Younger self car shenanigans

[KiwiDave]

If you haven’t done it, for me public road motoring nirvana still exists in the Pyrenees. Get up at 5am in the hills and you can spend 3 1/2 hours driving as fast as you want in the mountains, only slowing for villages, before traffic starts to interrupt flow. Easily worth the ten hour drive from Calais.

Had I been able to come back and visit the old man last year as planned, I was wanting to add 7-10 days to drive down through France and over into Italy as the 'me' bit of the trip. Still something I'd very much like to do. Complicated trying to hire something passable to drive on an International License without spending silly money though...

I was going to try and do NC500 too and spotted there's an outfit in Inverness who'll hire you an MX5 which seemed ideal...

Determined to do both of those drives while I can.

Ah, fun times indeed. Outgunned but we had fun trying
It's probably a good thing the meets tailed off when I got the DC2, that thing has indecent cross country pace all things considered.

That trip tailing HBP in the 'teg still stands out to me. I still look at them and have a saved search on our equivalent of Ebay. Current 'if I win the lotto tonight I'm having it' example: Clicky

[KiwiDave]

Actually I've remembered another from my first trip back after emigrating. Was sat in The Potstill in Glasgow with my old work colleagues catching up and was thrown by how light it was - sun sets much earlier like for like in NZ than in Scotland. Finally cottoning on that it was like 10pm not 8 I realised I was going to miss the last car ferry from Gourock over to Dunoon where we were staying.

Cue the long way round up the side of Loch Lomand, across to Arrochar, Cairndow, Strachur and down to Dunoon. Peugeot 307 hire car, light glimmering off the water in the deep indigo colour you get after sunset and I think three cars the entire time, either side of the road after Dumbarton. The majority of that drive was spent flat in top gear.

Shit car, very good memory!

[mik]

@KiwiDave When the sprogs were small and we had the caravan, we put it on to a “summer pitch” in a place on the Cowell Peninsula (that Dunoon sits at the bottom of).

I therefore did many runs along Loch Lomond, up through the (bizarrely named) Rest & Be Thankful and back down. Certain sections - like Loch Lomond - are heavily policed and require caution. Others less so. I had a handful of epic drives in the scoob when someone had forgotten something important and I had go back for it late evening, or if one of the boys had to be at a game early in the morning.

[KiwiDave]

I only ever drove down that route once, magical memory.

If anything, that's my biggest regret form my time in Scotland, too much time working my shitty job and not enough time driving. New Zealand is as it's made out to be (epic) but there's nothing yet stolen my heart in quite the same way as Scotland North of that Glasgow/Edinburgh divide. I don't miss the UK, but I miss those hills and lochs regularly.

[Coaster1]

Ah, fun times indeed. Outgunned but we had fun trying
It's probably a good thing the meets tailed off when I got the DC2, that thing has indecent cross country pace all things considered.

That trip tailing HBP in the 'teg still stands out to me. I still look at them and have a saved search on our equivalent of Ebay. Current 'if I win the lotto tonight I'm having it' example: Clicky

Great car..... but maybe it’s just me, to drive it fast on B-road takes serious concentration, some might say hard work. I remember in 2014 Marv, Duncs and I visited the secret road.... my DC2 was so fast. But a couple of days before I was under a bit of weather and I was quickly left behind.....

You need to be in attack mode. Having said that, the car is huge fun even at 6/10th.

[KiwiDave]

Great car..... but maybe it’s just me, to drive it fast on B-road takes serious concentration, some might say hard work. I remember in 2014 Marv, Duncs and I visited the secret road.... my DC2 was so fast. But a couple of days before I was under a bit of weather and I was quickly left behind.....

You need to be in attack mode. Having said that, the car is huge fun even at 6/10th.

You're probably very correct - I haven't driven them enough to have fully gelled with them to know when we're clicking and when there's more. I guess like all great cars though, more you put in, the bigger the reward.

[Barry]

DC2 is a perfect example of a car that gets better the harder you drive it. I got a ride around Milbrook (Alpine course) in mine, with professional instructor, and it was shocking how rapidly it covered ground.