Our Wicked Welsh Weekend

“Electrical conundrum

The day is hardly humdrum

Trying not to have a tantrum

its another Imp based problem”

Well, what can I say, we arrived at Wicked Welsh in the front passenger seats of a Lanes Recovery Vehicle, Dave at the wheel and Ffloyd being dragged behind.

A disappointing start, especially having successfully navigated 1100miles for Imp 50 in Scone and 500 miles for Ffloyd’s Essex makeover.  So we expected a faultless and uneventful short hop to The Rising Sun, Pandy (5 miles outside of Abergavenny. Instead we spent an hour in a layby the Brecon side of Bwlch watching the sun set, whilst cwtching John and waving to smiling drivers who passed by, hooting, giving the thumbs up and grinning at the perfect body Ffloyd sports following her cosmetic surgery.  They were, no doubt oblivious to the fact that we had broken down, as, with the engine in the back, it looked like we had the boot open for a picnic.

One lovely man, on his way home from a hard days work did stop to offer assistance.  This man, Derek Lee,(Builder and Carpenter) searched the contents of his van on our behalf for 6ft of cable (we thought we’d identified the problem and this was what was required).  Finding nothing, he even offered to cut 6 foot off his extension lead for us!!  Aww, Bless. How kind is that xx

Anyway,the lovely man from Lanes arrived as promised and hoisted us onto the speck lift.

The joy of having a 46 year old car is that  classic car insurance is not only very cheap, but comes with full breakdown recovery, offering to take you home or to your destination.  It was amusing talking to the breakdown recovery helpline and requesting to be taken to The Rising Sun pub in Pandy.

“We’ll arrange a vehicle to take you home”

“No thanks – please drop us at the pub in Pandy!”

I did however explain that the campsite would be full of Imp owners/mechanics/enthusiast who would scratch their heads, mull around the engine, procrastinate, deliberate and come up with a solution to make Ffloyd better.

So Dave towed us to our tent pitch, and, as he couldn’t stop for a pint, I pushed a tenner into his hand for a few drinks on his day off.

Tent erected we hit the bar, downed some beer (john), Vodka (me), had a meal (eventually – it was a long wait but the delay didn’t matter as the company was good , and by the time it arrived, the head was somewhat fuzzy)!  There were some very merry Impers that night and some pretty subdued Impers puzzling over Ffloyd’s electrics the following morning.  An electrical conundrum causing us to replace the ignition switch as it appeared to have a charge along the cable up to that point, only to discover the problem was at the other end!!  (any physics graduate should be able to explain that to you if you need to know more!).

We missed the Imp run on Saturday a shame but at least it covered our home stomping ground.  billed as 100 Welsh miles it was reportedly 140 miles taking in Llandovery Sheep Festival, Abergwesyn Valley, Llanwrtyd and the military roads over Brecon.  However, John and I had a lovely day and visited Linda Vista Gardens in Abergavenny and the back street coffee shop.

Saturday evening in The Rising sun is another story .  one involving car crashes into lion enclosures, a mankini clad man , Margaret Thatcher nutcrackers and Jill witnessing a ‘double erection’ in her Rapido……..!!!!!!….. as I said, another story for another day.

Anyway, i thought I might finish by mentioning (again) just how fabulous Ffloyd looks in her magenta and ice white livery was her mirror finish and perfect lines and curves.  I must say (again) a massive thank you to Graham Crompton who has inherited his dad’s ‘perfectionist’ gene and has sweated blood and tears to delivery her back to me in such fine fettle with a First prize trophy in hand. xxxxx