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Seven in the mountains...

I drove the saloon from Glasgow to the Highlands last Friday, it was a glorious day with plenty of snow and sunshine.

The 160 mile trip, on mostly minor roads, took me 7 hours and the car performed impeccably.

Just about to leave having dropped the girls at school...

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I headed north through Doune, Dunblane, behind Gleneagles Hotel and into Perth on very minor back roads.

This is where my great-great Auntie Edith lived (latterly, opposite the Austin Dealership in Perth) her entire life until she died in the 1980s aged 92...


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I passed through Guildtown - the site of the ScA7C National A7 Rally...

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Up through Blairgowrie and then into the mountains, Spittle of Glenshee...

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This is the highest public road in Britain...

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At the top I stopped to take a picture and drove into a ditch filled with snow!! A passer-by helped me lift the car up and out of it...

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From here I continued north towards C*ck Bridge, a brutally steep climb up towards the Lecht, the car did boil on this hill!

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I tried to link up with Hugh Barnes at this location, he was attempting to find a live web cam feed of the road - only time lapse ones were available however and the nearest photo taken was just after I left...

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From here I continued through Tomintoul and then down and up the hairpins at Bridge of Brown. I managed up this in second gear the whole way and even raised the n/s rear wheel clean off the ground on the last hairpin. From here it was a fast run through Nethy Bridge and down into Boat of Garten, my destination...

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I had to thoroughly clean the car

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Re: Seven in the mountains...

That's great motoring - envy

Nick

Location: Centre of the Universe

Re: Seven in the mountains...

I can see that Mrs McKay has been busy shovelling the snow off the Cockbridge to Tomintoul road. Bless her.

Great trip Ruairidh!

Location: North Herts

Re: Seven in the mountains...

Nick Salmon
I can see that Mrs McKay has been busy shovelling the snow off the Cockbridge to Tomintoul road. Bless her.

Great trip Ruairidh!


Ah. The much missed Mrs McKay....

Re: Seven in the mountains...

Re: Seven in the mountains...

What a treat for a wintery day in the Austin!
I did a lot of that route with five other Pembleton builders on a week-long "Highland Fling" in 2013. Some fantastic roads up there, you're lucky to have them on your doorstep.
Cairn o' Mount might be attractive too if you can get through…



Location: Ripon

Re: Seven in the mountains...

Ruairidh Dunford
From here it was a fast run through Nethy Bridge and down into Boat of Garten, my destination...

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>


That was a hell of a trip just to go to the toilet

Re: Seven in the mountains...



Austerity has a lot to answer for!!

Re: Seven in the mountains...

Well done. You should have told me and I would have come across to run back-up in the RP...

Location: Gard, France 30960. Used to be Languedoc-Roussillon but now it's Occitanie

Re: Seven in the mountains...

It's reassuring to hear that there are some helpful people still around to help lift your motor out of the ditch.

Re: Seven in the mountains...

What a wonderful little day trip. Thank you for posting all these photos. Cars do deserve to be driven ......... this is proof!

Location: POLAND

Re: Seven in the mountains...

An excellent manual on the repair and maintenance of Volkswagens, written by a hippie in the height of the hippie season, was entitled "How to keep your VW alive - the manual for the complete idiot". When you got to the chapter on driving tactics, there was a section on driving in the mountains. One would expect a long treatise on gear-changing etc, but what it said for VW Kombi's was "Start out early". I always applied that to Austin Sevens, although luckily we don't have any really high mountains in this Country. But Ruairidh has proven that completely wrong - great trip, great photos, Thanks, R. Cheers, Bill

Location: Euroa , Australia