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Date:         Thu, 18 Nov 1999 22:03:57 -0500
Reply-To:     Woody Halsey <WoodyHalsey@COMPUSERVE.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Woody Halsey <WoodyHalsey@COMPUSERVE.COM>
Subject:      Copy of: Re: take a car from Europe to North America?
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1

Dear Dreamers,

Here's a Vanagon story that may amuse you. It also *does* eventually respond to the importing question.

When I lived with my young family in France from 1980 to 1986, I started out with one child and ended with four.Towards the end of our stay we decided we needed a true family car and settled on a beautiful two-toned,

standard shift, navy blue Vanagon minibus (called "Caravelle," if memory serves, over there) with grey cloth upholstery, rubber mats on the floor,

and a rear window wiper. We drove it happily for a year or so and then sold it *at a profit!* when we moved back to the US. How did we make out so well, you ask. Easy, the dollar was at a record high against the French franc when we bought it and had dropped dramatically by the time we sold,

meaning that the francs we got on the sale bought a few more dollars than

we had put into it. Brilliant planning of course! Well, thank you Ronald Reagan and James Baker.

So, in July 1986 back to Massachusetts we went, where my sister had picked out the 1983 red and white V'gon which I am still coaxing to life today. It had but 28,000 miles on it and ran like a top. In September 1989 I was able to return to France for another year. Of course, we set out to find another second hand van. Guess what. They are virtually non-existent on the market in Europe. People buy them and keep them. As we looked and looked, through our friends and contacts there, we began to despair. At one point my wife

said, "Wouldn't it be funny if we came across the one we had before?" The proverbial LED illuminated in my dim noggin. "Why don't we just *call* the people we sold it to?" I remembered their name because it is the same as the famous race car driver, Alain Prost. Found their phone number through

the Minitel, a precursor to the Internet in France.(Historical note: all homes in the town where we lived, Rennes, were equipped for free by the phone company with little computer phone books in ... 1981. You thought the French were into only wine and cheese? Think again.) Called the Prosts and asked if they were interested in selling the lovely blue Vanagon back to us. They were. Not only that, they had put less than 20,000 miles on it in three years. So we bought it back and used it happily for another 12 months in Spain and southern France. Full disclosure: mechanical problems this time around forced me to learn some new vocabulary and we did have to replace a CV joint or two, but basically it was trouble free and the perfect vehicle for moving our family and all our stuff around.

What makes me think of this story? The query about bringing cars to North

America from Europe or elsewhere. We loved the van so much that our first

instinct was to bring it home with us. We did look into the laws. It was a total nightmare and I would discourage any and all from getting into it. At least in the US the laws are created specifically to protect homegrown dealers. The required modifications and paperwork and customs quarantines

and tariffs were simply not to be believed. Or at least not worth the trouble to circumvent. And we are not talking about emissions standards. I remember one specific example. The DOT required replacing the alternator bracket! Why, I asked. That's just the rule, I was told. Obviously, it was just a piece of the barbed wire fence they were throwing up at the behest

of car dealers here to make it impossible for people to save money abroad.

Moral of the tale: Enjoy your Vanagon in Europe, stay in touch, but don't

try to bring her home. It's easier to finagle a visa for your significant

other!

Woody


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