After nearly 50 years in production, the Golf Mark 8 will be the last combustion engine version of the VW Golf. For many drivers, it spells the end of an era. Here, Guardian readers share their memories of driving the vehicles in decades past.
‘The GTI defined me, I thought’
Having used red tape to disguise my GL as a GTI, I finally got the real thing in 1983. I adored it. I remember that GTI owners would flash each other at the time. This happened even when I had the red tape, and I felt a complete fraud. It stiffened my resolve to get a real one.
It helped that my eldest brother, Geoff, was a VW salesman in Brighton. It felt like such a rocketship, and yet today’s average Kia would probably outpace it. The GTI defined me, I thought, but sadly I now drive a Volvo.
Tim Parker, 63, retired, now living in Sydney
‘I still have it, nearly 27 years later’
I fell in love with the Mark II Golf Cabriolet as a kid. Its friendly double headlights and picnic basket shape seemed perfect to me. I had designs on it being my first car – imagining one of those 80s films where parents give their kid a car with a giant bow – but my parents quickly reminded me that I lacked a licence or money to pay for insurance, so that was that.
A few years later, I had my licence and the Mark III Cabrio was released. I was first on the road with one in my area. Even before the infamous “Pink Moon” commercial, I was picking up friends from parties, driving around in the moonlight and listening to Nick Drake. That first Cabrio only lasted three months before I was hit by a drunk driver, but I was relatively unscathed and bought another one. I still have that car, nearly 27 years later.
Kimberly Blessing, 48, American in Glasgow
‘I thought I was the ultimate in cool’
It was the heady days of the late 80s, and I lusted after a Mk1 Golf GTI convertible. I bought one from Auto Trader – high mileage but in good nick. It was paprika red with a grey hood. I thought I was the ultimate in cool. Me and my girlfriend (now wife of 30 years) drove around Europe that summer, hood down, singing at the top of our lungs to The Wall on the upgraded stereo.
Back home, reality hit. It was very attractive to the local car thieves in Leeds, where it was broken into three times in two-and-a-half years. They nicked the stereo, then the hood was slashed and had to be expensively replaced.
Finally, it was stolen from outside my house one night. The police found it a couple of days later – on bricks, with no wheels, no interior trim, no roof, no bonnet and no engine. Oh, and the no claims bonus on my insurance in tatters.
My son now has a Golf TDI, which is a bit of a money pit with engine issues, but he loves it. He wouldn’t listen!
Paul Elcock, 59, Menston, West Yorkshire
‘I got it secondhand in 1996, and I loved it’
My first serious boyfriend drove a red Golf, which he took up to university where I met him. It enabled us to get out and about on weekends, which was a luxury for students in 1990. On Valentine’s Day, I decorated his driver side window with stickers in the shape of a love heart and he kept them there until they eventually peeled off with the weather.
I bought a Golf myself some years after we’d split and I was with another partner. It was the boxy type – I can’t remember how old the car was when I got it secondhand in 1996, but I loved it. I was living in London and, again, it gave me the freedom to get out of town. I had no thoughts of green transport back then. I’ve had two Golfs since, including one I’m driving now. Despite the VW emissions scandal, I’m a committed fan.
Lucy Rouse, 51, Salisbury, Wiltshire
‘I had the two most nerve-racking drives of my life in it’
My wife and I drove a wonderful VW Golf for five years [from 2016]. Her dad had already used it for many years more. Altogether we ended up putting more than 200,000 miles on the clock and it always churned through the journeys with minimal fuss.
Within those 200,000 miles, we had summer holiday road trips, many laughs, a few arguments, and the two most nerve-racking drives of my life – shooting down to the hospital with my wife in labour, head hanging out of the window in the August evening heat with the air con broken (one of the car’s few hiccups), and the return leg several days later, our tiny daughter wrapped up and strapped in.
Towards the end of its life, the repair costs began to rise. The day before trading it in for an electric car, the dreaded red warning light came on. The next day we limped it down to the dealership and as the salesperson turned the engine over … no red light. A parting gift from our noble steed.
Jon, 31, Tunbridge Wells
