The Lonesome Dragon Tour - day 3

 Would you Adam & Eve it but today was even better than yesterday! Partly that was because the sun made an appearance but also because of that drivers heaven called the Elan Valley.

I've been coming to Wales for several road trips but most were in my kit car and that never took bumps very well, so the Elan Valley was a mixed blessing; fast roads but bumpy, which meant I used to ground my very low kitcar frequently, not an enjoyable experience.

But Barry is in another class - more ground clearance and silky smooth with it (the new suspension is harsh at slow speeds but is perfecto when speeds increase).

But I digress - first up were the Elan Valley lakes and you can see that they aren't short of water round here:

I did do some drone work at one of the dams but it needs some editing to improve it so I might add it later.

After that was the run through the valley itself and I'll try not to bore you again with how frickin brilliant it is. It looks like a windswept moor so I rarely stop for photos. It's about 50% B-road and the rest single lane but it's good single lane because you can see far ahead and don't have to slow to a crawl for all the blind bends. This makes those sections like a go-kart track; very narrow and roller-coaster like - you lose your stomach on occasion.

Sadly, the Two Hoots cafe at Devils Bridge, my regular stop from previous trips, has gone. The local steam railway that it used to be next to decided to end their lease, it seems, so they can add on to the station or something. There is another cafe at the other end of town but it has no character, just a modern money-spinner. Ah well...

After the stern talking to that I gave my satnav, it seemed to be much better today, finding some excellent twisties down towards the Brecon Beacons, although it did start sending me down glorified footpaths, so much so that I eventually gave up on it and just stuck on the wonderful B-road I was on at the time.

I headed for the famous Black Mountain road. For those that don't know, this is a short (7 mile?) stretch of tarmac over the Black Mountains (they're really not mountainy but, ya know, marketing). It is a nice road but short and despite someone having chopped down the average speed cameras (which REALLY ruined it), you can't be too sure. However, the road from Llangdog to the north end of the mountain road is actually much better and that was a hoot today, taking me up to the usual car park I always stop at:

At this point, my original route took me south on the rest of the Black Mountain road but it's only a short section and then you're into the fairly dull area south of the Brecons which never toasts my muffins. So I decided to head back north (repeating the road to Llangdog - yum) and headed up to Lake Brianne. There is a wonderful road that runs above the lake:

It was here, a few trips ago, that a few of us stopped and listened to the Queens funeral ceremony (on crackling LW radio) and the setting really added something to the occasion, so I remember it well.

From here, I decided to go on the 'boring' A-roads to Aberystwyth, a place I'd never been. But what I thought would be boring was anything but - the A485 was a revelation. It twisted and turned, rolled and dived, as good as any B-road. Best of all, I had a clear run and it was glorious.

An ice cream at the beach in the sun was enjoyable and then a last run back through the Elan Valley to my B&B - stupendo.

All that sun has given me a headache (the teeth-clenching on those roads probably didn't help) - tomorrow is for heading home. I'll try to make it interesting with a wiggle through the Cotswolds...

The Lonesome Dragon Tour - day 2

 What a superb day!

It started off gray and spitting rain and before the engine was even warm, I was on a twisty B-road out of Rhayader. By luck rather than judgement, my satnav kindly sent me on a corker of a road; twisting and,  best of all, empty. I'm not quite sure where everybody was but I wasn't complaining and the first 20 miles were lovely:

My satnav was really on it today, determined to find me the smallest lanes and I spent a bit of time crawling along at 15mph in the middle of nowhere, which was actually quite fun. Unlike the drought-hit SE, this bit of Wales seemed pretty moist, even flooded in parts:

I use TomTom for my routes because it allows more than 10 way points, it works with AndroidAuto and the maps are stored on my phone, so I don't need a data signal when out in the sticks but the latest update seems to have screwed it up a bit - it just can't seem to re-route if I go off the planned route. I may have to go back to CoPilot which is a bit simpler but always used to reroute really well.

As it was, I alternated between hectic B-roads and tiny, single lanes all the way up to Lake Unpronounceable (Vrnwy?) where I was shocked to find my usual cafe had shutdown. There was a new cafe 200 metres walk but I don't do walking on a road trip unless there's a chippy at the end of it, so I had to do without my mid-morning coffee. I did find a coffee van further round the lake but it coincided with a heavy burst of rain - the Welsh God's really didn't want me to drink coffee today.

