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Off we go to Biggar

pristine split screen camper

Crosseyed beach buggy

Three vintage Beetles

VW Golf pickup conversion. Are those Ford Cortina Mk1 rear lights?

some hot all black Audi's

These do not look comfy!

Trekker Kubelwagen

Compact and Bijou caravan
Rat look campervan with lowered suspension. Looks to be scraping the deck to me.
Graeme Gallaoway's Anglia
May Weekend Fun at Volksfling -  30 May 2016

Festival atmosphere at a sunny Biggar Volksfling
Volksfling came to Biggar for the bank holiday weekend, attracting a wide selection of everything, and anything Volkswagen, or Audi, classic, modern, and heavily customised as well.

My friend Graham is an avid VW fan, having owned a number of their classics. Currently he is the proud owner of a 1980 T25 camper and a 1972 VW Beetle 1600GT. Now GT and Beetle seem hard to say in the same breath, but his can squirt along the road at top side of 70mph with no problem at all. His Beetle is one of only 2500 made and only 1250 were in his  yellow colour. Graham's son Sam joined us, and when old enough to drive wants a Beetle too. Keep it in the family it appears.

It was a sunny morning for the 20 mile drive to Biggar which hosts a number of classic car shows during the year. The wide selection of Beetles and beach buggy variants, were supported by a plethora of camper vans, mostly the sought after T2 which are now commanding silly prices, especially the split screen variety which are now going for topside of £64000. The later bay window windscreen style  are more affordable but catching up fast.

We met CCHMSC member John Stuart who was along for the weekend in his T25 camper circa 1980 vintage. Our first stop on the walkabout was beside three early vintage pristine Beetles.

My question to these VW aficionado's was to identify them in chronological order. This was easier said than done as to me they all looked the same! The answer is found by looking at the back of the cars. No badges, so no clues there. Try the rear windows. The oldest had a split rear screen, the next a small one piece oval screen, and the newest a larger more rectangular screen. 1951, 55, and 59 was the correct answer. The '51 boasted an 1132cc engine putting out a whopping 25bhp, while the '55 managed 1192cc and 34bhp. VW must have been worried too much power and the '59 while still 1192cc could only manage 30bhp. No Herbie wheelies here then!

Bumped into another friend, literally, not actually, who had brought along his bay window T2 campervan.  Spotted on eBay he rescued it from a front garden somewhere in the south of England, then restored it from the ground up. Now travels all over the place, including the North Coast 500 round the top of Scotland. Has the advantage of not needing to find expensive B&B's on route, which are like hen's teeth anyway up there.

Of course there were plenty of beach buggies and an interesting WW2 Kubelwagen conversion, from the seventies, the VW 181/182 Trekker.  My personal favourite was the 1973 Type 3 Squareback estate complete with surfboard on the roof, ready to go.  Take me to the beach.

Some like to make their beetle go even faster, and a nice UVA Fugitive converted from twin Webers to fuel injection was a good example. I won't tell you how quickly the driver made it up from Durham!! 

Time for a break and armed with burgers and hotdogs we headed over to John Stuart's T25 camper to enjoy a cool beer, except for Sam who was limited to Coca Cola. A walk around the autojumble stalls picked up a few Beetle bits and pieces for Graham. I snapped up a few magnetic trays, ideal for those bolts you take out under the bonnet and can never find again. I'm told the trays work upside down as well, so no more hunting for the bolts when lying under the car feeling around and ending up banging my head on the exhaust pipe!

But the day was coming to a close and time to exit before the mad rush which can take hours on the single track exit route from the site. A great day, even if your not a VW fan, just to see how passionate these guys are about the marque.


Updated 2 June 2016
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