Health & Fitness
Gearhead for a Day: Visiting the Blackhawk Automotive Museum
One was a car from 1909, another had "bat wings" that made me think of early sci-fi vehicles.
Attention, car lovers! I have a museum you’re going to love. The Bay Area is a wonderful place to live (or visit) if you enjoy museums. In fact, even in the age of the Internet, there are so many museums in the area, it is easy to overlook the smaller sites that house some really neat stuff. Over the weekend, I had the opportunity to check out one of these smaller museums: the Blackhawk Automotive Museum in Danville.
I’m one of those people who thinks old cars look cool, and could maybe identify what decade the car is from. Oh, and I love to watch the British show Top Gear, too. But I am by no means a car expert or aficionado of any kind, so when I say I thought the BAM was incredibly fun, you better believe it!
The whole museum showcases about 80-90 classic cars in two main galleries. A small store is on the first floor to the left of the gallery. But once I stepped into the first gallery, all thoughts of shopping went out of my head. I stepped into the dark room filled with gleaming, absolutely beautiful, automobiles and couldn’t stop staring. In front of each car is a small pedestal with a few paragraphs of information—nothing too overwhelming but enough to tell me what I’m looking at and what makes it special.
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Just when I thought it couldn’t get any better, I walked up to the second floor, which had even more unique examples of automotive history. One was a car from 1909, another had “bat wings” that made me think of early sci-fi vehicles. By the end, I found myself wanting to stop and take pictures of each car I came across, and wishing I had some profound automotive knowledge to proclaim as I exited the building. Alas, I’m still just an average girl who thinks cars are cool. But for an afternoon, I got to stand in awe of some great automotive history.
The Blackhawk Automotive Museum is located at 3700 Blackhawk Plaza Circle, Danville, CA. They can be reached at (925) 736-4818 or www.blackhawkmuseum.org. The museum is open Wednesday thru Sunday, 10am-5pm. Admission is $10 for adults, $7 for students/seniors, and free for children under 6.
