While leaving Zion National Park in Utah, I ran into a pair of these guys taking photos as the sun went down:
From my quick conversation with them, I found they drove a pair of 2CVs all the way from Ontario, crossing into the US at Sarnia into Michigan. I wished them good luck as they had to leave. I told them they were brave souls, but the fellow behind the wheel of the pictured 2CV just shrugged and said "hey, it's an adventure." They were certainly all smiles.
That's cool.
There is a lady locally that has one for a daily driver. I see it all over town.
I had an army buddy in Germany who really wanted one. Sadly he was like 6 1/2 feet tall.
He should still fit one - they're surprisingly roomy. Wide is a bit more of a problem than tall...
I've seen they have quite a bit of headroom. The cloth roof allows for even more.
Wow, how many were that color?
I've seen two recently that same color. Both at completely different locations.
One was here in town.
The other was in Napa Valley.
(don't have that pic online yet)
Must have been a popular color (or the only one?)
I seem to recall that one of the original design criteria for the 2CV was that the Citroen Chief Engineer had to be able to get into it wearing his hat, and he was a tall man. One of the other criteria was that a farmer had to be able to carry a 2CV full of eggs to market over any French country road and not break any.
Kinda makes modern focus groups sound pretty lame.
did you know that in Europe the 2CV is synonymous with stoners in the same way that the old air cooled VW van is in the states?
The other 2cv was a cream color with wine-colored wings. Both were quite stunning in the desert scenery.
turboswede wrote:
Wow, how many were that color?
I've seen two recently that same color. Both at completely different locations.
One was here in town.
The other was in Napa Valley.
(don't have that pic online yet)
Must have been a popular color (or the only one?)
That was a fairly popular "special model" towards the end of the production run. I've seen tons of them in that colour in Europe, but most of them rusted away by now. They're actually pretty rare and cherished by now.
Re stoner-mobile, there was a certain element of that, but they were more the vehicle of choice for the green party leaning types, at least when I grew up in Germany. Plus they were popular with students simply because they were amongst the cheapest cars to run and insure (and insanely robust mechanically).
In France, they were mostly the vehicle of choice for rural cheap transport...