area that Haynes had set aside for us.

By 11.30 we had a very nice gathering of Saabs and then the first Volvo turned up, greeted with a cheer from the Saab owners. After all it was a Swedish Day. The Volvo was a very smart gold C70.

During the day we had a total of 41 different cars turn up. A couple of Saabs did turn up as visitors to the museum so were invited to park with us. It was great to talk to so many enthusiasts.

The oldest car was a very beautifully kept 1968 Volvo 144 from a local man here in Yeovil. The newest car, or I should say cars, were a pair of Saab 9-3 Turbo X’s, both picked up earlier this week. One an estate and the other a saloon. A visitor from Germany on holiday in the West Country came along to the event too, in his Volvo V40.

What’s the collective noun for a group of black turbos?

The Saabs and Volvos came from many places in the UK. Kent, Devon, Dorset, Hampshire, Wiltshire, Gloucestershire, West Midlands, Oxfordshire, West Sussex and here in Somerset.

Almost all the Saabs from the 99 & 96 to the newest models were on view. You will see a gallery of all those who entered at www.swedishday.co.uk. I hope I didn’t miss anybody out.

The other attraction of being at Haynes was the Museum. Everybody who signed their car in received a couple of tickets to get in the museum at a reduced rate. Almost everybody took a visit to enjoy the great cars within the Museum. The children had the play park as well, go-karts, diggers as well as the wooden fort/climbing frame. None of them looked bored.

During the day there were two judging competitions going on. One was named “The Most Admired” and was sponsored by Dave and Wendy from the “Designs on Something” embroidery company. Each entrant was given the task of choosing their Most Admired car at the show. The second was “Best in Show”, sponsored by Peter Swann from “The GB Motor Book Company” As Pete said it was very difficult to choose one as there were a great many “Best” cars, so he decided to ask himself, Which car would I like to travel home in?

The results for Most Admired were, 1st, David Dallimore with his Saab 99 Turbo in black & 2nd, Mark Smith with a Saab 99L in white. The Best in Show award went to Isabel Rankin in her Saab Classic 900 Convertible in red. You can see pictures of the winners at www.swedishday.co.uk.

I would like to thank everybody for supporting this event in its first year, the helpers, the two sponsors mentioned above, Tim and Haynes Museum for the location, Cheryl at Saab GB for arranging the banners and flags, my friends Simon, Pete & Alex for the constant support, the internet forums and trohattansaab.net and of course, my wife Kerry and daughter Azabeth. But the biggest thank you goes to all the owners of those lovely Saabs and Volvos that came along on the day.

See you next year, Sunday the 26th April sounds like a good date.

Robin.

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As I mentioned in snippets yesterday, it’s events like this and enthusiasts like Robin who make the motoring world go ’round. It’s not something that’s unique to Saab, but it’s noteworthy all the same.

There’s a gallery at the Swedish Day UK website (linked above) and there’s also 70+ photos at Flickr for you to peruse and there’s some brilliant cars in there, from Turbo X’s to Carlssons and V4s, and the odd Ovlov too, of course. It was called Swedish Day after all

Congratulations on a great event and all you UK Saabers, slot April 26 2009 into your calendar.