Part One: After a heavy night celebrating with friends, and getting home to watch England play France for third place in the World Cup, the idea of getting up early for a morning car meet was not high on my wish list. I woke to find I'd missed the end of the game anyway, but victory was maintained, so I didn't mind too much. My car was filthy. We're still in the middle of a heat wave here in the UK, and mine was covered in enough dirt and hot-blown dust to write “wash me” on

We've all seen them. We've all questioned them. Most of us still don't understand them. That neglected car, once polished and maintained like a silver cutlery set, now slowly turning to dust in the English weather. Until you've owned a car for a long stretch of your life, it's hard to understand the ties that form. The memories begin to outweigh the value, and the once cherished pride and joy sits abandoned at the end of a drive.It might have flat, cracked rubber boots at eac

Thought I'd take the car out tonight, purely as a public service, to add to the excitement ahead of the game. It's been stifling hot, the kind of heat where the tarmac looks like it's considering giving up entirely, and every flag in a three-mile radius is fluttering like it's personally invested in the result. As usual, the car gets its share of toots and waves. I'd love to say they're all for the car. They are not. They are for the enormous St George's cross flapping above

Having recently snapped my choke cable, I fitted a new one before giving the carburettor a careful tune-up. (My Rover runs a Weber carburettor conversion, so it’s a little different from the factory setup.) The result? It now starts at the touch of a button and runs beautifully, quiet, smooth, and pulling as strongly as ever. It’s amazing what a little TLC can do. If only the same applied to the driver. I also tracked down the mysterious battery drain. The culprit turned out

A Brit Survives the Modesto Classic Car Show Right, so. I've been to car shows before. Goodwood. The odd village fete with a bloke's restored MG parked next to the tombola. I thought I knew what I was walking into. I did not know what I was walking into. The first thing that hits you in Modesto isn't the cars, it's the heat, which arrives less like weather and more like a personal insult. I stepped out of the car park — sorry, "the lot" — and a man in a Hawaiian shirt the ap

Always nice to unexpectedly spot something a little different when travelling. I spotted this Citroën DS out my window in St Ives Harbour today. This one, a 1971/72 I believe, was a favourite with some seagulls — one of which didn't like its own reflection in the chrome hubcap, noisily turning the look of it into a golf ball with its beak. I missed the owner while I dashed round to get a shot or two, so unfortunately no real details available. He'd obviously driven through so