Spotted on the Road

We were going to the supermarket last week when we saw this car headed toward the fuel pumps. Naturally, we stopped for a chat.

The car is a Salmson VAL 3 from 1925 belonging to a man who has his workshop near la Roche Posay. He collects pre-war cycle cars, and although this tiny car is just that - tiny - I would have one. We may actually have seen this car - or one of the owner's other cars - at an event around the area. I would have to check through thousands of photos to be sure.

Salmson is a French engineering company founded as a pump manufacturer in 1890. In 1896 it started building internal combustion engines and turned to automobile and aeroplane manufacturing. They built their last car in 1957.