Cortina GTE

The Cortina GTE in 2012 with original wheels and factory wheel covers

CORTINA GTE WORDS AND PHOTOS ALAN STOKER

“Yes madam, … yes sir, we have a Mk3 GT Cortina at our North Shore Dealership.” The salesman at Campbell Motors assured us that it was a Mk 3 .

At 16 years of age I had persuaded my mother that her next car should be a Mk3 Cortina and at that age, as did most boys, I thought I knew a bit about cars.

Campbell Motors in Upper Queen Street had no Mk3 Cortinas in stock, but there was a Mk3 GT on the ‘Shore for $3,000. No, this can’t be right, I knew very well that a Mk3 GT was at least another $1,000, however the salesman insisted he was correct and that the car would be brought to our Mt Albert address for us to inspect.

The GTE and my old Vauxhall photo taken Taranaki in 1972.

The salesman was partially correct when a few hours later the GT arrived, but it was the wrong model!

Delivered to the door was a 1970 Mk2 GTE. Thinking back to 1972, I don’t recall ever having seen one of these. As a 16 year old I was certainly impressed, and it had red go-faster racing stripes.

It is hard to recall 48 years later but my mother must have liked it, either that or I was a better salesperson than I was given credit for, as the GTE never went back to the dealership and has stayed in the family since.

So now we owned a 18 month old silver Mk2 GTE Cortina with 11,000 miles on the clock and the price, $2800, was well under normal.

Oh how I loved every chance I had to drive that car, even making excuses that my own car was not running very well, and I did not want to break down. It was so much more fun, and much much quicker than my ‘59 Vauxhall Victor.

One fun story among many to share was a trip returning to Auckland from Tauranga via the Kaimai Hills. I was gunning it up the hill at about 90mph passing everything but keeping my eye on a MkII Zephyr which was gaining on me quite quickly...