Up before dawn for the annual London to Brighton Veteran Car Run. Can't remember now how many years we've been doing this - several, anyway. It's a rally that celebrates the passing of the Locomotives on the Highway Act in November 1896. Sometimes known as the Red Flag Act, it required that automobile drivers be preceded on the road by a man carrying a red flag in warning. Every time I set the alarm for six o'clock a small part of me thinks that it might rain, we might not really have to be up in the cold darkness.
But at the first sight or sound of a veteran car the adrenaline starts. Some cars are trailered in buty some drivers have stayed at hotels on our side of Hyde Park and head out along the Bayswater Road, two and three (sometimes even one) cylinder cars audible before we spot them in the dark. And brave drivers as many of the old cars have no lights at all. One pretty noisy little car we see loses power at each red light along the road and the driver has to pedal furiously until the engine catches when the lights turn green. Probably all right once on the open road, although like many of the entrants not too speedy. Cars are deemed to have completed the run (it's not a race) if they reach Brighton, some sixty miles away, by 4:30 in the afternoon, about a nine hour window. We enter the park while cars are still arriving, but it's a longish walk along the Serpentine where the vehicles are marshalled, admiring as we go, and the first cars are off before we reach the start point.
A pity in a way, as the lead car is a treasure - an 1893 Peugeot constructed only seven years after the world's first car. There's plenty to feast the eyes on, though, with some 450 cars in the event. They're all pre-1905 and come from as far away as Australia and Argentina. No two alike, and some must barely meet the definition of car, with tiller in place of steering wheel and bare boards construction.
Many are three wheeled and the passenger, when there is one, sometimes in front of the driver rather than beside or behind him (or in a few cases her). Totally delightful and the participants, many in period dress, are visibly thrilled. A little over an hour from the time the first car leaves at 7:02 until the last is on its way. By this time we're pretty chilled. The sun is up, but we've been standing watching for a long time, so home by tube to put a kettle on.