After some more miniscule lanes, I meandered up to Llangollen where I considered going up the Horseshoe Pass to the cafe for lunch but, by now, the sun had come out and I could see lots of bikes heading that way, which meant probably lots of rozzers and a big queue at the cafe, so I stuck on the A5 (a fabulously beautiful road but always busy) until the little hamlet of Corwen, which had a great cafe. They weren't helping the nations (or mine) obesity crisis by serving the advertised turkey and cranberry sandwich with sausage and bacon. I could have taken them out but that would be rude to my hosts...

I managed to stagger back to my car for a great run down to Bala on yet another B-road (although one my satnav wasn't going to take for some reason) and then a rare blast on an A-road to Lake Unpronounceable II (Tryweryn?):

This A-road was amazing - smooth and flowing with hardly anyone on it but I'm always a little wary of them because they are prime candidates for the rozzers and their cameras. I didn't see any but I prefer the anonymity of lesser roads, which I tried to find but they seemed lacking in this area.

I did find yet more pokey footpath-style lanes, although the scenery was other-worldly:

I did find some twisties to finish off my 250 mile day and got back around 5pm, with a kebab for tea (this isn't a gourmet health food tour).

The full Elan Valley tomorrow and the weather should be better so I'll try my drone out.

The Lonesome Dragon Tour - day 1

 ROAD TRIP!!!

Time for a jolly - despite asking a few people and because my son's car is still not repaired, this is a solo trip (hence 'Lonesome') which I've not tried before, so I hope it will work out.

I left on Thursday after work, stopping at the Bell Hotel in Tewkesbury, a really cute looking place I've never been to before:

The pub was across the road from the Abbey:

Breakfast in the morning was at the quaintest Wetherspoons ever, before setting off on a grey but dry day.

Most of the day was actually spent in England, wriggling through Gloucestershire. I was a bit lax about route planning and trusted TomTom more than normal, which wasn't the best idea as I had set it to 'thrill' mode which meant it chose a lot of single track lanes. However, there were a decent few stretches of lovely B-roads, with low levels of traffic.

I also consciously planned less miles than I normally do on these trips, with more stops and some sight-seeing; Ludlow was a beautiful little town that I'd never even heard of:

Some great roads coming into Wales - everyone complains about the 20mph limits but I don't understand that; they're only in towns where you're already going slow and no-one sticks to them anyway. Out in the sticks, traffic is light and Wales is a beautiful place.

Another town stop in Llandrindod Wells:

The last run was a drop into the stunning Elan valley (which I'll do again on Sunday when it's forecast to be nicer weather). I found the smallest, single lane road ever to get started:

...but soon joined the fecking awesome road that loops through the valley lakes:

What an awesome drive that last 30 minutes was, even in the rain. Barry is a PERFECT car for these sort of roads; small, torquey, like a go-kart. Makes up for months spent on my normal crowded local roads at home.

Pulled into my B&B for the next 3 nights in Rhayader, had fish and chips for tea and I'm glad to find that doing this alone isn't as bad as I expected. Brought my tablet with me and downloaded some Netflix films to keep me occupied (along with the Turkish Delight I bought in Ludlow) - all going well so far.

Sussex Thrash

 I joined in a run from a new group, the Gentlemens Driving Club. Interestingly, they are very strict about no girls allowed, which is different. Pretty rare for any girls in most of the groups I see anyway, so no biggie and my wife is never going to come on any of these runs with me.

It was an eclectic group who are mostly based on the south coast, so I may not do much more with them. As it was, I met them at Chichester which is almost 90 minutes from home. About 20 cars turned up, mostly BMWs but also a couple of Porsches, Ford RSs, a nice GR86, GR Yaris and an old (well, same age as Barry) Vantage:

This Dodge Challenger (or Charger?) had 730 bhp and was, according to the owner, damn scary in the damp conditions today:

The Vantage I was behind for an amazing fluky section with no other traffic in our way:

What followed was a frantically fast run up past Goodwood (the original plan was to stop there but the cafe was closed for Revival preparations) followed by a ubiquitous pop and bang run through the Hindhead tunnel (Ford RS doing the pops and bangs).

