Some of the coolest cars anywhere, ones with names like "Voodoo Vamps" and "Roam'n Relics," were on display at the Ventura County Fairgrounds on Saturday.

The cars, all built before 1970, represented a piece of this nation's automobile history, and each had a unique identity and story. It was a story many of the car owners seemed proud to share with passersby.

John Parker, the Port Hueneme man who organized the ninth annual Back to the Beach show, was expecting about 350 vehicles this year He got around 600.

Parker attributed the strong turnout to the enthusiasm the cars' owners have for their metallic machines.

It also didn't hurt that the show was held at the Ventura County Fairgrounds next to the ocean, on what turned out to be a sunny and cool day.

As in previous years, Saturday's show offered an opportunity for car owners and other automobile enthusiasts to get together and show off and compare their classic vehicles. The show began in Huntington Beach and moved to Ventura two years ago.

Most of these cars were not the "muscle cars" made popular during the second half of the 1960s, such as the Pontiac GTO, the Dodge Charger or the Ford Mustang.

Instead, there were hot-rods and "woodies," iconic cars lon associated with Southern California's beach-and-surf culture.

Geoffrey Faber, 17, of Camarillo got his two-door 1940 Ford sedan about five years ago. The Camarillo High School junior said his father —Hans Faber — taught him how to work on cars and instilled in him a deep love for them.

"This is one great machine," said Faber as he walked around the creamy-white sedan toward the front, where orange flames were painted around the fender.

Like most cars of its generation, this one had three gears. The only difference is the stick shift was on the steering wheel's column, or what Faber called "the tree," and not on the floor like many of cars parked nearby.

Exhaust fumes mixed with the thumping sounds of rock-surf music as Faber spoke.

Like Faber, Roy Kirby of Ojai has taken loving care of his 1951 Chevrolet station wagon since he bought it six months ago.

Kirby's midnight-blue station wagon is in the same style and spirit of the "woodie" station wagons popularized in the surf movies of the 1960s and in Beach Boys songs.

Had he bought a woodie, Kirby said, he very likely would have easily spent $100,000 or more. So he settled for the "tin woodie" model, made of metal and not wood.

Kirby said his station wagon was a precursor to the popular Chevrolet Suburban of today.

The American automobile industry stopped producing the woodies long ago, Kirby explained. The wood did not fare well in the colder, wetter parts of the nation, where it tended to rot after some years. California is reputed to have the largest number of woodies in part because of its warmer and drier climate.

Classic motorcycles were mixed in among the cars, including one once ridden by Burt Munro, a legendary speed-bike racer from New Zealand.

Munro is reputed to have reached 183.6 mph on the bike while riding it across Utah's Bonneville Speedway salt flats in August 1967. Munro was in his late 60s at the time and had a heart condition.

"It's incredible that he was able to go that fast when you look at how small this motorcycle is," said Tom Hensley, whose family owns some of the motorcycles Munro raced.