Land Rovers I have driven
Nigel Linton drives Land Rovers for a living. It's such a perfect job, he chronicles his adventures
As a delivery driver for a Land Rover specialist there isn’t a Landy Nigel Linton hasn’t driven
Why is Land Rover so special to me? It goes right back to 1955 when I remember hearing about a book entitled First Overland. It was about the longest of all overland journeys, from the English Channel to Singapore, and although several expeditions had already tried – some reaching as far as the deserts of Persia, no one managed to go beyond the plains of India. Six months, six days and 12,000 miles later, two very weary Land Rovers rolled into Singapore.
As a student I loved the romance of being able to get in a car and end up at the other end of the exotic world. I never appreciated what was involved until much later, when just before my retirement my son gave me the book. I read it from cover to cover and it bought back all the original memories of being able to go anywhere, at any time. Although I’ve got an overland trek in me, in reality I’d probably never do it, but its knowing that you could do something spectacular. And that’s what makes Land Rover, particularly the Defender, so special. It’s an adventure, every time you turn the key in one,” explains 65-year old Nigel Linton.
Despite having such an early fascination with Land Rover, it wasn’t until 2003, almost 50 years later when he experienced one first hand – purchasing a brand new Freelander three-door hardback in Stornoway Grey. The car was bought with his first bonus and as a present for his wife, for running the household whilst he was overseas with work, a part of his job that would increase over the years as his business grew to become the world’s largest brick manufacturing company.
He takes me back to how it all started, at the age of 18, when the option of £50 a week and a company car was more attractive than going to university. “Having always been interested in architecture and design, I left school to work my way up for a company called Lime, Sand, Mortar. Having dealt with all of the brick companies in the country, I then left to sell bricks,” explains Nigel.
With ten years of experience behind him, Nigel went on to become director of several companies. By the early 1980s, some seven years later, there was a brick shortage. “It was at that time when three of my friends approached me in the pub one night and said we think you’re the man to go abroad and source bricks for us. One was in logistics, one was good in reclaimed materials, and the third one, had common sense where cash flow was concerned” recalls Nigel.
Nigel’s role was to work with brick makers in Europe, who were not as buoyant at that time as we were in manufacturing, and help them to make the bricks that he wanted to sell. With a logistics guy on board they learnt how to package the bricks on pallets, shrink wrap them, put them on flat containers and in the ballast of the ferries across the North Sea. “They made the ships stable on rough crossings and it was historical really, as ballast like bricks and clay roof tiles were used to stabilise the sailing boats coming across from Holland and Belgium in the 17th century. We didn’t pay a premium either - they wanted our cargo so we got a very preferential rate which enabled us to competitively sell all of the 90 to 100 million bricks we were bringing in each year,” says Nigel.
Of course, the only downside to running such a successful business is the time that it takes away from your family. So, when his daughter, Steph, turned seven and said to daddy that she didn’t really know what he did, Nigel vowed that he would send a postcard to her every day, explaining where he was and what he was doing. “It was like getting a Valentine’s card every day for her, but I didn’t realise that until we were putting a collage together for her 21st, that we found them all among her photos.”
As Nigel was never a good flyer, he also spent a lot of time on the road, and having mainly driven 4x4s, like Mitsubishi Shoguns, Mercedes-Benz, Audi and BMW estate cars or SUVs, including the VW Touareg, it was bizarrely the latter that would get him to revisit Land Rover after buying his first.
“I got in my mind set driving the VW, that when I retired in 2008 and needed a project to keep my mind going, I’d buy and renovate a split screen campervan. However, after a long weekend in Cornwall, we realised straight away that it was too small, so that went off the agenda. I always had an affinity with Land Rovers, and although I loved my wife’s Freelander and it was capable, it wasn’t a Defender. That’s when I started to buy LRM and look at what spare parts were available” explains Nigel.
Jim Hallam, Land Rover and Range Rover specialists, in Rushton near Macclesfield, seemed the obvious place to start looking for a project car. “They had a wreck of a Defender tucked away in the workshop, it was like the elephant in the corner. Anyway, I took my wife to Guy Salmon, our local Land Rover dealer in Knutsford, for a test drive in a brand new Puma-engined Defender. She remarked that it wasn’t as bad as she thought it would be, so I said to her this one’s 27k, let me show you what I’ve got my eye on in Rushton,” recalls Nigel. As soon as she saw it she said ‘absolutely no way’. However, there was another one that she liked, a 2000 Coniston Green hard top with a Limestone roof. More importantly it was road worthy, with no leaks, had the Td5 engine, three seats in the front and it was £8k.
