Finding Carla (Dave and Lesley's UK Road Trips): Jacks Hill and a Cacklefest Friday 10th to Sunday 12th July 2015

A glorious afternoon on Friday 10^th July saw us driving the Hot Rod through the beautiful Bedfordshire, Buckinghamshire and Northamptonshire countryside to Towcester. It is only 28 miles away by direct route but we added a few extra miles to go the scenic route along the narrow and at times bumpy B and even smaller roads via Harrold, the market town of Olney, through the beautiful village Weston Underwood, stopping off at Salcey Forest and then Blisworth before arriving at our destination Jacks Hill Café in Towcester.

Salcey Forest

Salcey Forest is a medieval hunting forest, managed by the Forestry Commission and very user friendly for pedestrians, cyclists and horse riders. We walked up the Tree Top forest walk which climbs 50 feet through the trees and has a viewing platform a further 10 feet up and looks over the top of the trees. From here, you can see the Otis tower in Northampton several miles away. We did the Elephant walk which I discovered was named after the Elephant Pond where circus elephants used to bathe after felling trees from the forest in WW2!

Blisworth Tunnel

Blisworth is the village at the opposite end of the Blisworth tunnel, (part of the Grand Union Canal) to the more famous and touristy Stoke Bruene. We were surprised to discover the mouth to Blisworth tunnel wasn’t in the village at all, so ventured along the towpath for about a mile to reach it. The tunnel at 3015 yards long is the longest freely navigable tunnel in Europe. From its opening in 1805 until the 1930’s, the barges were “legged” by men lying on their backs pushing the barges along with their feet on the walls, while the horses were walked over the hill.

After driving through a few more pretty villages, none of which we had ever heard of let alone seen before (and only 20 miles away from home!) we arrived at Jacks Hill café at around 5pm, only the fourth or fifth car to do so which meant we got the pick of the parking spaces. We’ve never been here before so didn’t know what to expect. The café is primarily a 1940’s truck stop on the A5 (Roman road, Watling Street- hence it is a pretty straight road!) The setting is ideal for a car meet and the car park soon filled up with a variety of cars from classics to Hot Rods, Japs to American, a nice collection and well worth the drive over. We met up with a few friends- The Shuttleworths and the Stapletons and amazingly someone we used to employ nearly 30 years ago!


Jacks Hill Cafe,Towcester

The George, Tiffield

We slipped up on the food front. The menu was diner food. We rarely eat that kind of food these days and had already promised ourselves a nice pub meal. We left just as a few cars were moving on and stopped off at the George in Tiffield. It was a nice little pub, everyone was very friendly and very complimentary about the car but the food was about the standard of the diner so we ended up eating chips anyway!

I am struggling with navigating at the moment. In the US you would go miles and miles before you needed to spot a turning but here there are so many turns so close together that if you miss a tiny kink in the map, you end up on a different road to where you intend to be. It’s no big deal as the alternative road heads in the same direction and may take you half a mile out of your way but I’m missing quite a bit of the scenery while I keep looking down at the map. The signposts are not always helpful either. Hopefully I’ll get into the swing of it soon.

Another successful ride out ended just as dark descended but the car was covered in splattered bugs which had to be removed ready for our next trip to Dragstalgia at Santa Pod the following day.

Once again we got there fairly early so bagged a nice spot in the show’n’shine area, next to the fire up road and after a stroll around the pits, we joined other NSRA members in the VIP suite for the day giving us a prime view of the start line and the track. As the name implies, it was a throwback to the “good old days” and we were treated to a day of old school drag racing:- the old Christmas Tree, old style funny cars, front engine dragsters, altereds, fifties and sixties style back up girls, Ian and David the starters dressed in white boiler suits, flame burnouts, cacklefest, plenty of drama and lots of people to talk to. Paul came up with Zoe and her family who seemed to have a good time. We certainly did. It’s so nice to just kick back and relax for a change and in warm sunshine too! Dave returned on Sunday but with the weather forecast not looking good I decided to stay at home.