AN urban explorer has shared footage of a pair of iconic British sports cars he found abandoned in a garden, with weeds growing inside.
Stuart Stokes, known online as IMSTOKZE, posted a clip of the amazing classic left to rot on his YouTube channel.
YouTubeUrban explorer Stuart Stokes came across a pair of iconic British sports cars in Cornwall[/caption]
YouTubeOne was this lovely red Lotus Esprit[/caption]
YouTubeThe other was a silver Jaguar XJS[/caption]
In the clip, Stuart was visiting a quiet town in Cornwall which house some real motoring treasures.
On the driveway of an end-of-terrace house tucked around a corner sat a pair of British automotive legends.
One was a Jaguar XJS convertible in pale silver, which a registration check reveals dates back to 1989.
The low-slung convertible was the V12 version of the car, which packed an extra performance punch.
Sat next to it was a bright red 1982 Lotus Esprit.
The car is perhaps best know to Brits for its starring turn in the 1977 Bond film The Spy Who Loved Me.
The iconic film sees Roger Moore drive a specially modified Esprit underwater to escape a band of evil henchmen.
Indeed, a Swiss engineering firm took inspiration from that scene to create the world’s first real swimming motor.
Sadly, this Esprit and the accompanying XJS were in nowhere near good enough condition to drive let alone dive.
The had seemingly been abandoned for some years and a thick carpet of grass was growing in the shade underneath them.
The paintwork on both was badly scratched, while the open engine bay of the Lotus revealed a thicket of weeds growing inside.
According to the DVLA, the Jag had not been taxed since 2016 and its MOT expired the year before.
Likewise, the Esprit had remained untaxed since 2008, but neither had been registered SORN.
Social media commenters begged for the cars to be saved.
One wrote: “Awesome classics just sitting they need to be restored so they can be on the road again.”
Another added: “Well ‘nobody does it better’.. with the Lotus. Proper Bond model.”
One driver saved his classic Ford after “almost forgetting” what it looked like.
YouTubeThe Esprit had weeds growing inside[/caption]
YouTubeBoth cars had been off the road for some years[/caption]“}]]