James Bond may have turned his nose up at them, but that didn’t stop a north-east museum celebrating some of the not-so-classic cars of the past 70 years.
Grampian Transport Museum’s annual How Many Left? event celebrates Britain and Europe’s motoring past, with particular focus on the endangered species of the car world.
This year, about 600 petrolheads arrived in Alford to take a trip back down memory lane with some of the more forgotten cars of the past.
Collectors from as far afield as Peterborough brought their rare vehicles to the museum, some of them dating back to 1945, to take part in the event.
First prize went to the Opal Commodore which topped the rarity index – which is calculated by how few of the cars there are now versus how many were once on the roads at the height of their popularity.
Marketing manager Oliver Edwards says the event’s selling point is a little different to most car shows.
He said: “The attraction is that these are nostalgic cars for people – rather than dreaming about them, people remember them.
“They went on their first dates in them, they went to school in them, they remember that one type had a dodgy steering wheel or the mirrors were in the wrong place, it’s a fond trip down memory lane.”
For the real car enthusiasts there were models from Britain, America, Germany, Italy and even the Soviet Union on show.
But the event also offered fun for all the family, with trips in a Reliant Robin, immortalised in Only Fools and Horses, on the outdoor track.
The centrepiece of the day was a parade involving 60 different cars spanning the past 70 years.
Mr Edwards added: “It’s been a really great day, we’ve held this for three years now and it gets more and more popular every year.”
The next stop on the museum’s calendar is Speed Fest on July 2, which celebrates the fastest cars on the roads today.
The museum is open from 10am-5pm every day.
