356 Spring Run in the UK - Sussex and Kent and wetness

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JohnLiles
356 Fan
Posts: 206
Joined: Tue Dec 11, 2012 8:56 am
Location: London and NW England

356 Spring Run in the UK - Sussex and Kent and wetness

#1 Post by JohnLiles »

Last year I went on this run out for 356s organised by Richard East , it was great fun , good weather , interesting cars , country roads with no one else using them , bar horses and tractors , finishing up at Crosthwaite & Gardiner.......fantastic place. They have built replica pre war Grand Prix cars ( Auto Union , Mercedes ) for well heeled clients and for the manufacturers . Beyond my purse but Bernie Ecclestone has one .

This year I was fortunate enough to have a navigator - 'Big Dave' - to decode the 'tulip' diagrams provided , lots of turns , typically 10 miles as crow flies equates to 30 on the road . This turned out to be a master stroke as it poured with rain and as 356ers know , that means plenty of steaming up in the cabin , so an extra pair of hands demisting side screens and windscreen was definitely required to see where we were going. Zeroing the trip recorder was also definitely required - we forgot everytime we set off on a leg , don't try doing this while driving on your own !

We had 6 cars in the run , out of a potential list of 12 , 4 coupes and 2 speedsters . One of the A coupes was a rally veteran owned by David and Julia Harrison that they have driven all around the world , a car created and maintained by Robert Gant , a leading UK specialist for sporting 356s and 911s.
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The black speedster was brought along by Mark Sumpter and his father , I understand that the engine is far from standard. Mark owns Paragon garage in Sussex , an independent Porsche specialist dealing in both classic and modern cars - 'Big Dave' had a close look at this car .
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The red speedster owned by Dick Crosthwaite featured last year in a duel with Mark on dry Kent roads , this year the main concern was keeping dry rather than podium position .
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To round off the 356's , Richard's grey SC , Hugo's ivory A , and my blue C parked up at Paragon
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Inside Paragon , I have taken a few shots of the cars for sale , some early 911s and a couple of late RSs , most shots taken from rear so that the sticker price does not provoke a heart attack .....only the 964RS taken from front , it was not the most expensive car there :lol: At time of writing 1£ is 1.4US$
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Finally , somewhat later than planned , ye olde pub lunch , watching the cars outside getting extremely wet , no rush to get back on the road , cancelled out the final 'rally leg' which was to get to another pub for afternoon tea , returned 'Big Dave' to his transport , switched on the TomTom satnav to navigate home , plenty of country road closures , eventually got onto the London ring motorway M25 , a bad place to be on a Friday afternoon / evening because of volume of traffic , just 150 minutes of peering through spray required to get back to my garage . Had to leave the car to dry off . I did open the front hood and remove spare wheel to discover plenty of water had collected :shock:

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Next trip is to Aarhus Denmark in just over 2 weeks time , only 12 hours drive and a ferry to get there from London 8)
1957 'A' and 1955 'Continental Outlaw'

David Harrison
356 Fan
Posts: 1
Joined: Thu Apr 05, 2012 4:52 am

Re: 356 Spring Run in the UK - Sussex and Kent and wetness

#2 Post by David Harrison »

Great report:) one of the UK's wettest days and the 356's took it all in their stride.
Our next rally in ' Molly ' will be Japan in 2017 and then Thailand, Loas, Burma, and Vietnam in 2018 with a few ' local ' rallies in between. Not bad for a 58 year old car and similar aged crew :)
Thanks to Richard for organising the run.
www.mollyporsche.co.uk
David and Julie Harrison

Richard East
356 Fan
Posts: 1
Joined: Fri Dec 09, 2011 10:29 am
Location: SE London/North Kent

Re: 356 Spring Run in the UK - Sussex and Kent and wetness

#3 Post by Richard East »

It was so gratifying to have so many cars turn out despite the worst day weather forecast for two weeks.

We are so fortunate to have easy access to Kent and East Sussex in springtime. Living the dream, keeping the faith down south.

Rich.
 

Hendrik Moulds
356 Fan
Posts: 117
Joined: Wed Mar 26, 2008 3:35 am
Location: Beautiful Yorkshire, UK

Re: 356 Spring Run in the UK - Sussex and Kent and wetness

#4 Post by Hendrik Moulds »

Looks like you had fun despite the weather!
'53 Cabriolet
'61 Notchback

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