Posted on 01/15/2025 6:10:17 AM PST by Red Badger
A VW van sits among burned out homes, Jan. 9, 2025, in Malibu, Calif. Mark J. Terrill/AP Photo
Preston Martin figured the retro blue Volkswagen van he slept in for a year during college was a goner, given that he parked it in a Malibu neighborhood just before the Palisades fire ripped through, reducing homes and cars to rubble and charred metal.
So the surfboard maker was stunned to find that the vehicle survived. Not only that, a photo of the vibrant bus taken by an Associated Press photographer was circulating widely on television and online, giving viewers a measure of joy.
“There is magic in that van,” Martin, 24, said Tuesday in an interview with AP. “It makes no sense why this happened. It should have been toasted, but here we are.”
The neighborhood remains closed to the public, and neither Martin nor the friend and business partner to whom he sold the van last summer, Megan Krystle Weinraub, have been able to inspect the vehicle. In other photos of the van, it appears to have soot on its windows, Martin said.
Martin purchased the 1977 Volkswagen Type 2 somewhat on a whim sometime around his junior year studying mechanical engineering at the University of California, Santa Barbara.
His mother, Tracey Martin, of Irvine, yelled at him for blowing his money, but Martin told her he’d save on rent by fixing up the inside and living in it his senior year, which he did. She came to love the bus, and sewed curtains for the windows.
(Excerpt) Read more at theepochtimes.com ...
You must’ve had your foot to the floor rolling downhill with a tail wind.
Per AI
The top speed of a 1969 Volkswagen bus was approximately 60-65 mph. Car Life magazine reported that the VW Bus had a top speed of “just at 60 mph, which can be maintained for hours without harm”
I had a 1968 van until a tree fell on it, and then I got a 1969. Lived in both of them at one time or another, and drove them all over Oregon, Nevada, and Arizona. Usually did about 55 on level roads, and of course slower uphill.
I had the ‘68 over 85 mph once, coming down US 26 off Mt. Hood, in neutral. Then those old drum brakes faded to where I thought I’d never get it stopped. I wasn’t too worried, but the hitchhiker seemed a bit tense. Fun times.
It was the 1980s, 55, 60, or 65, whatever it did was comfortable, another thing was how it held up to a little off roading, not to beat it deliberately, but traveling where there weren’t roads, it was a fine vehicle.
Yes, those things were a lot better in the rough stuff than people thought, mostly because of the ground clearance. First gear, a firm foot on the gas, and careful steering would get you a lot of places. Not a good idea to go where it was too steep, though.
Saw one today and I thought 60’s for a second , looks great.
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