The Road Back to Scotland

After a nostalgic weekend in Warwick, finding my old car, and meeting up with some great friends, I thought I'd indulge another little trip down “Memory Lane” and visit the city where I studied a few years ago. Memory lane turned out to be a fantastic little back road from Haseley to Kenilworth, zigzagging around Warwickshire fields and farms, before stretching out into the long, arrow-straight A429, passing the illustrious University of Warwick and into the not-so-illustrious City of Coventry.

The city centre is, by any standards, a bit grim, but it was nice to be back in familiar surroundings. After a satisfying coffee and a slice of the best carrot & walnut cake in my old favourite café, “Brown's,” I got back into the Astra GTC for the next stage of my journey.

Brown's Café

I eventually managed to negotiate Coventry's fantastically complicated road system and after half an hour of wishing the good people at Peter Vardy Vauxhall had selected the Sat-Nav option for this car, I found the motorway and began powering northwards, up the M1.

The Astra GTC performs well on the motorway, but despite being among the fastest roads in the country they are still incredibly dull. Not a lot happened between Coventry and my overnight stop in the grand old City of York and I think even the car was thoroughly bored with the 70mph cruise.

So the following morning, I imposed a motorway ban! OK, there wasn't much motorway left to use, but the principle remained. The Astra GTC seemed quite happy with this decision too, as it got back to doing what it does best, through the Yorkshire Moors. I love the sound the car makes when I give it the beans. The turbo gives it the slightest of asthmatic wheezes when lifting off the gas, but it adds tremendous character to a tremendous car. The smile on my face was matched only by the smile on the car's grill as it bobbed and weaved through the land. The car feels totally planted and still, after 2000 miles of relentless punishment, it revels in the twisty stuff, with the clever new mechanical bits under the skin keeping the car level in the corners, when it really should be wallowing into a ditch at the side of the road.

The control you feel in this car is immense. I never once felt that gut-churning sensation that I had taken a bend too fast, yet I am pretty sure other cars would have struggled to cope with some of the corners at the speeds I was comfortable doing in this car. There is an obvious warning, then, with this car. It is hugely competent, and inspires a great deal of confidence, so you always have to be aware of the speeds you are doing. If I was driving something else, and found myself being overtaken by an Astra GTC, I wouldn't even try to keep up. It can do things other cars just can't.

All too soon I arrived at Darlington, and time for another coffee break As my road-atlas starts to fall apart (a sure sign that I'm on a good journey), I plan out a route to the A68. The road that will bring me to my final overnight stop, in Edinburgh.

This is a pretty impressive piece of road-building, albeit a very dangerous road. South of the Border, the road consists of impossibly long straights stretching out beyond the horizon, but continually rising and falling with some long steep climbs and descents, interspersed with small hidden dips and blind crests. The sensation is similar to a “Big Dipper” style fun-ride but it's easy to let the concentration slip when there are no corners for miles.

Further North, I made the final border crossing of my journey and I rolled back into Scotland where, immediately, the roads got interesting again. However, the Electronic Speed Limiter had to be deployed, as the roads in the Scottish Borders have (probably) the highest concentration of Speed Cameras in the country! On roads where I need to be fully focussed on the road ahead, watching out for deer, sheep and other motorists, it's good to be able to let the car worry about the speedometer. The Speed Limiter will even beep if I get onto a long steep hill where gravity starts to pull the car over the set limit, encouraging me to cover the brakes to avoid any unnecessary fines.

Scotland - England Border

It wasn't long before I reached the City of Edinburgh, and arrived at my accommodation. The following day I head across town for a fantastic lunch with two of the “Polar” Bears (The Sporting Bears in Scotland) who helped make my journey come together. From there I visited the Headquarters of CHAS – The Children's Hospice Association in Scotland.

Visiting CHAS

I had a fascinating chat with Kirsten, from the fundraising team at CHAS, about the two hospices they run, Rachel House in Kinross, and Robyn House in Balloch. They hold open days and guided tours throughout the year so people can come and see some of the fantastic work they do for families with children who have life-limiting conditions. On the CHAS website, Ewan Macgregor (no stranger to adventure, himself) explains what CHAS does:

CHAS Website

CHAS has received almost £20,000 from the Sporting Bears Motor Club. Much of this can be attributed to the fantastic Dream Rides events held throughout the year. If you own an interesting classic, or modern sports car, why not join the Sporting Bears and bring it along to one of these events, taking people out for a ride to raise money for great charities like CHAS. The annual membership fee for the club is just £20 a year, and this covers all the club's costs allowing every penny raised through events and tours to be directed to the children's charities.

Sporting Bears Website

Climbing Snowdon

The final leg of my great drive took place last week end.  From Scafell we took the windy A595 onto the A590, enjoying Lake District scenery before hitting the M6 until junction 20a where 20 miles on the M56 takes up into North Wales.  The A494 joins the A55 and more breath-taking scenery awaits.  My passengers are very happy with the comfort and ride, stating that they are not sure if it my driving or the car that is to congratulate. The road runs along the coast providing a wonderful backdrop for the drive.  

We join the A5 for a couple of minutes before picking up signs for Llamberis and the A4244. Traffic was very quiet on this Saturday morning and the car again did us proud.  Our ETA of 12:00 was beaten by 30 min and we took to the mountain kitted and watered.

The Llamberis trek is one of the longest but easiest routes, hopefully emulating aspect of Kilimanjaro. Three hours and up and two down resulted in a well-deserved pint (not for me), before returning home, reversing much of the above route.

The weather began to cloud over producing a moody backdrop of lakes and mountains. Queen entertained us as we pulled in loose ends as this was the last time we would be together before meeting in Tanzania.

There will be no blog for the next few weeks, however I will be doing a lot of filming as we climb, leaving the beloved GTC in Heathrow car park.

Thanks again Peter Vardy for this great car!