Finally, Nigel had a project that he could start restoring. The team at Jim Hallam resprayed it Fuji White with Java Black detailing, and Nigel learnt how to reupholster so he could re-leather some of the panels.
Two and a half years later, the car was left with Joe Hallam, who runs the garage, to be serviced and MoT’d while Nigel and his wife spent some time in Australia with their son. Whilst he was away he got a buyer for his car, who offered £12k and Nigel couldn't resist.
“Every time you turn the key in
a Defender, it's an adventure”
“It was so wild: I had one of the most
amazing drives you can imagine”
The replacement was a Discovery 3 in Zambezi Silver for the same price. "I loved it to bits, we had some great holidays in it, and used it for greenlaning, but it was a bit big for a shopping car,” says Nigel.
So, the Discovery 3 was exchanged for a 2009 Freelander 2, whilst Nigel got a 1972 Series III from Joe’s dad, Jim. The car had lived on his farm for 25 years, but more recently it was retired to a barn in favour of a Range Rover for looking after the cattle. In return for painting one of the barns to store some of the garage’s prestige cars, Nigel was given the Series III on the proviso it was MoT’d.
In addition, the paintwork was tidied up, new leaf springs and dumb irons fitted on the front with new brake pipes and springs on the back. Before long it became Nigel’s pride and joy. “It’s noisy, smelly, heavy – no power steering, and cold, but it’s fantastic,” he confesses. On the upside its appreciating £300 to £400 a year, it doesn’t require road tax and insurance is only £120. It’s also since benefitted from an Exmoor Trim full tilt and rebuilt Fairey Overdrive
Over the years, Nigel has become good friends with Joe, and it’s rather ironic that he was his first port of call when he needed a project to keep himself busy, given what he now does with the majority of his spare time. Nigel takes up the story: “Just before Christmas two years ago, Joe called to say would I do him a favour and collect a 90 County Station Wagon from Edinburgh as the rest of his team were flat out prepping cars for their customers. I jumped at this one-off invitation, and it was a great adventure.”
Ever since that fateful day, Nigel has been collecting and delivering Land Rovers across the country – in his own words, it’s a fantastic hobby and it keeps him occupied. Better still, the money he makes from it offsets the cost of running his wife’s Freelander 2, his daughter’s 2007 Santorini Black Freelander 2 and his Series III.
And it seems that old habits die hard, as he’s been keeping a dairy of his adventures, rather like he wrote postcards to his daughter whilst abroad. Reading through the 104-page chronical that he sent to LRM, I spotted that his most memorable moment was when he picked up a 90 County Station Wagon from Swansea during the floods last year. I’m eager to know more: “Trains were being diverted or cancelled, it was a nightmare, but I managed to make it up there. There was no way I was going to get out though with the M5 shut, along with all routes out of Cardiff. My parents at one time had moved out to Cardigan, so I knew the roads very well and having realised that the rivers were causing the issues, I thought if I head along the coast of Wales, where the rivers wouldn’t be as swollen on the flat land, and out to Cheshire, I’d be okay. I had one of the most amazing drives you can imagine. It was so wild, and there was next to no traffic, as everyone listened to the warnings but me. I must have used the full wading height of half a metre at times, driving through streams that had broken along some of the side roads, yet it always felt safe,” he recalls.
In travelling up to 600 miles a day whilst running his company, Nigel learnt that you need to have confidence in your vehicle, and that’s why he likes Land Rover so much. “They may not be the fastest, or the most economical, but you do feel comfortable in them. You never worry in a Land Rover.”
Nigel’s next Land Rover is one of the last Heritage 90 models, due to arrive in September. I bet he’s looking forward to that: “Oh, it’s like expecting a grandchild. One of the last Defenders of its configuration, in a classic colour [Grasmere Green with white detailing], it will be absolutely fantastic. It’s a car you keep for Sunday best, but you're tempted to use every day.” Funnily enough his favourite Land Rover is one that he’s never owned, but one that he’s collected on behalf of Joe, a Heritage 90 Td5, perhaps that will all change when he takes delivery of his Defender – just promise us one thing Nigel, please share your diary of adventures in it with us?