While in Britain, I was captivated by the Bond Bug. What?
The Bond Bug is a small British two-seat, wedge-shaped, three-wheeled automobile.It was built from 1970 to 1974, initially by Bond Cars Ltd and subsequently by the Reliant Motor Company.
The motor was only 700cc, and it supposedly had a top speed of 75 miles per hour or 120 km/h - mainly because of the very light fibreglass body.
It had a lift-up canopy and side screens instead of conventional doors. And they almost all came in bright orange.Because there was virtually no luggage room, I fitted two brackets onto the rear of the bodywork to hold our backpacks.
As we were going to be in Britain for a while, Danielle got a British learner's permit so it was an opportunity for her to learn to drive.
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| The Bug outside our house |
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| Danielle testing the roof strength |
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| On the road with a backpack attached to the rear |
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| Welsh country road |
This plan came to a sad end on our way back from travelling in Wales towards Shrewsbury. A feature of Welsh country roads is their narrowness bordered by stone walls. They are also used to move sheep from paddock to paddock or farm to farm.
Well, we were travelling along one of these roads in drizzling rain, suitably coated with sheep poo, and encountered a farmer in his 'built like a tank' Russian Lada 4WD coming in the opposite direction. Our meeting was at a suitably low speed, but the damage to the fragile fibreglass front end of the Bug was substantial - of course his vehicle didn't even have a scratch.
The bottom line was that we didn't have the money to repair the Bug, so we had to sell it to the Bond/Reliant dealer in Shrewsbury where we'd left it, and continue our travels by public transport.
