ON THE ROAD

It’s been an interesting month for Trevor with his Discovery 2 Td5 pulling some unique loads

I’ve been on the road quite a lot lately, in my Discovery 2 Td5, mostly towing a trailer – with various loads on board. My regular trips to Richards Chassis Ltd in Doncaster, to collect stock for Land Rover owners in Ireland, took an interesting turn on the most recent one. I was contacted by Britpart boss, Paul Myers, to see if I could help a friend of his get a car from Northern Ireland to Birkenhead. Paul’s friend Mike Moran had bought a trials car in Co Armagh and he had discovered the eye-watering costs involved in getting stuff across the Irish Sea. Helping a friend of Paul’s was a no-hesitation moment for me – and I duly got the details.

Ahead of my planned trip I collected the trials car from the seller and discovered that it would be an easy load – two of us were able to push the nimble machine up onto my tilted trailer. An interesting vehicle indeed, but the really interesting part was when I met Mike Moran at his place of work in Birkenhead – the Cammell Laird shipyard. Having disembarked the Stena ferry, it was only a few short miles to the shipyard. When I pulled up to the security gates in my Discovery, not only was the security guard expecting me, but he was chuckling at Mike’s latest purchase. The laughter continued when I pulled up to the offices and Mike bounded out with excitement to see his car.

Mike and I transferred the trials car straight across to another trailer and parked the Discovery safely out of the way. I was then treated to a tour of the massive manufacturing shed where a certain well-known ship was under construction. The public voted to call her ‘Boaty Mcboatface’ but she will in fact be called RRS Sir David Attenborough – a sophisticated state-of-the-art polar research vessel due to be launched in 2019. What a privilege it was to meet Mike and walk under part of the hull of the Sir David Attenborough! After the tour we had coffee and bacon butties – as well a great chat about Land Rovers that we own and have owned. I was then on my way to collect my back-load of new Land Rover frames.

Two further trips in the Td5 Discovery, during the following week, took me to different corners of Ireland on consecutive days. The first was to deliver a Land Rover chassis to Co Meath, for Paddy Carroll, which was required urgently. Here I met a mechanic who had set up on his own only one year previously, having been previously employed by a bigger business. From said mechanic, Stephen Brady, I managed to get some very valuable advice on procuring a credit card machine and some interesting and humorous insights into Stephen’s challenges of collecting payment for his work. With the chassis delivered it was onwards to Dublin to meet a potential new client, and then finally home to bed.

The next morning brought a run across to the west of Ireland, to Sligo town, where I was going to look at an 88in Series IIA project. I had been contacted about this Land Rover over a year previously but hadn’t followed it up. Surprisingly I was contacted again about the truck – the owner had held on to it, because he didn’t want to sell it to, and I quote, “some eejit, who would trash it into a ditch.” The old Land Rover is an interesting proposition and I have to give it some serious thought, as to whether I should add it to the fleet – and the list of my own projects that are pending.

Just a final note on my new friend, Mike Moran. I heard from him the other day – and he and his trials car partner-in-crime, Tony Coid, are naming the new car Trialy Mctrialface.

I couldn’t help but laugh out loud!