With summer upon us, the memorable family road trips are due to commence.

With summer upon us, the memorable family road trips are due to commence.

If you told this to the young people today, they wouldn't believe it: cars built last century almost never had video screens built into the back of the seat headrests. Many of them didn't even have airconditioning.

And the vinyl of that era - only the more expensive cars had cloth, while leather was the stuff of upper luxury - was specifically designed to heat to three times the ambient temperature and fuse to skin.

But there was something even hotter than the vinyl: the chrome-plated, all-metal seatbelt buckle. If you returned to a parked car and didn't wrap the bottom of your T-shirt around this buckle before touching it, you'd almost certainly require a skin graft.

The family beach holiday is an Aussie staple.

The family beach holiday is an Aussie staple.

Under such stifling circumstances, cars were never driven in midsummer, right?

Well, no. If my memory is right - and that of almost everyone who grew up from the 1960s through to the '80s - we spent more time in cars then than in today's climate-controlled, iPod-connected, screen-filled conveyances.

Back in the day, taking a jet between cities was for the rich. Most of us made it to those northern beach holidays crammed among siblings in the back of mobile ovens, crawling down single-lane ''highways'' for long hours behind caravans and trucks.

A good picnic spot could be just about anywhere.

A good picnic spot could be just about anywhere.

The occasional burst of overtaking brought with it the racket of roasting wind buffeting through open windows.

And would we have changed a thing? Probably, yes. Possibly everything. But we can still treasure the memories. Here are a few battle stories from veterans of those days.

Tim Ross, comedian

Every good road trip should involve some fishing.

Every good road trip should involve some fishing.

We always went on driving holidays; everyone did. We didn't have a caravan but you'd always put as much stuff into the back of the car as you possibly could. My old man turned it into an art form - the way that everything had to go in the right place and then if it wasn't right, he'd have to take everything out and pack it again.

People used to drive forever and no airconditioning meant if we were hot, we would just wind down the windows. And then mum would get one pack of jelly beans to last the family the whole trip and back. So we used to get one jelly bean every 500 kilometres, or so it seemed.

Steve Bedwell, comedian

My dad wasn't one to stop. He was very specific about time and destination, how long it would take. And nothing, no amount of cheap roadside tomatoes or watermelons on the Pacific Highway, would get him to stop.

He was hell-bent on getting to wherever he had to get and that was that. Even bathroom breaks were very, very rare - only when he wanted to go. You had to hold on and pray that dad wanted to go soon. That's what it was like.

Jane Caro, author

The Volkswagen Beetle was the family car that we drove - I think it was our first family holiday in Australia - up to Surfers Paradise in Queensland, from Sydney, with six of us on board.

There was my mother and father in the front, my father driving. Three of us kids - I was the oldest at about six or seven - in the back. And then my baby sister, who was brand new.

The old Volkswagen Beetle used to have a little sort of compartment - over the engine, now that I think of it - that was like a little box and you could store things in it. My mother made a bed for my little baby sister in there and she travelled to the Gold Coast in this lethal position. But back in the '60s - I mean, you didn't wear seatbelts - you did things like that.

Pru Black, design lecturer

There would always be the drives for barbecues or picnics and we would load up the car. Dad had his own barbecue that he kept in a box, pristine, and you would get the plate out and screw the legs in. You would set it up anywhere and then you'd lay the picnic rug out. We'd go anywhere and the photos show the places were pretty ugly, like they weren't even beautiful.

You'd just go for a drive, it didn't really matter where. But as long as it was about 20 miles out of town, you'd just stop, you'd set up your barbecue, you'd lay the picnic rug out and that would be it.

Wendy Harmer, comedian

Dad would just drive until the petrol gauge said half full and then he would stop, we'd have the picnic and then drive home. It didn't even matter where we were. If it was on a median strip, it wouldn't matter. And we'd have these bottles of warm Kia-Ora 50-50 cordial and tomato sandwiches and a bit of fruit cake. Then we would all get back in the car and then drive home.

I think we inherited the tradition from England, where it made sense because there was actually a place to go: a nice old curiosity shop or a castle. Here there's nothing to see, except paddocks with sheep in them. Also in England, your average car was warmer and had more windows than your average family home.

But in Australia, when you've got a huge backyard, why would you pile six people into a tiny little car and drive for six hours?

Bill Woods, broadcaster

Throughout my childhood, my dad always had a Kingswood station wagon. He used to put the back seat down, set up a little makeshift bed with a few cushions and I'd lie unrestrained in the back with picnic hampers around me or an Esky and maybe the dog.

We'd cruise to a fishing location up or down the coast and I'd be looking at the blue sky and the trees flashing past. It was all very relaxing and enjoyable - totally unsafe and illegal but a fantastic way to travel. You had the window down for airconditioning, you sang songs, told jokes and stories and made up games about number plates.

Mike Whitney, TV host

We did a lot of car trips when I was growing up. We used to go to Forster every year for holidays and the first few times I can recall going out to Wisemans Ferry, getting the punt across and going on from there.

Other times we'd take my sister horse riding down south at Darkes Forest or out to Rouse Hill. There were no expressways, so it was a long way in those days. Dad had a '64 Falcon and then later a '69 Ford Fairmont with a 302 V8 in it. He'd play Robert Goulet, Glen Campbell and Frank Sinatra on an eight-track cassette player as we drove and my sister and I loved it.

Laurie Lawrence, swim coach

On Friday night, we'd pile in the back of the FJ Holden and away we'd go to Pallarenda, which is a drive along the foreshore of Townsville. I remember lying in the car looking out and watching the moon as we went along. The windows were open - there was no airconditioning. Then you'd sit up and see the moon shimmer on the water and wonder how it could actually keep up with you. But the best thing of all was the fish and chips shop when we got to Pallarenda. We'd sit in a little park on the end, stare across at Magnetic Island and eat fish and chips.

Ian Turpie, entertainer

Dad's first car was a 1936 Plymouth - great car. Big. My mother and father had seven kids and we'd all be in the back - no seatbelts in those days. Some were sitting and some were standing and some were lying. We lived about an hour out of Melbourne in a place called Boronia and about all we ever did was go up to the Dandenongs, only about 10 miles (16 kilometres), and have a picnic.

It was probably incredibly boring but we loved it. Dad worked pretty hard - he didn't get home until about 11 o'clock most nights - and it was just good to get out. Beautiful memories.

Andrew Daddo, TV presenter

Most of our summer driving was from Mount Eliza to Point Leo, with four kids in the back seat. Once mum and dad had a brand-new silver Holden Premier - mags, electric aerial, electric windows.

To reserve my seat by the window for one particular drive, I put chewing gum on the seatbelt. When I tried to get it off, I couldn't.

I was sitting there chewing my seatbelt when finally my father sees what I'm doing, sees this chewing gum and realises that his brand-new perfect car was forever ruined.

Comments from Wendy Harmer, Steve Bedwell, Jane Caro, Tim Ross and Pru Black are from Wide Open Road, ABC Books, $65.