Out of the old box… a couple of shows we attendet in the previous century!
Yes we drive to VW shows for a while now!! last century, even before Europe was united we drove all over the place to visit certain shows… I don’t recall the years anymore but here’s a few show pictures from an era long time gone…
With my Black 53 ragtop at a show in Cecina Mare Italy, looooong time ago!!
wowh, I used to have long hair… with the limo bus in Zemst Belgium…
Even longer ago, in Antwerp, very small show, but we brought out a real cool oval window ragtop we imported from California back then! Half on the trailer was a cool green split window….
Same oval was showed off at the Antwerp Classic salon… I still had hair, and Gunter had hair too!…
With my beige perfect restored split at le Bug show on the race track of Spa Francorchamps… that car was close to perfect… I sold it over 15 years ago maybe even 20 years ago to Japan…
With a bunch of friends and the BBT Limo to the south of France, Super VW nationals in Lege Cap Ferret!
and finally with my trusty worker from back then Dave at a small VW event in hometown Antwerp, at the docks of the port long before they made Antwerp a low emission zone….
Nice to see old pictures… always good memories!!
The Schwimmwagen club from Paris in the fifties! Many super cool period pictures!
When I drove my 52 Convertible to its second owner in Paris about 10 days ago (see Blog report HERE) Mr Thomas told me that he used to own a schwimmwagen before the convertible and participated in a club for Schwimmwagens in Paris in the fifties, he had plenty of pictures what we went through for almost two hours… some of these pictures I could not resist to share with you here below!!
Cool beautiful period photographs!
The club called “Autocross” and they even had a cool logo!
All the pictures are made between 1951 and 1959… here at the salon nautique in 1953!
They used the schwimmwagens mostly for holidays all over France, swimming suits mandatory!
They had up to 6 schwimmwagens participating! Even back then!!
Action!! This was the president of the club!!
Some pictures are a real work of (photography) art!
Camp out!!
Some converted their schwimmwagens real bizar! This guy was a friend, not a member, and lived in a ski resort, only car that could reach his house was a schwimmwagen!
This was the Schwimmwagen of Mr Thomas himself how he bought it!
Those were the days!!
Happy sunday to everybody! Greetings from the incredible Ben Pon Show, watch this Blog for a full report!!
Cheapest price
Big reunion for our 1952 convertible with its 89 years old second owner!!
Last thursday was bank holiday in Belgium. So BBT Pascal and yours truly steered our 1952 all original Beetle convertible to Paris. A perfect timing.
We had set up a “reunion” between our gorgeous survivor convertible and its second owner, Mr Thomas and his family, who owned and drove the car from 1961 till 1969… fond memories…
Also Cyril , a free-lance photographer for the Super VW Magazine was present and made a super nice feature You can read in your favorite French magazine any time soon!
From left to right, Cyril the photographer, Mme Thomas, Mr Thomas, their son Dominique and far right BBT Pascal… I felt naked in this company having no beard!
Mr Thomas is 89 years old, and anti digital, so he took his pictures of the car with his real reflex camera on film!
Mr Thomas was delighted, he wanted to see everything on the car, and even inspected the engine compartment!! It was amazing what he still knew about the car. He has real fond memories, and always loved his little beetle, he never saw his car anymore since he sold it in 1969!
oh yes, time to get behind the wheel!
Was there a small tear? Could be!
and also Mme Thomas had to come aboard!! Incredible picture moments, and goose bump times, believe me!
Just like in the sixties, shall they leave for a ride?
The smile on their faces… priceless…
Fully crash gearbox? No problem for Mr Thomas, he drove the car through Paris like star! (dept 94 for the people who like to have the geographic details) I must honestly admit he grinded less gears as I do!
What a blast we had… we left home at 6.30 am and came back at 1.00 in the morning next day, back and forth to Paris by regular roads, who needs freeways, not with a split window convertible, do we? We used all 25 Horses on board and ran them hard!
We like to thank especially Cyril for the pictures, the story and the help with the little (gas) breakdown. We like to thank A LOT Mme Thomas for the remarkable lunch (their house is on the board of the Seine river)
And we like to thank endlessly the stars of the day, Mr Thomas and “his” old but trusty unrestored fully operational 1952 Splitwindow beetle!
Oh, the car Mr Thomas had before the 1952 Convertible was a VW schwimmwagen and he participated regularly in the Parisienne Schwimmwagen club outings in the fifties!! That story You can read next Sunday!
So stay tuned!
A nice and happy VW sunday to everybody!
BBT Flashback
These pictures been in our old shop in Brecht, “The Pigfarm” as we called it as that was what it used to be… this was our second location.
We worked hard as hell, but we had so much fun, young and powerful… oh no, we didn’t stop for the night…:)
Me behind the counter! When I still had hair! A lot of hair!…:)
Every week we took two beetles apart! yes, that’s 2 a week or over a hundred a year!!
Hein found the cars in Germany, when he had 7 beetles together, he called Jan, the transporter and he brought them over every other couple of weeks…
Where are these days gone? what a time…
If i want to go back?…No way! Today is fun too! Been there , done that….:)