Recently, on a warm Saturday in October, I took the family for an afternoon jaunt in the ‘ol Valiant Wagon. We took a ~ 250-mile trip up into the mountains and high country of PA (which is not hard to do from my location if you travel anywhere to the east.) So we aimed the Torsion Bar-equipped front end vaguely northeast. Read on to find out how this family road trip panned out in a 62-year-old MoPar.
Many of the views from the day’s drive looked like this; US Route 22 heading East and upward in elevation:
PA State Route 53 North just north of Cresson, PA:
Our first stop was for dinner at Black Moshannon State Park, not too far from Beaver Stadium (A geographical reference for those of you who pay attention to college football.):
We packed a grille and some provisions for dinner:
While there, I took the opportunity to gather some Glamour shots…
After our dinner, the sun was hanging low in the sky for another hour or so. This was the view out of the Park on PA State Route 504 South, back toward Phillipsburg, PA. (Please excuse the bugs on the ‘shield.)
One of the best reasons for taking the off-interstate routes is to find new curbside items to document along the way like this rusty but still functioning Chevy C70 Dump truck. Hopefully, more on those in a future write-up if I can find the time:
We arrived at our next State Park, Prince Gallitzin, at the request of my daughter who wanted some ice cream at the Pirates Cove Restaurant.
The Pirates Cove Restaurant in Patton PA, is a summertime favorite and we incorrectly assumed that they would be open until 9 PM like they are in May-August. That assumption was wrong, but we had some time for some fantastic “Golden Hour” pictures and glamour shots:
My daughter wanted to pose with the State Park Sign and the Valiant:
In all, we had a great family outing, covered some ground in the 62-year-old machine, and found some Ice Cream before the end of the nite.
As we frequently road trip in my vintage MoPars, I hope to have some more adventures to write about, but that is all for this one, as it was a quick day trip out and back. As the days keep getting shorter and shorter, I really appreciate the beautiful local and regional scenery before all of the brown settles in for November through March. Fortunately, we have had a spectacular stretch of October weather around these parts in 2024, so as long as it is nice, and dry I will have the vintage MoPars out for drives and road trips!
Gorgeous scenery. Gorgeous car.
Great adventures & love your car! As a kid I thought the Valiants/Darts were cute in a grotesque way; my CC friends have helped enlighten me to their tremendous attributes. My Dad’s last new car was a ’75 Dart, one of the better choices for his budget back then.
Thank you for your kind words.
By ’75 as the Maliese era set in, the MoPar A bodies lost their true intention, as a scrappy lightweight go getter. As they became more throughly broughamified and heavy in ’75 and ’76 I feel they were still good cars, but just less true to their original form.
Those pictures look like they could have been used in a 1962 Plymouth Valiant sales brochure. If someone is going to take a CC-oriented road trip, using a very nice, 1st gen A-body station wagon seems like one of the better ways to do it, simply due to the slant-six/TorqueFlite combo’s anvil-tough reputation.
With that said, I’m a little torn on the taillights. I suppose the 1962 looks a bit better with the Lancer-style lights, but the original ‘cats-eye’ 1960-61 versions are way more distinctive.
The styling on this generation of the Valiant and Lancer is in a word-bizarre. Mechanically they were excellent cars, but their appearance looked like they were styled by a French pastry chef.
Love these, especially the wagon. Yours is a gem. Great shots.
Max. speed: 82.8 mph. Good for you!
Is the engine stock or warmed up a bit?
Beautiful wagon, and scenery. So nice your family is willing to accompany you on such trips.