First of all, not mine! Last weekend saw my good buddy Brad finally tie the knot with the lovely Ros – and not before time! Having bought Carlos the Karmann Ghia last year, what better car was there to take him to the church? His drive from Reading to the very, very pleasant Hanbury Manor Hotel a couple of nights before the wedding was always going to be a nervy one; not just because he was getting married less than 48 hours later, but also because he was driving a 44 year old car that had barely been driven in the last couple of months. Would he make it under his own steam – or on the back of a recovery truck?
Well as it happens, he made it under his own steam. Admittedly this was after he’d spent over 2 and a half hours waiting for the breakdown guy to arrive, but fortunately said breakdown guy simply diagnosed some slightly misadjusted points so he was soon back on his way! It’s almost like these old VWs know when the most inconvenient time to break down is……
Anyway, as the car was to be used to take the condemned man to the site of his execution, we needed to get some ribbons on it. I was a little disappointed not to be getting in on the act and ribboning up the bug or the bus, but the fact was that it was a very long trip down to Hanbury Manor and I wanted to make sure I got there ok. Oh, and Andy offered me a lift – which meant that I didn’t have to drive home the following day. Which, as it turns out, was a very good thing!
The journey to the church was a little like something out of Top Gear, in that we kept overtaking Brad and Jim in the KG and taking photos out of the window. Unfortunately those are all on Brad’s camera, as mine is still buried somewhere at the bottom of my storage room. I’ll add those at a later date, and in at least one of them you can see Jim holding up the horn push button, which fell off half way to the church. I hope Brad quickly realises that this is simply a part of owning an old VW, and something that you just have to get used to!
After an awesome weekend I was very glad to have taken the Monday off work. I’m not exactly motivated at the moment following the announcement a couple of weeks ago and the wedding had been pretty tough emotionally (I miss her), so what better way to forget about the stresses and strains of recent events than to get out in the bug for an hour or so in the sunshine? Had a lovely little potter around, with the soundtrack being provided (quite loudly) by ACDC – it’s a pretty awesome combination! On the way back to the ranch I took the opportunity to pop in and see our friend John at Beetle People for a coffee and a chat, and thoroughly enjoyed catching up with him.
As promised, now Brad has returned from honeymoon here are the shots we took of Carlos en route to the church!
