Reflections from Aachen . . .

.
.
.
It has been entirely too long since I last participated in a Weekend Reflections session over at James' place, so here goes with a couple of reflections I found yesterday while driving back home from Germany, where a certain chain of events kept me chained to a desk in Cologne for the last two weeks, with no internet connection and no time to go look for an internet café. But finally got back home late last night, and while driving back took a few minutes to explore the city center of Aachen, near the borders of Belgium and Holland. These votive candles were in a church there.
.
.
.

.
.
.
A little further along I spotted this ad in a store window, evidently done by someone who loves old VW buses. I had two old VWs like these long ago, and still have a soft spot for them, so was pleased to see their spirit is still alive in Germany.
.
.
.

I liked the collection of small bus models... Have a great weekend !
.
.

.
.
.
.

Bug-Eyed in Bugland

.
.
.
A while back I posted some photos from a VW bug and bus cemetery discovered by chance in the deep, dark jungles of central Pennsylvania (Penn's woods) way back long ago in September. I wasn't done with that site after that earlier posting, and am still not done with it after this one. It was a beautiful and bountiful booty of bugs fallen from grace. A place to lay one's bugbears to rest, to say peek-a-boo to one's bugaboos and leave them behind buried in the bucolic underbrush of the backwoods, until rust do them ravish. It is a place to dream about, to ponder over, to ruminate and reflect on, full of messages about the passing of an age, the ephemeral nature of man's creations, the nature which will reclaim all in the end. Ah, am I getting positively buggy in my advanced age ?
.
.

.
.
.
The view looking out from the inside.
.
.

.
.
.

Must have been a passing radioactive cloud from the not so distance Three Mile Island.
.
.

.
.
.
Is there really a bug here, or did I just dream it ?
.

.

.
Traces of the past.
.
.

.
.
.
Has life ever left you feeling shattered ? All the king's horses and all the king's men . . .
.
.

.
.
.
I've looked at broken windshields from both sides now
From outside in and inside out
It's windshield cracks that I recall
I really don't know the wind, at all . . .
.
(Oh, and since this one, and the photo just above, both have some bits of reflections in them, perhaps they could count to be included in James' Weekend Reflections ?)
.
.

.
.

.

Driving On Into Dreams of the New Year . . .

.
.
.
Back in September, in the back woods of Pennsylvania, driving down a back country road, far at the back of a vacant lot I caught a glimpse of something that flashed a spark of immediate recognition in my mind; I slammed on the brakes, turned around and drove back there. I had no choice in the matter. It was inevitable to me that this was an unavoidable rendez vous with chance, with hazard, with whatever you'd like to call it, yes, the dippity-do of serendipity had struck again.
.
Barely visible from the road were three old Volkswagen buses quietly abandoned there. Finishing their days with the vacant expressions of a vacant lot, forgotten, forgotten save for probably the extremely rare passerby such as myself who might actually turn around to come take a closer look. But how could I not ? In another life long ago I owned two of these beasties. Not at the same time. Both of them came to tragic ends. Perhaps they also now inhabit some place like this. I don't know. But I do know there was something quite magical for me in this place.
.
While I was there admiring the three VW buses visible from the road, a large four wheel drive pickup truck pulled into the lot, and I admit to having a moment of serious apprehension that it might be a local redneck ready to have me arrested for trespassing, or worse. In fact, it turned out to be the owner of the land, who lived just up the road, where he has a thriving VW repair business. He was quite friendly, when he realized I had a little bit of a passion for old VWs, he suggested I go poke around in the woods up the hill from the vacant lot, where there were a few dozen more old VWs finishing their lives in the underbrush. I didn't need to be asked twice.
.
So what better way to head into the new year coming up soon, than to take a little trip down memory lane to a small corner of dreamland, inhabited by dream cars just waiting for someone to stop by and appreciate them. I was pleased, tickled pink in fact, to have been able to play that role that fine autumn day. (and many thanks to you, Craig, if you should ever see this ! )
.
.
.


.
.
Some of the vehicles in question had obviously belonged to Grateful Dead fans. But just as the Grateful Dead died when Jerry Garcia passed away in 1995, so too did the need for so many VWs like these which carried Deadheads from concert to concert, back in those days long ago. "How ya Phillin" is of course a reference to the Grateful Dead bass player, Phil Lesh.
.
As there are a few reflections in some of these windows, am including this in the Weekend Reflections series over at James place.
.
.
.


.
.
More Grateful Dead art in a window sticker... dancing bears, terrapins from Terrapin Station, and the raven...
.
.
.


.
.
.
.
.


.
.
Still more Grateful Dead VW art . . . VW buses going forever in a circle on a VW window.
.
.
.


.
.
VWs were not the only vehicles abandoned there . . . a school bus was hiding in the trees, ready for another road trip, further on down the road.
.
.
.







































.
.
This blue bus was nearly identical to the first one I purchased, out in California. ("I'll meet you in the back of the . . . blue bus, the blue bus...")
.
.
.


.
.
The jungle seemed to be on the verge of winning the battle. In another year or two these beautiful old cars may be totally obscured. I wish I could have brought a few back home with me. They make great lawn ornaments !
.
.
.


.
.
.
.

.
.
Many different models and colors were available ! All in varying degrees of dilapidation.
.
.
.







































.
.
Who could ever forget the dashboards in these babies, and the wacky shifter diagram they had on the ashtray ?
.
.
.


