My car is about to celebrate her 40th birthday so thought I might start a thread about her life story!
From the late 1960s my family ( Dad, Mum , my sister and I ) drove to Spain for a camping holiday every year , it was on these trips that I first became a 2CV fanatic and vowed to have one as soon as I was old enough to drive even if it would have to be LHD. I remember when they were reintroduced here with RHD in 1974 but I was still only 13!
Fast forward to spring 1976 , my Mum had returned to work and needed a car of her own , Dad drove a GS then and thought a Dyane might suit her. Then , as now , I wasn't so keen on those and persuaded them to test drive a 2CV aswell. At Dell Motors in Leamimgton we tried a beige Dyane and a Cedrat 2CV , luckily for me Mum preferred the 2CV so the hunt began for a used one. An ad in the evening telegraph turned up a green car in Edgebaston so we set off to see it. It belonged to a Dentist's wife who was selling to buy a Datsun Sunny estate as she was expecting her third child , they had seen a 2CV at the Birmingham Motor Show and bought one straight afterwards , the car was registered on Nov 1st 74 so was one of the first on the road here. Anyway we bought her , for around £800 I think , I remember the mileometer passed 6666 on the drive home.
I have memories of trips with the roof open during the long hot summer that year and my schoolfriends making fun of the car when I was dropped off in it.
Over the next few years my sister and I both learned to drive and took our driving tests in Greenpeace as Mum had named her. At the age of 18 I bought my own 2CV , a Belgian nursing authority car imported by Lovekyn of Kingston, but still drove and looked after GOM too.
By 1983 she was looking a bit shabby and Mum bought a new Beachcomber to replace her , she was sold to the daughter of a good friend so we still got updates about her.
8 years later Sue , her owner , was looking for something newer and offered her back to me , of course I said yes please! She was still pretty good but had adventure bumpers and a stripy roof which I quickly got rid of , after a lot of cleaning up she won the best Drummer at the first 2CVGB Registers Day
Another 3 years passed , I was buying a house and had about 10 cars , all Citroen of course, so needed to raise some cash and a car designer friend needed a car so foolishly I sold her again , something I immediately regretted. Bob , the new owner moved away and we lost touch but a few years later I heard he was living in Worthing so I phoned him and discovered the car had failed it's MOT a couple of years earlier but luckily he had put her in his garage rather than scrap her. So a deal was done and I bought her back and trailered her home back in 1998.
She was in a sorry state by now with plenty of rust in the rear wings etc , Martin Little of Cotswold 2CV came to the rescue and a few months later she was back on the road, never to be sold again.
In the last few years I have used her regularly and tried to gradually make improvements and keep the rust at bay, she still looks pretty good and has covered 130,000 miles now. I have loads of photos but posting them on here is beyond me!
Sorry for the long , boring essay but it's raining outside and I've nothing better to do!
Rob

Don't apologise, it's great to find out some background on one of my favourite cars! I'd love to see some pics from the earlier days - if you can send them in an e-mail I'll stick them up here, if you like...

Nice story!

2CVs: once bitten, forever smitten!

A few from the recent past...

Another GOM:

I looked at a beige N-reg GOM at a garage in Oldbury (near West Brom) in 82. Agreed a price of £400, but realised it was too far gone and ended up buying FAC 334T instead. First car I ever bought. £1100.

A few from the man himself...

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Great stuff!

That is a very nice car....