Team Adventure
James Walshe goes on holiday and accidentally stumbles into a classic car paradise
Walshe heads to Gibraltar and gets more than he bargained for…
If the definition of a holiday is ‘an extended period of leisure and recreation’, you probably think we’re on a break all the time at Practical
Classics. We drive, fix and maintain old cars and then sit in an air-conditioned office with cups to tea to write twaddle about them. And I can promise that you won’t hear a single complaint.
However, given that we live and breathe cars on a daily basis, a holiday for us can actually be a period of leisure and recreation WITHOUT them. As such, I decided recently to visit a friend in Gibraltar – a place I had not previously been and with a history I was keen to explore. Within days of mentioning this to my pal, a member of the Gibraltar Classic Vehicle
Association (GCVA), it was brought to my attention that mistakenly, word had spread there: ‘Practical Classics is coming to Gibraltar!’ Ah…
In truth, I reckon it might make for a fun distraction from the planned hiking to spend an hour with a couple of fellow enthusiasts but, having made contact with the GVCA committee, I got rather more than I bargained for.
As I was to discover, the British Overseas Territory is a hotbed of classics and I was to be presented with a rich feast of beautiful cars.
Rocky landing
The landing at Gibraltar Airport is an occasion in itself. The runway crosses the main road from Spain and operates in much the same way as a railway level crossing does. Amid the roaring, shuddering cacophony from the Airbus’ thrust reversers, I note a bizarre blur of pedestrians and cyclists behind the airport barrier as we speed past. I’m met from the airport by my friend Paul, who drags me to a nearby bar, not in Gibraltar but across the Spanish border, for a Friday night beer. It turns out he lives in La Línea, which is nice enough, but I came here for red phone boxes, a big rock and some monkeys.
That’s exactly what I get next morning, when I’m picked up by GCVA member Stefan Nicholson in his Morgan Plus 8. Once through the border, we hit the aforementioned barrier and await the passing of an Easyjet arrival before Stefan floors it across the runway, Gibraltar’s giant, craggy rock majestically filling the skyline ahead.
Stefan moved to Gibraltar in 1977 and knows every corner of the 2.6-square mile peninsula.
With that 3.9-litre V8 woofling up front, we skirt around the eastern side of the rock, under rocky crags and all the way to the southern tip at Punta de Europa where we admire the view across to the mountainous North African coast. ‘The club occasionally does trips to Morocco’ he beams.
Stefan ordered his Morgan new in 1990 and finally took delivery seven years later. ‘It’s a very precious car to me but I’m not afraid to use it. I took it to the Sahara once and managed to negotiate all sorts of desert and mountain roads!’ Normally, members of the GCVA meet on less dramatic ground, in the centre of the town. My proper introduction to Gibraltar’s classic car scene will begin tomorrow and will involve a special trip across the border and up the coast of Spain, where both Gibraltarian and Spanish enthusiasts regularly meet for breakfast at the marina in Sotogrande.
Into Spain
Following a Saturday afternoon touring Gibraltar’s extraordinary terrain – which, by the way, did include red phone boxes, monkeys (Barbary macaques, I think you’ll find) and a trip to the top of the rock via its astonishing maze of caves – I wander next morning to a car park near the Spanish border where I find a gaggle of classics.
There’s little time to waste as breakfast awaits some 20km up the road. I climb into the driving seat of the 1925 Morris Cowley ‘Bullnose’ owned by Stefan and wife Judith and set off on the first leg up the coast. A few miles of clumsy crunching and swearing (sorry, Judith!) and I begin to master the controls, with a warm breeze blowing directly into my face and several flies into my mouth. It is a joyous contraption and I’m grateful for the education but given my amateur vintage vehicle driving skills and the time constraints of the day, I decide it’s best enjoyed from the back seat for the last few miles, where I can take pictures of Stefan doing it properly. We chug into Puerto Sotogrande - an enormous privately-owned development, national park and nature reserve, billed as a leisure port and ‘gateway to the Straights of Gibraltar’. It’s home to many a mover and shaker in Spain – evidenced by countless grand villas and immaculately kept lawns and fairways. There’s a warm Andalusian welcome as our little convoy slides past a vast flotilla of pristine yachts and into the harbour.
Fresh juice
The waterfront is full of classic cars on both sides. Scrambled eggs and endlessly refilled glasses of fresh orange juice are served under the parasols of the KE Sotogrande café, where we get a prime view of classics ranging from a Twenties Rolls Royce to the 1995 Volkswagen Vento owned by Vicente Sevillano. He’s a proud member of the International Federation of Antique Vehicles (FIVA) and a leading light of its youth working group. ‘I think these days, it’s more important than ever to preserve old cars and protect owners. As you can see here, there are enthusiasts and cars of all ages, so we need to
‘Our convoy slides past a vast flotilla of pristine yachts’
support each other.’ Attention turns to his tidy VW Vento, which he shares with his brother Juan Jose. ‘It was bought new by my family and driven mostly by our mother. These are rare now. Everything is original – from the engine to the bodywork!’
Alongside the nostalgia is evidence of some grit and determination, too. Dylan Azzopardi and girlfriend Isabelle flew to Surrey in order to buy their 1984 Mini. ‘It needed a fair bit of mechanical work to coax it back to life and eventually got through an MOT.’ The pair then set off from Britain on the drive home to Gibraltar, but it didn’t go that well. ‘We got as far as the middle of Spain before we gave up and called for the tow truck’ admits Dylan. ‘It kept going wrong. Every bump felt scary, as if the car was about to fall apart.’ Gladly, once home, he was able to fix all the suspension issues and the Mini is now regularly seen buzzing around Gibraltar’s rock.
Off the cliff
The giant monolithic promontory itself tells a somewhat grim story about the fate of many a car sold there before the early Seventies (see panel right). Needless to say, with thousands of old
vehicles meeting a watery grave thanks to Franco, the reponening of the Spain-gibraltar border in 1985 meant classics could be more easily brought in from the rest of Europe, including the stunning red 1965 MG Midget of Joe Saldiva, Roy Smith’s 1990 Fiat X/19, who drove it here from Ireland and Keith Campbell’s Nissan Micra, which he inherited from his mother-in-law (who bought it new in 1992) and, just as many have done with their own cars, drove it all the way to Gibraltar for a new life.
After breakfast and a good few hours of nattering, we head back to Gibraltar, this time in David Risso’s 1967 Citroën ID19. A man after my own heart, David has owned Citroëns of all kinds. ‘My first car at the age of 22 was a CX GTI Turbo, like yours. After that, I was hooked – there’s a real love of old cars in Gibraltar and it’s definitely growing.’
David says that’s evident at the ever-expanding annual GCVA Classic and Vintage Vehicle Rally, in its 19th year, and all set for May 16. ‘The weather is usually excellent with a warm climate, while the roads here are perfect for older cars. Like many other vehicles of its era, my Citroën isn’t a one you can hurry about in, anyway. To me, it perfectly captures the sun-soaked, laid-back spirit of Gibraltarians, for whom the journey is far more important than the destination.’