.
.
.
.






































.
.
A pair of hubcaps was lying forlornly in the autumn leaves. With the owner's permission, I did bring one of them back home, it was all I could fit in my bagage. A dead WV souvenir.
.
.
.

.
.
.

.
.
.

Beetle-mania !

For some reason I kept running into VW Beetles in the blogosphere today, first at Desi's place in South Africa, and then at Lynne's Décolleté in Canada, two most captivating blogs and hostesses. . . so please go check them both out promptly. There must be some kind of blue Beetle virus in the air today. So all of that prompted me to pull this photo out of the archives. I posted another one of this same Beetle quite a ways back, but from a different angle. Could it have been blue before the fire ?
.




















.
.

Three Excellent Norwegian Blogs . . .

One of the many pleasures of blogging involves getting out for a drive in the countryside as it were, and discovering new blogs. There are literally millions of blogs in existence these days, and one can spend endless hours blog-surfing. . . seeing everything possible under the sun. Now and then, however, one may have a wonderful surprise, and stumble on a blog that immediately brings a big smile to one's face . . . and that is exactly what happened to me yesterday when I found purely and totally by serendipitous chance, a photography blog in Norway run by a gentleman named John, where some of the loveliest photos that I have ever seen of what I have called in several previous posts in these pages "Dream Cars" are displayed.
.
This photograph of a derelict VW Bus in a car graveyard in Sweden was taken by John, and this beauty, and many other absolutely stunning pictures can be seen at his blog, JohnsFoto.
.
I would highly recommend that you go take a look quickly if you like dream cars that have gone to automobile heaven, where the clouds are all exhaust, where the angels are hood ornaments, where their horns will honk no more forever, as much as I do. . .
.
His wife is also a very talented photographer, and has an excellent blog of her own, with more dream cars in it, which you can see here.
.
John also participates in a group blog with a few other excellent Norwegian photographers which you can see at norsknettfoto. That is where I saw the first of his photos that I came across yesterday, an ancient moss covered VW Bug, and I knew right away I had to see more. . . All three of these blogs are well worth a visit !
.
I would like to send a big "THANK YOU" to John in Drammen, Norway, for graciously giving me permission to reproduce his beautiful VW Bus photo here :
.





















PS . . This all has absolutely nothing to do with the Monty Python sketch about the Norwegian Blue Parrot. The VW Bus in this picture is not dead, it's just resting ! This is not an ex-VW Bus.
.
.

Of Swine and Men (and their marvellous motorcars)

First, I did not take this photo, it appeared on the Jalopnik.com website where it appeared with an interesting and pertinent story about Swine Flu and automobiles, that an alert reader sent me the link to (thanks Walter !) Worth reading. These are strange times we live in, as you may have noticed already, and Swine Flu is just the latest plague to beset the planet. . . just when we'd almost forgotten about Bird Flu. There is also a blog article on A Tidings of Magpies you may want to look at along these same lines. (And while you are there take a walk through Distracted by Shiny Objects past posts, it is a smorgasbord of fine reading to rival "Babette's Feast".) But also this photo was timely in regards to a bit of a discussion that got going concerning old VW campers, between a below post here and a couple of posts on Jumble Sale Rabbits, which btw is another fun and friendly blog. . . as well as on a blog in Australia done by Nathalie who is now in Avignon, France. Happy reading, and if any swine approach you in a dark alley asking you to get into a car that looks like this one, just tell them. . . I gave at the office, and then run for your life !

.

.

.

A Home On Wheels. . .

This has nothing to do with anything, it's just a blast from the past. (And an incitement to go take a look at Jumble Sale Rabbits where Liz in Scotland has also posted some old Volkswagen shots. . . there's some fun stuff going on there !)
.
A long, long time ago I owned in succession two VW Transporters. The first one, bought in California, came to a tragic end in a fire. I'll never forget when I took off the inside cover of the driver side door to mount a stereo speaker in it, it was very obvious from the inside surface that a shotgun blast had hit the door just below the window. The outside had been repaired, smoothed over, sanded, and re-painted, but the inside had a multitude of unmistakable dimples in a circular pattern. Glad it wasn't me behind the wheel at the time. Not sure I want to know what really happened. The second VW bus, pictured below, broke down going up a long hill in New England, and it would have cost way too much to repair it, so it headed for a junkyard. . . was sad to see it go, had alot of good times in it. You can click on this first one for a bigger image to read the bumper stickers, one of which says, "The Only Good Bumpersticker Is A Dead One". . . So, that tells you something about the kind of guy I was between age 20 and 30 . . . then I got a job and got married, and moved to France !
.

.














.
.

Canary Beetle . . .

Why someone felt compelled to hoist this old VW Beetle up on top of a shipping container parked in the pumice fields and cold lava flow covered with cactus in that corner of the Canary Island of Tenerife was but one of many mysteries encountered on those mysterious and beautiful islands. And it had a see-through interior . . .
.

































.



















.
.

Lebanon Volkswagen

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

I had to travel to the far southeast corner of Lebanon to the town of Marjayoum, opposite the biblical Mount Hermon, which is now an Israeli military zone, off limits to common mortals like myself, in order to find this old Lebanese Volkswagen parked in front of an ancient palace. Not sure now which was the original color here... shades of Andy Warhol.