Culford Car Show 2021 (part 1)

A couple of years ago there was a great car show inside a walled garden at Elevedon. Due to the Covid pandemic it was cancelled last year. The show got some great feedback and demand for places was high. It was clear this year it would need to be moved to a new venue; Culford School in Suffolk. Culford is a private school and quite exclusive for those with plenty of money. This year’s event was held in collaboration with the ‘Teenage Cancer Trust’. This show has jumped pretty near the top for my favourite car shows, with the much larger and beautiful grounds of Culford. I took over one hundred and eighty pictures on the day so I will split this show’s coverage into two halves.

The weather was due to be hot all weekend and I woke up Sunday morning with a huge smile as the sun was out. It was going to be the hottest day of the year so far peaking at 30 deg cel. This poses other issues to classic car owners – will it over heat and other such terrifying questions.

I packed lots of of drinks and and the wife told me to also pack a dog bowl and some water for the dogs at the show if they are out for the day in the heat. Initially I thought she was mad, but thinking about it, the dogs do get dragged around in the heat with their tongues hanging out. So I thought why not (we are massive dog lovers with two little guys of our own), we don’t want to see any dog to overheat.

The drive there was calm and collected, easy to get after a thirty minute drive. Pulling into the school gate the were speed humps. Not ideal as I know that my exhaust headers sit quite low. The first hump caught my attention with the scrap of metal even though I was going slow.

The rest were taken at snails pace to allow the car to gently go over them. Funny enough on the way out I scrapped the same hump, so that one must have been a tiny bit higher. The grounds of the event are beautifully kept, almost film set quality.

As you can see from the queue of cars waiting to get in there was indeed a few cars that had broken down.

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Halfway along the drive there was a little church for the school.

Pulling into the main area of the school where some had already parked up, I believe these were allocated spots.

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I showed my pass to the organisers for ‘Area A’ and was told to follow the Jag XKR to a parking location. We had to drive across a field and we were all pointed to some trees. I wasn’t best impressed thinking about the tree sap and potential bird stuff landing on the car. In fact a few cars parked up behind us and were asked to move forward a bit. They tried but wouldn’t start up again, a TVR and a VW Beetle with a Porsche engine bolted in the back having the worst of the trouble and were pushed forward a few feet. The heat

I got out and spoke to the Jag guys who turned out to be great company all day. We had a quick chat about the trees, the impending hot weather, they pointed out that at least we are in the shade. Point taken and and all was good with me again. Sap and stuff would have to be tolerated, for now. The car that also followed me parked up and everybody got busy with dusting over their cars to make them look good.

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Looking forwards I could see the expanse of the fields and car that were going to be there.

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I now honestly think that our spaces were the best there.

Not forgetting what the wife told me, once I had finished cleaning my car the dog bowl was out.

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As it turned out I topped up the bowl twice and I was pleased to see that there weren’t that many dogs there, hopefully being kept cool at home.

After the exhausting work of quick detailing the car in the rising temperatures I got my chair out and had a little rest, it was then that I decided that my car really does have a nice rear end. Biased comment to say I know, a little biased here (OK a lot), but in the shade with a little sunlight glinting of it, I think it looked pretty good.

I’m gonna jump the sequence of the day a little bit for a very good reason. After I got back from my wander round I had two little guys take an interest in my car with their parents. They were well behaved and very polite and credit to their parents.

So let me introduce you to ‘Christopher’ and ‘Ollie’. (I think that I spelt the name right, I did try to find them again later on to check, but I couldn’t see them.)

So guys if I have spelt your name wrong, please let me know and I will update it for you straight away.

They little guys wanted to sit in the car so I agreed and they took turns in the drivers seat. I didn’t manage grab a pic at that time. But, they also asked to sit in the back. Now as that was a real first for me – I thought – why not? In you get again boys. Now you’re famous. 😀

As with all these little things, it made my day. I hope to see you little guys again.

Back to the sequence of the day; After a little sit down and a rest I decided to go for a walk and have a look round for some pictures. There was some pretty average cars there and on the other hand some great cars, on neither hand, quite a few I had seen and posted on my little ol’ blog before.

A little gathering of some UK fords right near my parking zone. Note the flaked out dog by the Granada in the shade.

As I worked my way nearer to the centre and the school there is this wonderful view.

The day was just getting hotter and hotter, and everybody was in great spirits. I suspect that they were glad to get out for some sunshine therapy. I met a very interesting guy there and I will explain in the next post.

‘Part Two’ coming in a couple of days, watch this space…..