Sage Advice: When high hopes float

I was fixing to write a column about beans and how it’s a tough year to be one in my garden, what with all the deer and rabbits and no rain. But then, as I was pretending to be out on the Internet doing useful work, I saw the coolest thing I’ve seen online since that time a group of Cubans got caught crossing the Florida Straits atop a 1951 Chevy pickup held afl oat by empty oil drums.

And that floating truck, which made headlines about four years ago, was way cooler than the fi rst time I saw the Amphicar. The Amphicar, from what I remember, was a German-made machine that looked like a regular convertible except for the twin propellers hanging out the back.

I first saw it in a magazine when I was probably 11 years old tops. I wanted one immediately. That, I decided then and there, would be my fi rst car when I turned 16. For the record, it wasn’t.

My first car was a 1984 Cavalier. The Cavalier was probably the better choice. For starters, it was a whole lot cheaper than a limited- edition, collector’s item, antique boat-car would have been. The Cavalier couldn’t float, but if you got to going real fast on a wet parking lot and cut the wheel to the left, it would hydroplane at at least 30 mph. Besides, the Cavalier could do other things, things no Amphicar could.

It could go off-roading with all but the biggest of four-wheel drive trucks. It could catch a whole lot of air at the railroad crossing leading up to my grandparents’ house.

One very memorable night it cleared a full 12- ounce can. And it could almost safely, though nowhere near comfortably, seat eight on a trip to the beach. Eventually I sold that Cavalier, but not the memories that went with the permanently dented roof or the deep scar along the passenger’s side created by a rather well-made fence line on one icy morning.

The Cavalier and the vehicles that followed, those solid Detroit chariots that took so much abuse over the years and served me well, though even I couldn’t have faulted them had they not, had made me forget almost completely that I had once dreamed of a car that could not only uncomfortably and perhaps unsafely transport seven friends and acquaintances to the beach, but once there drive them into the ocean without killing us all and, more importantly, ruining the cloth seats.

Almost. I say almost because I got reminded Wednesday morning while pretending to be doing useful work on the Internet. See a British car maker is bringing his plans for a car-boat hybrid to the states.

The car, called the Aquada, looks like a convertible roadster, and according to a press release on the Gibbs Technologies Web site, can go 100 mph on land and 30 mph on water. The Web site explained that previous fl oating cars could only muster about 7 mph on sea. No matter than I haven’t felt the need to go 100 mph on land since I owned my Cavalier. That 30 mph by sea means the thing is fast enough to water ski behind. Nothing is cooler than water skiing behind a vehicle that has no business pulling a water skier. My Cavalier, and I swear this is true, once pulled my friends and I across a buddy’s pond. We weren’t exactly water skiing, true, since we never stood up, but we did more or less bob behind until land came rising up to meet us and we were dragged through cow manure, thorns and razor-sharp grass. Though each of us swore to the one waiting to go behind that it was the single worst experience of the night, we all had to give it a try, just in case it wasn’t.

I’m ready for my Aquada now. Its wheels, the Web site says, tuck inside the body when you press a button. The press release mentions that it only takes 12 seconds to do this, though for the life of me I can’t figure out why the time it takes to do so matters. You’ve got a car that floats.

Unfortunately, the operative word in that last sentence is you. Though the Web site didn’t list any prices, other places on the Internet say it will cost somewhere between $100,000 and $250,000. Even if I save every penny I can, the best I’ll be able to do is a 1984 Cavalier and a half dozen 55-gallon oil drums. And that’s fi ne. The Cavalier-oil drum machine probably won’t be able to reach 30 mph on open water, but then there’s no way that Aquada could clear a full 12-ounce can placed on the railroad crossing going up to my grandparents’ house.

Mark Sage