IT’S STILL ON MY BUCKET LIST
Drive from Cairo to Cape Town If I could do one transcontinental drive, this would be it. I’d like to do it in a new Land Rover Defender because there’d be no better way of proving it was worthy of the name. I’d like to break the record – held by a Fiat Panda last time I heard – but not to linger a little would be a shame. Although I have no connection to the continent save being married to someone who grew up there, there is nowhere I am happier or, weirdly, feel more at home than sub-saharan Africa. Plans? None. But if Land Rover were planning such a trip, I can confirm my availability. ANDREW FRANKEL Drive across America
The cliché alarm might be jangling, but I’ve always wanted to drive all the way across the US in one trip. I don’t want to try to beat the record – an improbable 28 hours and 50 minutes from New York to LA – but rather take a leisurely route that I pretty much make up as I go along and one that would be chosen to take in the more interesting roads of Montana and the Pacific Northwest instead of the normal straight shot. The ideal vehicle would be something big, American and dumb: I’ve toyed with buying a decommissioned police-spec Crown Victoria. MIKE DUFF Buy a BSA Bantam
In 1974, my brother-in-law Jimmy Smart gave me his BSA Bantam. It was a Bitza, D1 frame, with a 150cc D3 engine. It was tired and the last tax disc said May 1972 after he rode home from work and chucked a tarpaulin over it. Jimmy died of cancer two years later and I lost heart in the restoration and then discovered girls and cars. I have got it to a stage where it only needs oily engine bits. Finding them has been difficult and I have even toyed with the idea of turning it into a battery-electric Bantam. Help. JAMES RUPPERT Master off-roading
Every now and then, there’s a chance to do some spectacular off-roading as part of a new car launch, but no matter how butt-clenching the challenge, you always know that they wouldn’t be asking you to drive through the river lapping over the bonnet if there was the remotest risk of it going wrong.
I’d love to buy something cheap and cheerful (an old Suzuki Jimny, perhaps) and spend a weekend with some committed amateur green-laners on unfamiliar roads, protected by their expertise but with a dose of jeopardy
thrown in. Research suggests spare time is my only enemy, as joining an appropriate car club looks no harder than a swift internet search and signing a very small cheque. JIM HOLDER
Import a US classic
Buying a classic car in the US and driving it to the east coast for shipping: it’s a bit of a cliché, and I’ve half done it already, buying a Chevrolet Corvair in Montana and dragging it to Newark. The difference is that I’d like to drive the next acquisition rather than towing it (the ’Vair wasn’t quite fit enough), and this time, I want V8 power, wrapped in one of GM’S most dramatic shapes. The ’68 Corvette C3 tends to be overlooked these days, being long-lived, degraded and familiar. But early chrome-bumper versions look great and, allegedly, drive spectacularly with the rare 370bhp LT-1 small block. One day, I aim to find out. RICHARD BREMNER
Drive a Bugatti Veyron
Surprisingly, for someone who considers supercars (let alone hypercars) a waste of time and only of great use to people with selfconfidence issues, I would very much like to drive a Bugatti Veyron. I was never offered, or tried to arrange for myself, a drive in the Veyron when it was launched. I’d like a go in one now because I’m curious. I’ve heard so much about the car that I do feel that I’ve missed out by not driving one. If you own one and are willing to risk it, you know how to find me. COLIN GOODWIN
Restore a car
I’ve done a little bit of welding, a little bit of painting, a little bit of trimming and a little bit of mechanical tinkering. But I’ve never done any of them particularly well and, crucially, I’ve never done them together. It’s still, though, right up my list of things to do with cars, and I don’t think I’ll be satisfied until I’ve taken an absolute barn-find snotter and restored it back to its former glory. Maybe not to concours or factory condition, but to absolutely as I want it. I’ve almost got space, equipment and skills. One day, it’ll all fall into place.