Inveterate Travellers: Aston Martin and Mary Rose

Whilst in Wallingford, we took the opportunity to seek out the Aston Martin Owners Club and the Aston Martin Heritage Trust Museum, which is only a few miles from where we were staying. The Owners Club is the official guardian of the Aston Martin archive and all the records, photos, trophies, prototype engines and chassis are stored. It is also the home of the oldest surviving prototype (original chassis #A3) Aston Martin car, which dates from 1918 and was Kate Martin’s personal car and favourite. Designed and built by Robert Bamford and Lionel Martin, it is beautifully restored, lovingly driven on a regular basis and is also in original condition – a very gorgeous car. The museum is also the home of a few other cars in lovely condition, an original Le Mans racer, an amazing array of memorabilia and prototype engines on engine stands – developmental and current.

The fifteenth century tithe barn in which the Trust holds the archives, trophies and cars, is also restored and is quite beautiful, but it is a little difficult to find, with very few signs and in a tiny village not far from Oxford. It is at the end of a quite rough farm road, so you would need to trailer cars in and out. Two of the display cars were missing when we were there because they are undergoing some restoration work in readiness for the Goodwood Festival in September.

The following day we headed off to Portsmouth to see the historic dockyard, where the restored ships, The Warrior (1860), Admiral Nelson’s The Victory and the 15^th century flagship of King Henry VIII, the Mary Rose. The Mary Rose was recovered from the mud and silt of Portsmouth harbour in the last 20 years after being sunk in a battle with the French in 1545. Only half of the ship is intact – the half which was covered in mud and silt, as the other half eroded by sea action and animals (wood-worm, etc), but over 19,000 articles including cannons, anchor and personal items were recovered and are on display. It’s an amazing place to visit.

Another visit we made was to Buckler's Hard, a fifteenth century village on the upper reaches of the Solent estuary and where hundreds of ships were built in the following couple of hundred years. It is fully restored with a very interesting museum and the remains of several docks where the ships were built. It's near the village of Beaulieu (pronounced bewley) on the Beaulieu Estate, the home of Lord & Lady Montagu. It's a very pretty area in The New Forest, most of which is national park.

We’re now having a couple of days of R&R at Kate’s house before we take the car back on Friday and catch the Eurostar to Belgium and the second half of our trek and our third wedding, perhaps the most important, that of my nephew Simon to the gorgeous Kim in Stockholm.