Here's a red Sixties special edition spotted at the side of the road near Pont d'Ain in France. I first saw it whilst passing in summer 2011, then again on the way to Geneva in April 2012, when I stopped for a closer look. One glance at the speedo showed this to be something quite extraordinary. It has apparently done well over 400,000km, though the CT and other stickers in the windscreen indicated that it had been out of action for the last four years or so. With its distinctive twin sunroofs and colourful interior furnishings, it's one of a couple I know of in the region, the other - also red - often being parked up on the hill above my flat in Lyon. You might note the registration in the photos ends with 39, for the neighbouring département of Jura. Under old French law still in force at the time this vehicle was last apparently in action, the plate would have had to be changed for one reflecting the département of Ain (number 01 of France's 93 mainland administrative divisions, Corsica excluded), where it currently resides.

On this second passing, I also noticed a few other oldies parked in the roads around the town, including a Citroën Méhari, a Citroën Acadiane and, something I haven't seen since I was a growing lad, a Volvo 244 Saloon in that most '70s-like shade of carrot juice orange. I remember going with my dad to look at one of those for sale secondhand in the mid 1980s, and even then it was considered an old stalwart from another era.

I passed this R4 Sixties most recently in August 2012, the old soldier still sitting idle. Will it ever see a new dawn to help it over the half-million mark?