10. VW Type 1 Beetle

1953-1976 FROM $8000

Like the Morris Minor, Germany’s People’s Car was designed to help put a nation on wheels, but it ended up being many nations, including Australia (where local assembly commenced in 1957) and small-car-starved America. Slow, noisy, air-cooled and oddly packaged, the rearengined, rear-drive Bug also proved accessible, durable and capable in equal measures, with almost annual improvements implemented despite unchanged appearances to keep the Beetle relevant against increasingly competitive rivals. However, time ultimately caught up and a beleaguered Volkswagen switched to the modernist Golf instead. Original ’60s 1200 and 1300 models are highly prized and priced accordingly high, as are the various imported Cabriolets, leaving the latter 1500 and ’70s 1300 and 1600 Superbugs as the most affordable. Our advice is to stretch to the Beetle your heart longs for, because these are all about emotion and nostalgia. Don’t hesitate either, because right now, prices haven’t multiplied as per many other period steel-bumper classics, but this situation isn’t likely to last long. This is one Bug worth catching in these COVID times.