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volkswagen

The essence of fun

5 August, 2025

The dak-dak-dak of the beach buggy’s air-cooled engine spreads head-turning smiles wherever it goes. It has a timeless appeal but it also comes laden with more than a hint of nostalgia for the golden summers of youth, before ice creams — and suntans for that matter — became a guilty pleasure.
The boom time for the beach buggy was the 1960s. They were invented then but volume manufacture screeched to a halt in the 1970s. New car legislation in the US outlawed things like open wheels and exposed engines, but the owner of this classic example, Rob Schrickel, says small-scale manufacture has bubbled along happily ever since.
“They never really went away,” he says.

Kombined Affair

22 June, 2023

We recently caught up with VW enthusiast Steve Fejos, son of Hungarian parents who arrived in New Zealand as refugees after the ’56 uprising. Being European Steve was naturally attracted to European cars, especially the more affordable VWs. “We must have owned at least 20 Kombis and Beetles over the years,” says Steve. “My father was a handyman and was always doing things — buying, selling, and doing work and repairs at his property, so the Kombi was the ideal work horse he needed.”
As a young boy, under 10 years of age, Steve always liked to tag along with his father. Kombis in the 1960s and 1970s were usually rust buckets, but that didn’t deter his father from buying one every year and spending the winter months ‘doing it up’.