Eagle Nest, New Mexico, 2012. “People like to drive because driving is actually and symbolically an almost perfect mechanism for escape…there is probably no human being who does not have troubles, real or imagined, from which he at times feels the need to flee.” George R. Stewart.

PHB

My Photo
Brooklin, Maine, United States
We own a 1976 GMC Sierra Grande 15 in Maine, and an '86 Chevrolet Custom Deluxe 10 in West Texas. Also a pair of '97 Volvo 850 wagons. Average age of the fleet is 24 years--we're recyclers. I've published a book of stories NIGHT DRIVING (1987), and 2 novels: THE LAW OF DREAMS (2006), and THE O'BRIENS, which came out in the US (Pantheon) and Canada (House of Anansi) in 2012. A book of stories TRAVELING LIGHT comes out in 2013. More of my book stuff at www.peterbehrens.org I'm a Fellow at the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study for 2012-13.

Wednesday, April 25, 2012

Volvo P1800 For Sale



On the apparently endless The O'Briens booktour, I spotted this Volvo P1800 for sale at a small garage near Bridgton, Maine. Don't know if it is still there. And I don't know if it was listed anywhere on the web. It seemed a very clean survivor. There was one patch of rust on a fender


but otherwise everything seemed solid. And amazingly, original. Especially the interior. Dusty, but all there.



The p1800 looks like it has spent a lot of time hiding in a barn and it certainly doesn't seem to have encountered many Maine winters. Asking was $3K. The seller seems to think it a 1969 but I would say 1967; not that I'm an expert on these sweet little Swedish machines, but it has no side marker lights and I think these were mandatory starting 1968. How trainspotterish of me to know that.




Okay I must wedge in another shameless book plug. There are 2 videos of me holding forth on my new novel The O'Briens:  one is an interview I did with Jeff Glor of CBS, and another is one of the Writers Talk About Writing series produced by my US publisher, Pantheon Books and available on youtube. I'm having an extremely bad-hair day in the CBS interview.
Posted by autoliterate at 7:16 PM

2 comments:

  1. Love these as well as the P1800ES wagons .

    ReplyDelete

  2. Actually, it is a '65 model, chassis numbers 12500-16499.
    After '66 they got rid of the swooping door trim.

    ReplyDelete

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)