Surprisingly or not, Cuba’s cars are not only vehicles from the American or even the Soviet era and most of the times you can find pleasant surprises at every step. Just like this once-gracefully Mercedes-Benz 300SL Gullwing.
The car was spotted by Piotr Degler, an automotive photographer who told Classic Driver magazine that he had heard rumours about a neglected 1955 Mercedes-Benz 300SL Gullwing in Cuba. He needed to find quickly a subject for his upcoming 2015 calendar. Just when he thought he stood no chance anymore in finding the car, he found it left abandoned for years under a banana tree. Given the fact that recently Cuba’s government has lifted all the restrictions regarding the car imports, the era that made icons of the island’s vintage automobiles came to an end.
For a month, Piotr Degler has searched every place on the island, travelling more than 1,800 miles and taking more than 25,000 photographs. He asked everyone he would meet, but no one knew anything about a Mercedes-Benz Gullwing. You can see his efforts documented in this astonishing photograph, one of the 12 images from his 2015 calendar, named Carros de Cuba.
Piotr Degler told Classic Driver that “I found many hidden treasures on my travels across Cuba – a Hispano-Suiza being one – but the Gullwing eluded me until a few days before my planned departure. When I first found it, I spent the whole day taking pictures, but then I realised a night shoot might be more appropriate. Finding the car was an indescribable experience,” he said.
If the cars could talk….it would tell incredible stories.
