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...

Breakfast of Kings

 It's been a busy holiday period, with a wonderful trip to France (again) and a long weekend in Cornwall for my mums 80th birthday,  so little driving until today - the Goodwood breakfast club.

I've been a couple of times in the past and it is always impressive, especially as it is free and today was no exception. Part of the reason I like it is the route down there - lots of B-roads to stretch Barry's legs.

The place was heaving, with a surprisingly large number of fairly dull cars from my childhood in the 80s - Fiestas, Golf's etc. They were all immaculate so people are obviously restoring and garaging these, sorry, very boring cars 😀

But some of the other stuff - wow!!! Double figures for the number of E-types, 3 or 4 DB5s and 4s, bucket loads of Triumph Stags, TR6s, TR4s, even a TR3 I didn't know existed. I tried to be restrained and only take pictures of cars I hadn't seen before but even that meant a lot:

This is a 1950 Cadillac Healey, whatever the hell that is:

An Auto Union ie. early Audi:

Mm, mmm, mmmm - look at those bonnet bulges:

This is a Montevardi 375 - the owner was just driving off and it sounded beautiful:

Possibly my 2 faves of the day:

....and. Stanley steam powered thing - check out the controls in the cabin:

A glorious half day out with a fun drive there and back.