Dave and some other tight spots
Nick Ridley has had his fair share of adventures in his old Landies and here he relates a few memorable tales
As a father and now a grandfather, I have come to realise how the things that you do with your children and grandchildren in their formative years can influence them for the rest of their lives.
So it was with me and my passion for that British icon, the Land Rover. On my faded and yellowed birth certificate, my dad’s occupation is stated as ‘private investigator’. I realise that may well conjure up images of him hiding in the shadows of a London back street in the 1960s spying on an unfaithful husband, but his job wasn’t quite what it appeared to be on paper.
In fact, Dad was what was known in the trade as a ‘car snatcher’. He worked for a finance company and, back in the day, if you missed the payments on your new Cortina or Humber, he would come along, hook it up and tow it away. There were occasional moments of glamour and Mum often recalls the time they had the use of a recovered Cadillac for a few days, which turned a few heads in Finchley High Road.
So, what has all that got to do with me and my passion for old Land Rovers? Well, Dad’s snatch-and-grab truck was a bronzegreen 1960 Series II pickup, fitted with a crane on the back. I clearly remember sitting on his lap, gripping the dustbin-lid-sized steering wheel, pretending I was driving it up and down Lichfield Grove. Those special moments stayed with me. Fast-forward two decades and I had the chance to buy my first Land Rover, a 1965 2.25-litre diesel Series II. It wasn’t in the best condition, but I was so proud of it. At the time, I had a springer called Meg and a lurcher, Midge, and it was my shoot-day vehicle.
Tight spot
In my youth, I spent a couple of years Down Under and Australians have a well-known saying: “If you want to get into the desert,
drive a Land Rover; if you want to get back out of the desert, drive a Land Cruiser.” I quickly came to understand what that meant, as I spent more time underneath that old Landy than I did sitting inside it.
I recall heading off with Mrs R to Hertford market one winter’s day to buy a couple of ferrets and we were halfway there when the temperature gauge went through the roof. I pulled over and opened the bonnet, only to find that the fan belt had snapped. We were in the middle of nowhere and, although
I did have a few tools with me, I didn’t have a spare belt.
I remembered my dad telling me about an old-time trick he had used, so I popped my head back in the Landy and requested that Mrs R “get ‘em off ” and in no time at all I had manufactured a temporary fan belt out of a pair of 60-denier tights and off we headed. It is true, you don’t ever simply go for a drive in an old Land Rover, you go on an adventure.
It was a sad day when I said goodbye to that bone rattler, but only a few years later the itch needed scratching again and along came Bump, a 1984 Series III. By now, the girls were a bit older and they named him due to the rather uncomfortable ride they got while sitting on the rear bench seats.
We did some miles in that old Landy. I can remember driving to Cornwall one summer loaded to the gunwales and towing a trailer tent. As we headed down a steep hill towards the Eden Project, I was having real problems with the brakes. Basically, they were not working. The brake shoes had become so hot they had started to glaze off and lost any ability to stop. It was quite scary and it took a lot of double-declutching and plenty of nerve to keep any degree of control without scaring the living daylights out of the kids. It was also another lesson learned about the quirkiness of an old Land Rover. I sold Bump to a landscape gardener some 20 years ago and I have just checked, it is still registered and, hopefully, still on the road.
A couple of years later, I bought an ex-demo Defender XS with all the toys. It had electric windows, air con, heated seats and I had it fitted with a Howling Moon roof tent, CAB dog box and drawer system. It was my pride and joy. I hadn’t had it for more than 18 months when, one evening after finishing working at Crufts, I parked it in a hotel car park never to see it again. I was devastated.
I had a tracker on it, but the thieves must have disabled it. It affected my desire to own another Land Rover as so many were being stolen. They still are, although it seems now thieves are stripping them where they are parked and the first thing an owner knows about it is when they are greeted with only the shell of a vehicle that used to be their pride and joy.
It took me a number of years before I began to realise that my life wasn’t complete without an uncomfortable, oilleaking, non-starting, rattling series Land
Rover parked on my drive. And so began my quest to find another. I forget how many I looked at, but I knew what I wanted. I am not a mechanic, but I don’t mind having a tinker. There was so much rubbish on offer and prices had started to climb. I checked the online adverts regularly and one kept catching my eye.
Dave was a 1968 Series IIA that had been bought by a military family for their son. It had been restored a year or two before and had only done 94 miles since the rebuild. Once their son had passed his test, he bought a VW Polo and wasn’t interested in driving Dave, so they reluctantly decided to sell him. Trouble was, Dave was out of our budget, so it was some weeks before I took a chance and made a phone call.
We drove down to Dorset to have a look and, as I suspected, I only had to do a deal. One thing about old Land Rover owners is that we care about who takes on the custodianship of our Landy. So, as well as
“You don’t ever simply go for a drive in an old Land Rover, you go on an adventure”
coming to an amicable financial agreement, Dave’s owners wanted us to take him on and give him a solid future. So we shook hands and a week later I was trundling along the A303 heading home.
Memories
I have heard it said that our memories are not only made up of visual cues, but that a smell can also bring back a rush of recollections — and the waft of warm EP90 gear oil transported me back 50 years to when I was sat on my dad’s lap.
Over the past seven years, Dave has been a family favourite, though something of a money pit. I have made a few modifications, such as putting in a little heater and an original Fairey overdrive. I resprayed him in 2020 and most weekends I can be found fettling and tinkering.
Like me, he can take a bit to get going in the mornings, especially when it is cold and damp. And I am not proud, but I have been done for exceeding the speed limit in him twice (both times 34 in a 30), but that may be something to do with the way the speedo needle bounces around, as it can take some time to gain any forward motion.
I try to use Dave most days and, although he is a very tidy specimen of a 54-year-old Land Rover, he is not mollycoddled, as he has a job to do. He has been used on various occasions as a prop for my dog photography and numerous images of a dog hanging out of the canvas tilt have been featured on magazine front covers and calendars.
He is used to haul horse food and hay, and to transport the cockers on shoot days. The roof comes off in the summer, so we can enjoy the singular experience of burning our legs on the plastic-covered seats. At least that makes a change from the winter experience of getting wet from the leaking roof or scraping frost from the inside of the windscreen before you dare venture off.
Owning an old Land Rover is a lifestyle. Everything takes that little bit longer and, in a perverse kind of way, that is the joy of owning one. Dave is currently a guest of our garage as he refuses to start. It is suspected that his starter motor has seen better days.
At the beginning of this piece, I mentioned how as a parent and grandparent you can influence your offspring without really realising — and so it was with our daughters. Both were adamant that they had to have Land Rovers as their wedding cars. Our younger daughter, Holly, used two Series Is, Stanley and Bert, and Gemma used Dave as her bridesmaids’ car. Our grandchildren are also obsessed with him and their favourite game is to drive him up a make-believe mountain or down to the beach for a picnic. A visit cannot go by without them wanting to get behind that big steering wheel and go off on their adventures. They do say the apple never falls far from the tree.
In my occasional moments of non-starting frustration I do briefly consider selling him, but I know deep down that is not going to happen. In fact, we often joke that when my time comes I will be loaded into the back of him and we will go for one last trundle. Mind you, I must make sure there is a pair of old tights in the toolbox. Just in case.