Josey from the new café La Caz Creole has an approving smile for Graham's car.
Graham took me for spin along the Esplanade and I understood how good his 1978 Leyland Californian really is.
“It was lying in a mate’s barn for 15 years and it was rusted and needed a major makeover, so he gave it to me, Graham said.
“I’d always promised the wife I’d get her a convertible and that’s all I could afford.
“So I stripped it, every nut and bolt, down to nothing and rebuilt it.”
Graham, 62, had never worked on a car in his life, but he’s a former waterside worker who’s been in the building industry for many years, so he knows how to create things.
Like many, he’s a dedicated local and remembers earlier days when Port Adelaide was a bustling port and he was a wharfie waiting outside the First Commercial Hotel each morning for the tray truck to arrive to take workers to the docks.
“Some days we’d be loading fruit and if we couldn’t get that work we’d be carrying heavy sacks of flour from the mills.
“In Semaphore, Largs and the Port everyone’s so friendly has so many great characters here, and once you get over that bridge you think your home now.
“I’ve always lived here and why wouldn’t you?
“Wherever I’ve travelled around Australia I’m always meeting people from here.
After working on the wharves in the Port, Graham became a building site manager and worked on many big projects in Adelaide.
He’s just finished work on the Adelaide Zoo enclosure for the pandas Wang and Funi, now Adelaide’s biggest tourist attraction.
He was also site manager for the rebuilding of the Wine Underground in the city after it was destroyed in a building fire, and the Elizabeth Aquadome, designed for fun and relaxation.
And that’s what Graham’s glistening black and chrome car is all about.
For car enthusiasts we can tell you that Graham, with some help from his mates, grit blasted the Californian, undercoated it with two-pack epoxy, then traded some building work with a painter for the final shiny coat of black.
“We all worked on each others’ cars and they helped me in fitting twin SU carbs and extractors, bored out from 1000 to 1100, and fitted new brake linings and lines, sourcing most parts from Mini Sports in Queensland.
“The seats were done by two local women motor trimmers and we fitted marine grade carpet.”
The wheels came from Wheel Works in Hindmarsh and the tyres from America and as Graham says, and I can confirm, “it’s running like a dream now.”
While I was talking with Graham along came one of his mates Peter Walsh and he joined us for coffee.
“I’ve found another one in a shed,” said Peter, “and I might do that one up too.
“I call them café cruisers and there’s heaps of them running round Sydney; I saw one on the internet selling for $52,000.”
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