Dan the Man cars ?

I’d fly out there and look at it. If it sucked I’d fly home.

If it was what I wanted I drive it back home. Spend a few hundred bucks on some HF tools (which you'd still have to use when you got home), make sure I had AAA or some other towing service and make a vacation out of it.

My buddy bought a 73 Duster that had been sitting for years. He towed it home, dropped a 4 barrel carb and intake on it and made it run.

Several months later he needed to move, so I flew to California to help him. We loaded up that Duster so much it was almost doing a wheelie. It looked like the Clampetts loaded it up. Loaded the rest of his junk up in his Durango and headed north to Washington.

I did tune it up before we left. But that thing never missed a beat, got 16 MPG fully overloaded and performed flawlessly.

We stopped in Oregon at his parents place to stay the night. Hi mom was panicked it would break down. I laughed and said that car was more reliable than the Jeep she was driving.

Its still going today, except it has a 340 in it, a manual shift 904 with a 9.5 inch PTC converter and 3.92 gears.

I‘d have no fear jumping in that car and driving back to California or even across the country in it right now.
Right On, That's the Spirit! And part of the Fun!