TEAM ADVENTURE
Danny Hopkins takes a week out to visit the five classic charities you love the best
It can be easy to lose faith these days. If you believe the news, the online sensationalism that invades our lives every day, the world is full of spite, division and selfishness… we’re all doomed. Yet, back in the real world, particularly in our world, the opposite is true. We are surrounded by decent humans doing great things to help each other, and that is what our Britain’s Favourite Classic Charity competition set out to celebrate. With our mates at Lancaster Insurance Services, we asked you to nominate, and then vote for, your favourite classic car related charities. You did, and now my job is to go and visit each on in turn to find out why they are so special and how we can all get involved.
My mission to join the ‘famous five’ also coincided with the completion of our little Reliant Rebel van, our Rebel With a Cause, so what better vehicle to take on this epic adventure to visit the classic car related charities you chose, starting with one of the most visible and familiar… the Sporting Bears.
DAY 1 SPORTING BEARS
Easy day today. Starting from the PC workshop, where the Rebel had enjoyed a final week of fettling, I set off early to trundle the 12 miles south to Peterborough, to Media House, where the magazine’s parent company, Bauer Media, is based. This is where I will meet up with the rest of the PC team and our guests for the day, the Sporting Bears Motor Club.
The Rebel starts with the first flick of the key, and everything works, a tribute to the team who have restored this remarkable little car over the last couple of years. Matt Tomkins and James Holland had spent much of the previous month finishing it off, and now it is my responsibility to drive it with care as the previously rebuilt engine, the only part the guys hadn’t touched, is run in.
This means I am working at speeds of under 35mph everywhere. The Rebel is extremely high geared, so the 750cc four-pot hits 3000rpm somewhere under 40mph. Again, just as I did last year with the VW Type 2 van, I have to recalibrate my brain as I drive any distance. I’ll need to ‘not be in a hurry’ this week – ‘leave very early and arrive on time’ is my mantra.
The ‘Bears’ have turned up in force by the time I reach Media House, including our old friend Paul Bonsall, who runs the Fat Lamb Inn in Cumbria and hosts many Bears events. I count twenty cars, of various exotic flavours, all of which are the type of vehicle that would give anyone a thrill, which is the point really, Sporting Bears being an organisation which, by offering paid for rides in exciting cars, raises some £200k every year for kids’ charities.
It started i
