Hello, bonjour and boujou!
It’s 26th June 2022, I’m on a bicycle,
and once again, I’ve brought you all to a field
in the middle of nowhere.
(This particular one is in Normandy.)
So I suppose the question is: what exactly am I doing here?
Well let’s rewind three months.
Back in March I made a video about the legendary Cityrama Citroen 55s,
the fantastic futuristic tourist buses of 1960s Paris.
But the one thing I couldn’t do in that video
that I would have loved to
is show you one of the buses in real life.
I just couldn’t find any information on the internet about what had happened to them;
this old Flickr photo from 2008 seemed to be
the last time anyone had seen one of them alive.
But I thought,
if anyone knows more about this, it’s my viewers...
and sure enough, a couple of you told me the Cityrama from the photo still survives,
but it’s the only one left,
and it’s kept in private storage, locked up in a secret location.
But then two weeks ago I received a new message.
And that’s why today, I’ve cycled 25km across rural Normandy
to bring you all to this field.
I’ve come to an event called Les Ruralies,
which is not easy to pronounce if you’re not French,
but it is a classic car event with a rural twist
– in other words, it’s not just cars,
there are also tractors,
trucks,
vans,
tractors,
more tractors,
you get the idea.
And to be fair, there are some absolutely gorgeous vintage vehicles here
that have been beautifully looked after
by some very proud owners.
And of course, we’re not here to see any of that.
Let’s face it, there is only one thing we’re here for.
This is the last surviving Cityrama Citroen 55.
(And it’s just about hanging on...)
There’s rust everywhere,
it’s lost part of its big red fin at the back,
and most of the windows have long since disappeared,
which, if anything, has vastly improved the ventilation issues with the original design.
But regardless of the state that it’s in,
it is brilliant just to see it in real life.
This is not only the first time that I’ve ever seen it,
it’s the first time nearly anyone has seen it for something like twenty years.
And almost unbelievably, someone actually drove it here.
It still works!
I’m told they had to drive it very gently
to make sure that no more bits of it fell off on the way,
and apparently it didn’t have to travel too far from the secret location
(they still won’t tell anyone where exactly that is).
But more to the point: what is it doing here?
Why have they decided to bring it out now
after such a long time hidden away?
Well it’s good news!
The Cityrama is now owned by a local group of classic vehicle enthusiasts
called the ANAU,
and thanks to them,
it is finally going to be sent to the repair shop.
But before they hand it over,
they’ve brought it here today
in order to generate a bit of publicity
and try and raise extra funds for the restoration work.
And more about that later if you’d like to help out.
But first here’s Philippe from Normandy Classics,
the company who’ve been given the job of restoring it,
and he’s going to tell us which parts of the vehicle they need to work on.
Luckily, Philippe and his team have literally tonnes of experience of restoring classic vehicles,
and it’s great to know the Cityrama is in good hands.
If all goes well, then in four years’ time, I’ll make another video about it,
and it should look quite different.
But right now, I can’t help noticing that someone has left the back door open.
And there is no way we’re missing an opportunity to take a quick look inside.
When I made that video about the Cityrama back in March,
I was hoping we might track it down one day,
but I never dreamed that just three months later,
I would be literally standing inside it.
Yet these are the same panoramic windows
that gave beautiful views of Paris to hundreds of happy tourists,
while gradually toasting them.
And you can still see the buttons on the armrest
where passengers could choose the language
that they wanted their guided tour to be in,
something that would have blown your mind back when these buses were built.
Anyway I’m going to jump back off the bus
before I accidentally break something irreplaceable,
but before we end the video,
I promised the people from the association that I would share their donation link.
So if you'd like to make a small contribution to restoring the Cityrama,
the link for donations is on screen now,
and I’ll put it in the description too.
I need to warn you the site is exclusively in French,
but hopefully it’s fairly intuitive even if you don’t speak the language.
You just need to select the amount you want to donate,
fill in your name and address,
whack in your payment details,
press the big red button
and you’re done.
Meanwhile, if you want to see the Cityrama yourself,
I’m afraid you'll either have to wait four years, or be very quick:
it’s at Le Mans this weekend for the classic car race.
After that it will go to the repair shop to be looked after by the experts
and I don’t know whether people like you and me will be able to go and see it.
So a massive thank you to everyone who tagged me on social media
to let me know that this event was happening today,
a big merci to the ANAU and the team from Normandy Classics for all of their help,
thank you all for watching,
and I will you soon.