By John Lamm
Horatio McCallister is from Springfield, Oregon, where he captains a number of ships and owns his own seafood restaurant, The Frying Dutchman. In his free time, he teaches sailing and operates the projector on movie nights at a local summer camp, runs “a small academy for lobsters,” and once captained the yacht of eccentric billionaire Artie Ziff. If we had to guess which Fiat best suited Mr. McCallister, we’d put our money on one of the trio of 500s the Italian marque showed off at the Vans U.S. Open of Surfing in Huntington Beach, California.
You see, the three 500s Fiat brought to California—a standard model, a cabrio, and an Abarth—are the closest things yet to the amphibious Fiats made famous by the brand’s commercial signifying its return to America. In fact, they’re actually personal watercraft with 500 body shells constructed around them. In addition to the PWCs-turned-Cinquecentos, Fiat also brought along its fantastically cool 500C Beach Cruiser that debuted at last year’s SEMA show.
- Instrumented Test: 2013 Fiat 500C Abarth
- First Drive: 2014 Fiat 500L
- Instrumented Test: 2013 Fiat 500E EV
Of course, Fiat isn’t the first manufacturer of quirky subcompacts to convert one of its offerings into a seagoing vessel. Mini grafted the body shell and accessories off one of its convertible models onto a boat and went for a pleasant cruise on the Charles River in Cambridge, Massachusetts, last fall. If we’re lucky, maybe we could stage a small regatta between the seagoing Fiats and Minis and call it The America’s Teacup. If either manufacturer is interested, we can recommend the name of a great captain.
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Car & Driver