Getting there slowly...

The caption might be a reference to how fast the ferries use to go. In this case it's just a progress report. Main visible changes are the additions of four loading ramps and the hinge mechanisms. What a so-so-so they were to fit. Sounds easy but they have to move smoothly or they just stick and then snap. I know, they're ramps 2/4/5/6, ramps 1 and 3 are in the bin.

The car load is interesting - well it is to me! The full size blue Renault Dauphine belongs to a friend of mine. He wrote to the Oxford Model Company when he heard that they were releasing one and they asked for photos and reproduced his car. Even the registration is authentic.

The white Mini is only interesting because I never owned on. I had a Minivan and what a dog that was. I had to give it a decoke and fit a new head gasket in a car park in Dartmouth. The alternative was come home at 20 mph - half it's normal speed.

The Moggie 1000 Traveller is similar to one 'Dirty Dicker' my first father in law owned. I spent more time under the bonnet of it than I ever did travelling in it. He would tinker with it until he cobbled it altogether then me and friend Dave had to put it back together for him.

The cream Hillman Imp was given to me by (late) Don Craggs a friend in Hong Kong who had a company making these models. I once borrowed one from a motor dealer friend who warned that the top hose might 'let go'. As it was a free loan I wasn't bothered until the hose blew in the middle of the Wire Forest near Kidderminster in the pouring rain.

Then I found out that the actual hose was about 12 feet long and was threaded through the sub frame. The next day a trip to a Rootes dealer in Digbeth, Birmingham ensured the next afternoon was spent under the car. All effort failed to thread it back in place so we came home with it coming from the front radiator, out through the drivers window, duck taped to the outside of the roof and forced into the engine at the rear.

The red car is a model of a Vauxhall Victor, the type loaned to me by the same 'friend' as a 'sorry' for the Imp saga. Not long after that he went to jail for embezzlement. Actually he was a very nice bloke.

The black Standard 'Flying 12' is similar to one I hitched a lift in in 1962. I'd walked from Balachulish Ferry to Kingshouse Hotel on the Friday night in March and had to sleep outside in a tent. The next morning with a covering of snow on the A82 the only car to pass in an hour or so was one of these. Unimpressed at the wreck it was, I suspected it was only going to nearby Bridge of Orchy so I ambled up only to be told the occupants were going to Glasgow (as I was) and that they'd take me all the way! I don't know who won the 'Auld Firm derby' but it was a pleasure to get into a warm if smelly car!