Triumph meets Healey at look out on Struie Hill

Having completed the International Autoecosse without any major drama's Tim and Susan Hunt decided to extend their stay north of the border to retrace some of the sights seen on the Club Triumph Round Britain Reliability Run earlier in the year. Here is Tims' story.

We headed off to John O'Groats on the Monday, by way of Stanley Mills, the preserved 18th century cotton mill/up-market housing development just north of Perth. After John O' Groats we also also visited the most northerly part of the British mainland at Dunnett Head. (Ed's note - Luckily for Tim the waves were not pounding the coast, otherwise this photo would have shown them soaked from the spray. I know, as I have experienced it there!)

After an overnght at Bettyhill we followed the A836 to Tongue and Altnaharra where we again joined the Round Britain route through Lairg and Bonar Bridge and the B9176 to Alness. On this road at the popular look out on Struie Hill we met up with a Dutch couple in a very nice 1962 Austin Healey 3000. The Healey crew had just been on the big A.H. tour of Scotland (See Report of their RBT visit here). We then followed the Healey to Inverness before parting company.

We took the quiet B862/B852 down the east side of Loch Ness then detoured on the white road and down the infamous Corkscrew to Inverfarigaig (fortunately they met no one coming up!). At Fort Augustus we again joined the RB route to our overnight stop in Stirling. On Wednesday morning after spending a fascinating 3 hours at Stirling Castle we set off for home in Hertfordshire where we arrived shortly before 20.00.

By using observation, anticipation and acceleration sense we covered the 380 odd miles between joining the M80 just south of Stirling and junction 10 of the M1 at Luton only braking twice, both times when we stopped at service areas. (Ed's note - How's that for conservation?)

Tim is pleased to report that his TR4A redeemed itself after last year’s head gasket failure, completing 1800+ miles over six days at a true average consumption of just over 34mpg. The car never missed a beat and Tim didn’t open his tool kit once. Unbelievably they had the top off for the whole six days all the time they were on the road.

Sounds like a good advert for a Triumph TR and a trip round Britain in June. I can't think of anything better than to enjoy great scenery in an open top car, in the sunshine if possible.

Thanks Tim for sharing your story.

Back to Top

Updated 24 June 2013
Webmaster