Remember the scene from National Lampoon’s Vacation, when Clark and Rusty go to pick up the brand-new Antarctic Blue Super Sports Wagon? We all know that they wound up with two tons of pea-green fun known as the Wagon Queen Family Truckster, but did you ever wonder what the Super Sports Wagon was supposed to actually look like? Well, it’s not blue, but this 1973 Chevrolet Chevelle comes about as close as you could probably get to being accurate. About the only thing that this Chevelle and the Family Truckster have in common is that they are four-door station wagons…after that, it’s day and night.
From tip to tail, this Chevelle is one smart-looking people mover. The 1973 Laguna nose looks gorgeous, the color is an excellent choice, the tinted glass is a nice touch, and having the whole car slightly lowered over Rally wheels on white-letter tires is a good call. But the good news isn’t the modifications, it’s the factory options: the 454 cubic inch big block, which would have had it’s new net rating of 245 horsepower…a far cry from just a couple of years prior but still a torque-laden lump of a mill that could make magic happen. The other is factory air conditioning, which some might decry for being a luxury. If it was a race car, we’d agree. This isn’t a race car, this is the car you drive first and race if you are in the mood. Happiness in a car like that is kicking on the air conditioning during the summer months!
Long roofs don’t come better than this Chevelle, that’s for sure!
Craigslist Link: 1973 Chevrolet Chevelle station wagon
That’s a good looking wagon.
Always loved these, sweet curves along the sides and that neat-o rear hatch. I figured when I was a kid I might get one later, then they all seemed to disappear off the face of the planet.
If Chevelles seemed like a barge back when, put it next to an Excursion and it’d look like a sports car. A cross-country trip in the above would be the bomb.
Hard to sell a bumper sandwich car for that kind of money.