My fascination with those enormous cars, aka land yachts, can be compared to the fascination I have for Seventies dive watches. When the Eighties arrived I started to dislike those watches. Cushion shaped cases? Mesh bracelets? Bah! But now, decades later, I love those designs.
The same goes for those cars. I come from a very small country that was hit hard by WWII and furthermore 'blessed' with a rather Calvinistic view on life where ostentatious opulence is frowned upon. And because The Netherlands was one of the countries that was struck by the oil boycott of 1973 (and we were singled out for an even more stringent boycott), cars that did 3 miles to the gallon were not very popular here. They weren't even imported.
And when you are used to going about in cars like the VW Beetle and Opel Kadett, those battleships were just out of this world. But in the land of plenty, they were a common sight.
And it is that 'everything is possible' and 'why not?' attitude of the carmakers from that era that produced that awesome automobiles. I'll try to post two-door coupes only because they represent the epitome of those land yachts. And no one seemed to be interested in any kind of fuel economy what so ever
