Buckley’s market matters
Writing this in mid-january, I am still suffering from the traditional post-christmas insomnia that is the inevitable result of a broken routine and the general mental upheaval that this hateful time of year brings. Too much food, too much booze and too much time to ponder the things you can do nothing about.
With sleep patterns gone totally to pot, counting cars rather than sheep eventually had me nodding off. Alarmingly, I have owned upwards of 60 Lancias since 1984, if you count all the spares cars and rusty projects. Overall, I think if I factored in things such as the Talbot Samba I blew up on the M6, and various Volvos and Audis I’ve forgotten about, the total could be somewhere near 400. I certainly got to 200-plus before I fell asleep, including more than 30 Mercedes, 10 Fiat 130s, and 15 each under the BMW and Jaguar headings.
Staring at the ceiling at 4am, trying to resist the temptation of the TV, I compiled a supplementary list of 20-plus cars people have given me for nothing – be it out of kindness, pity or as a cheap means of garage clearance. This threw up some interesting cars (including my one and only Borgward), as did the tally of classics that were theoretically mine, but which I never actually saw in the metal; these included a Gilbern Invader, an ex-laura Ashley Mercedesbenz 300SEL 6.3 and an early Jensen Interceptor.
BMC featured in the main (paid-for) tally with an Austin A40, a Wolseley 6/110 and two Austin 3 Litres, but never the actual ‘Landcrab’ – as immortalised by Scott and Whitfield in the opening credits of Terry and June.
Then again, the sitcom legends never owned an Espada. I did – two in fact, if joint ownership counts – and, talking of Lambos, I am still trying to get to the bottom of a story that involves a ‘stolen’ Miura and a celebrity chef.
Finally, I had use of a Bentley Continental R for a while recently: probably the best-looking car of the ’90s – and, at £190k in 1993, one of the most expensive. In today’s world of plastic footballers’ Bentleys, surely the Continental R will have its day soon?