We returned back through the tunnel and flew down to C&M for a coffee and natter before I had a fun run back home on some reasonably quiet roads.

So an interesting day, with some like-minded hooligans, although there were a lot of 'tats on display 😀

Back home, I spent 10 minutes sorting out the most common Boxster issue - elastic not pulling the roof in properly:

Luckily, all that was needed was a new hole cutting and fitting over the screw. The whole thing looks a bit worse for wear, so it may need something more involved next time.

Wales next weekend...looking forward to it.

East of Eden(bridge)

 Today was the Edenbridge Motor Show and it was pretty good (strictly it was south of Edenbridge) - our hot weather continues even approaching mid-September, so it was a popular day out.

Lots of interesting cars:

This hotrod is actually available to hire:

You don't see many Ultima's and probably see less now that the company has sadly gone under:

Nice colour and check out the size of the exhausts:

Struggled to get this into one shot:

Possibly my fave of the day was this bicycle - zoom in to the details:

I had a reasonable run there and back; very busy but a few clear sections to have some fun. 

I've booked a long weekend to Wales in a couple of weeks, going with all my mates ie. by myself 😀. I was hoping there might be a club at the show today which I could join because it would be nice to do some runs with others but I guess a show is the wrong place; I want a club who drive, not display at shows. Ironically, my previous kit car club are doing more regular runs out (albeit a bit early in the day). One of the reasons I sold my kit car was because of the lack of activity and now, since my Porsche group have almost all sold up, I'm back on my lonesome again. 

Fitted in a quick oil and filter change yesterday, a few months overdue.

Trains and a Phoenix

 Not much happening recently - I try to drive at least once a week and I tend to go to the same old places and same routes, so I don't bore my many 1000s of fans with all that.

This weekend, I had a slightly different route ending up at the Chalet Cafe for breakfast (they do a great omelette). This was Barry with all our friends:

Strange how quiet it was, the weather was pretty good? In fact, the roads were very quiet as well and I had a fun drive. I also popped along to a local model railway society's open day:

When I was about 12, I used to volunteer at a similar place and still have a soft spot for steam engines.

I recently was a bit worried about the tramlining which seemed to be worse than before, so I checked the tyre pressures; the fronts were only 6 psi below what they should be but once pumped up, the tramlining was gone. Amazing how much of a difference a few psi makes and I need to remember this for future.

In other news, my son finally got a payout on his M4 - and he's bought it back off copart and is rebuilding it!! More details in this forum post, if you're interested.

A lot of Motion

 Another weekend, another trip to see cars - what a nerd I am. This weekend was the semi-famous Bicester Motion event, held oop norff (for me) on an ex-WW2 airfield which is now a collection of old hangars and small, shed-like engineering firms.

I'd heard a lot of good things about it, so I thought I'd give it a go. It was a good hour and a half trip if I stuck to the motorway, which I don't like doing, so my A-road version took me 2 hours and it was OK but I don't know this part of the world well enough to find the best roads, so I was stuck on the A-roads which were OK in places but too busy.

The event itself was pretty impressive; a huge number of cars from the 80s onwards (not too much before that), lots of (expensive) food and a live stage which I didn't bother with.

There were several owners clubs there, including Porsche GB:

A MASSIVE display of Caterhams:

A fair percentage of the S2000s in the country:

And a ton of modern Beemers, Ferraris, Mclarens, Mustangs etc:

Several funky oldies:

A recently restored Roller with a 27 litre Meteor engine, good for 850bhp:

Notice anything weird about this Mini?

Yup, 2 steering wheels. The doofus on the Mini stand didn't even know why it was like that - a couple of us looked it up and it might be a film car, where the actor uses one wheel while the stunt driver actually drives from the other one?

A few other beauties:

And my fave of the day - Aston Vantage convertible in Storm Purple; stunning:

I actually only spent 2 hours there, which was just about enough time to see it all. 

My return journey took me even longer as I tried to find some decent B-roads, with only partial success. A fun day out and my head is more burnt than ever.

Since my shock absorber replacements, the ride is really hard and if anything, seems to be getting harder! Admittedly, the roads in Oxfordshire seem worse than Surrey but maybe I should check my tyre pressures, not done that for a while...