Opel Corsa Swing/GT Opel Corsa A 1982-1992


Opel Corsa, with a lady as beautiful as the old man's ex-wife from Stokke.
The old guy on a trip in his Opel Corsa, admittedly in his younger days. His wife from Lithuania is no longer with him and hasn't been there since.

Well, this car might be a tad too old to be a hot rod in 2020, but since I've seen a bunch of those old Opels used as hot rods, like a late '70s Opel Rekord up in North-Trøndelag in Norway a few years back, I figured the Opel Corsa belongs here on the blog.

An old buddy of my dad supposedly drove a white Opel Corsa, 'bout a 1982 model, all the way till early 2000. This fella was a real country original, always drivin' an old German vintage car. Before '82, he's supposed to have driven an old red Volkswagen Karmann Ghia. From 2000 onward, he's always had a bottle-green Opel Astra wagon, 'round a 2001 model.
This fella lived in Stokke in Vestfold Norway, had a mix of Inner Grenland and Inner Vestfold dialect, and I remember him as a real funny guy.

The man had a house with a big yard when my dad talked to him back in 2000. Dad said the house was in good shape, but the 'house book,' well, that wasn't doing so well... And at the tender age of 13, I pondered for a good while what this 'house book' was, only to find out in my older days from dad that it was all about hylotrupes! Yep, those pests known for causing havoc in door and window frames! (House book in Norwegian is almost the same as Housebukk, which is what these pests are called in Norwegian).

Not surprising, considering the man swore by old worn-out cars. At over 70 years old, and probably several million kilometers under his belt, he'd only owned three cars (read: driven 'em to the ground), all of 'em old German makes.
In 2019, I experienced this firsthand when I flew up to Alta in Norway with my mom and dad. The crazy man first drove a short trip from Stokke to Fornebu in Norway to visit his son, then drove off at 5:00 the next morning, and kept on driving, and driving, and driving, all the way through northern Sweden up to the border between Sweden and Finland in 19 hours.
And there, in a grove way up in Sápmi, he supposedly finally laid down to sleep in his "house book". (The link is to a Norwegian video).

At 6:00 the next morning, his journey continued to Alta. A few hours later, I met him at an orienteering race in Masi, where he bragged about being proud to have fixed up his car again, about how the coil was working now, and that the car even got EU approval. Additionally, the man was mighty proud that his FM radio started working again when he got through Sweden. So yeah, this guy must've been certifiably crazy!


"You can get this car as recent as a 1992 model. That's also in a fierce version called Opel Corsa Swing. Or you can pimp it out into a Corsa GT, which I reckon is way cooler. 'Cause this one can go faster than an old '70s Rekord."


Corsa, GT

 
Opel Corsa Swing, produced until ca. 1993.



























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