But a closer look among the stalls reveals there’s much more to the 28-year-old event.

Where others around him brought ute-loads and van-fulls of car, truck and motorcycle tools, parts, bric-a-brac and chrome, Lachlan Taylor of Canberra brought just one item.

Mr Taylor’s parents' 1959 four-door Morris Minor 1000 had been sitting on their farm "for 20 years,” he said, and the doer-upper certainly looked every day of those decades.

“It's time to get rid of it,” he said, and judging by the number of hobbyists and restorers who stopped by, the vintage vehicle was destined for a new home and a new look.

Ray Mason from Bargo was more typical of the stalls that kept car enthusiasts enthralled, with paraphernalia from tail lights to bonnet badges, and all in between.

Likewise, Paul Manton from Pitt Town reckoned he had been bringing his big collection of motoring books and magazines to the meet "from the start," some 29 meets ago.

He went to similar events "nearly every weekend," but said Goulburn was the biggest.

Colleen Wilson of 'Collelltales' had come all the way from Lake Albert in Wagga Wagga with her "100 per cent Australian wool, 100 per cent fun" felted toys and decorations.

In the age of online selling, what was the attraction? It was “a small investment” to make the trip – just a motel room and a modest site fee – and she enjoyed meeting people.

A customer of Goulburn man and carnivorous plant cultivator Owen O'Neill asked whether his tee-shirt slogan, ‘Feed me, Seymour’, was a reference to the Victorian town.

He explained it was from the American black comedy The Little Shop of Horrors, about a particularly hungry plant, and recommended she invest in glazed pots for her own.

He had first grown a Venus Fly Trap at the age of 12, and had been cultivating plants such as the sarracenia leucophylla (crimson pitcherplant or purple trumpet-leaf) since.

The plants were “easy care” but needed a lot of watering; glazed pots would limit water loss, unlike a porous clay planter. Another sale, with free comedy and cultivating advice.

Avid glass and china collector Kathy Spanakis, also of Goulburn, had attended her first Goulburn Swap Meet two years ago, and had returned as a seller for the first time.

In the cool but bright autumn sunshine, her handpicked items from her own “massive” collection (“massive,” her husband agreed, “a whole room, and a shed”) sparkled.

At the stall next door, a very different offering included some lively ferrets. Grant Elder of Goulburn said he had four adult ferrets at home, and bred them as a hobbyist.

He explained the practice of netting warrens before sending the mammal down to ferret out the rabbits; but if they caught and ate one, he said, they’d sleep it off down there.

Ferrets can sleep anywhere from 14 to 18 hours a day, so that would mean quite a wait.

The Swap Meet stretches the length of the Recreation Area on Braidwood Road, from gate 1 to gate 7, and it is no exaggeration to say thousands showed up this Sunday.

Many stallholders had arrived to set up on the Saturday, some camping out on site.

From 6am on April 2, the gates opened and people began to pour in, from the city and the district as well as much further afield. Matthew Jansen of Canberra was among them, lugging sons Max, 11 months, and Reggie, 3, in a four-wheeled little red wagon.

Cute, but the boys would have to make way if he found something to buy, he laughed.

Organised by Goulburn Mulwaree Rotary Club, the Swap Meet site fees are $25 to $40. Entrants pay $5 on the gate (under 14 free) and proceeds go to charities and projects.