RE: Gray Market Cars

[Mark Nelson <mnelson@brls.com>]

I'm sure some of you are aware of this, but for those who aren't, about
6 or 7 years back, Bill Gates and his partner Paul Reuben both bought
959's out of Germany.  They had them shipped out here (illegally) in a
Cargo ship, where they were kept in the hull in a large sea container.
They were caught ~10 miles off the US coastline, and the cars were
confiscated.  Obviously someone squealed, and the cars, to my
understanding, are still kept in some government warehouse in the Bay
Area.

The only LEGAL 959's in the US belong to Vasek Polak who is a legitimate
collector, but he cannot legally drive the cars on public streets.  It
took him 2 1/2 years to get the cars over here (2 or 3 of them I
believe)!

Don't ya just love big brother!

Anyway, I still remember sometime back when gray market cars were coming
into the US  As I remember my Dad brought quit a few gray market Porsche
930 Turbos over in the early 80's.   Too bad you can't do it anymore
though.  BTW Porsche still does the European delivery program.  You can
take delivery of your US spec car and drive it in Europe while on
Vacation.  Whenever you are ready to go back, Porsche ships the car to
the US (to either their North Carolina import facility, or the one here
in Reno, Nevada), fully details it, and you can pick it up just about
wherever you like.  Motor Trend did a full article on the whole Porsche
European Delivery Program last year, when they did their long term
roadtest of a bright yellow Carrera 4 (drool).

Regards,

Mark Nelson

'87 5KTQ (For Sale)
'91 CQ (building for SCCA pro-rally)