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ANG015 - Edition 2,000

This is the 'Supervan' that was owned by the late Brian Nelson, owner of the 'Monte Carlo' garage in Dublin and was used on two trips that were made in his Anglia Van in the early 1970’s. We first spoke to Alice his daughter earlier this year and she explained that she had made a short film about the story - “A Map With Gaps”. There were two trips one from Dublin to Moscow and then the following year the van made a second long distance trip from Dublin to Timbuktu. The first trip with co-driver Paddy McClintock was in 1972, sailing to Helsinki they then drove into the Soviet Union from Leningrad to Moscow and then on to Kiev in the Ukraine, from there they drove into Poland and then passed through Romania, Bulgaria, Turkey, Greece, Yugoslavia, Italy and France before finally sailing back to Ireland. 14 Countries, 12,000 miles, in 26 days. The Ford Motor Company of Eire helped out by providing parts etc as did Duckhams and Dunlop. The second trip in 1973 was to Timbuktu and was done to raise money for Famine Relief, this time the Co-Driver was Gerry Mooney. The route taken was down through Spain, across to Morocco and straight down to Timbuktu through the Sahara Desert and then back to Dublin.