Engines revved, hoods popped and crowds gazed Saturday as the 2018 Woodward Dream Cruise took over one of metro Detroit's major traffic arteries. The partly-cloudy skies and warm weather made for ideal conditions as sports cars, hot rods, antiques and more drew crowds along Woodward Avenue between Ferndale and Pontiac. The annual event drew as many as 1.5 million people and 40,000 classic cars. In addition to traditions such as Mustang Alley — a line of Ford Mustangs new and old parked along 9 Mile in Ferndale — a number of off-beat automotive enthusiasts joined the parade of shiny, waxed fenders and rumbling exhaust pipes. Among them: the classic hearses and ambulances with the Professional Car Society. The international group brought its annual meeting, including about 100 people with their cars, to this year's Dream Cruise. It meant more "Ghostbusters"-style vehicles in the mix than perhaps ever before. Also seen were an upside-down van, a Coca-Cola-themed convertible with a large, open umbrella, and a golf cart customized to look like a classic car with little headlights and flame decals. More on 2018 Woodward Dream Cruise: Your guide to the Dream Cruise this weekend Is that a hearse at the Woodward Dream Cruise? How businesses cash in on Dream Cruise See top car designers' art before Dream Cruise 5 best places to watch the Dream Cruise<doc-sep>The Woodward Dream Cruise is Pure Michigan. Rich Lytle’s rolling recliner is pure Dream Cruise. So is a dad explaining an automotive camel to his kids, and a Rolls Royce with a trunk full of toy sharks, and just about everything else associated with a long, loud, deliciously Metro Detroit day. Maybe you could see some of it somewhere else, but you wouldn’t see all of it in the space of a few miles. Lytle of Warren parked his custom motorized scooter on the corner of Cambourne and Woodward in Ferndale. He mounted a recliner on the scooter, fixed a cooler to the back, and rolled through Ferndale before finding a spot to post up. Thinking you might want something like it for next August? The chair is for sale, he said — even though “I usually have the best seat.” Ever wonder if the Joker really got away after the Batmobile lost its wheel? Well, wonder no longer as the Dark Night apparently got a Polaris Slingshot and was seen chasing his nemesis down Woodward near College Street in Ferndale. Elsewhere, Jeff Taylor of Northville was sharing his expertise — and more important, his enthusiasm — with his 9-year-old son. First he took Brady to the forward end of a Chevrolet El Camino parked on Old Woodward in Birmingham, which was closed to traffic south of Maple. “It looks like a car in front and a truck in back,” Taylor said. “Isn’t that cool?” Brady agreed that it was. “That’s the experience I want to share with him,” said Taylor, a middle school science and math teacher who uses car concepts like brakes and friction in the classroom. “Both of his grandfathers are car guys, too, so he’s hooked. He’s in.” Taylor’s teal 1992 Camaro was parked down the block. He bought the car with his dad when he was 17, and it has finally aged into officially being a historic vehicle. The Camaro carried Taylor and his wife, Jennifer, to their high school prom. “You can go and buy a $70,000 Corvette,” he said, “but you can’t duplicate that,” any more than you can copy the glee of a car guy and a car kid surrounded by hoopla and history. Peter Kohnken of Highland Township arrived at Dream Cruise by himself, but he’s a kid at heart. A mildly delinquent kid. Kohnken has a sticker on the rear bumper of his car: “Live simply so that others may simply live.” The car is a maroon and taupe 1957 Rolls Royce, and above the bumper was an open trunk full of stuffed sharks singing “One Way or Another.” “They’re my lawyers,” said Kohnken, 78, a retired EPA enforcement officer. As for the bumper sticker, the satchel full of fake money on the passenger seat and the jar of Grey Poupon on a shelf next to the right-hand-drive steering wheel, “I’m crazy. That’s why.” “I’m an in-your-face guy,” he explained further — but also a softie. He was giving the plush sharks away to any little kid who showed an interest in them. Also in the kid-at-heart category, as well as the kid-on-Woodward category, was Robin DeDecker. She lives in Gibraltar and takes owning a real-life Transformer as a calling. With her husband, Mark, at the wheel, she was peering out the window of their limited edition Chevrolet Camaro wearing a Bumblebee mask. Even the heat couldn’t stop her. The Camaro is a limited edition 2010 modeled after the car from the movie — in bumblebee yellow, of course. “She’s a trooper for putting that helmet on,” Mark DeDecker said. “Every year we try to do something different.” Their car is one of just 300 made. The engine is emblazoned with the movie character and the advisory, “bee powered.” The personalized license plate leaves no doubts either: "BEE PWR." Five stories above Woodward but not far from the spirit of the day, Swedish auto executive Bo Andersson and some of his friends watched the cruise from one of the two penthouse patios of his apartment in Birmingham’s Greenleaf Trust building. Former Detroit Tigers pitcher Justin Verlander used to live one floor down, if that helps give a sense of the loftiness. The rent is $15,000 a month, a friend says. That’s about a tenth of what you’d pay in Manhattan — and in New York, they don’t even have a Dream Cruise. Staff writers Ian Thibodeau and Lauren Abdel-Razzaq contributed.<doc-sep>
Automotive freak flags were flying at this year's Woodward Dream Cruise with the annual parade of oddities sprinkled among the Motor City's finest. Dave Fawcett of Independence, Kentucky, came to the Dream Cruise for the first time this year with his 1961 International Scout. It's usually a brand for farm equipment and tractors, but Fawcett has held onto this gem of a truck for nearly 30 years, waiting for the right time to restore it. The unique and boxy red ride is a tribute to his father, who he calls "the best man in the world." Over at the Performance Park show in Royal Oak, a 1970s racecar opens like the jaws of an alligator to welcome the driver. The "Color Me Gone" 1977 Monza Funny Car, owned by Jim Matuszak of Caro, Michigan, is a restored "flopper." Matuszak doesn't race the car — it's restored exactly to its 1977 specs, so it's missing some safety requirements for today's track — but he revved the engine for the crowd every hour or so during the Cruise. Then there's the "Ratillac," a matte black 1988 Cadillac Brome customized by Alan Cleland of Warren. He found the old Caddy on Craigslist a year ago and spent the last 12 months customizing it from top to bottom. From the black paint job to the skeletons in the front seat, Cleland has only one explanation for his customization: “I just wanted something kinda different,” he said. At the other end of the spectrum is Pat Wiegand's 1955 Ford Thunderbird. The Macomb Township resident refers to it as “the Barbie car.” “It’s a color that was in my poodle-skirt,” she said. "A lot of attention for the pink car. I let the little girls sit in it. They get dragged here and don’t want to come, but then they see it and they get excited." Every aspect of the '55 T-Bird is sweet as candy. Her license plate says QT 1955, Barbie is on the dash, a Lamb Chop puppet is on the gear shifter and a few other pink stuffed animals are arrayed in the car. Last but not least is a 1992 Michigan State Police Service Package Mustang, parked Saturday in Mustang Alley in Ferndale. Owned by Ann and Mike Patterson, the car was in service from 1992-1997. It has a 5.0-liter, 225-horsepower engine mates to a four-speed automatic transmission. Staff writers Ian Thibodeau and Lauren Abdel-Razzaq contributed. nnaughton@detroitnews.com Twitter: @NoraNaughton