The Hows, Whys And Wherefores
The How centered around two particular ways of achieving the objective. I guess on reflection, it probably helped to look at is as a kind of project.
One was flying out and taking the ashes in a plastic container that would be approved for flight and then getting local connections to Limone. the other was to drive it myself.
At the time, I had a beaten up old diesel BMW 5 Series 520D, which was reliable enough to do the run to and from Brussels when we lived there, but it wasn’t, not to my mind anyway, a fitting vehicle for the tribute to her that was what I was hoping to achieve in this case.
Being a typical Leo, I was and still am, given to Grand Gestures… so it was a very easy leap from “I must drive to Italy” to “I must drive to Italy, taking her to her resting place in style as the last big thing that I can do for her, to show the world that I loved her more than anything and that I will honour her memory as best I can”.
And I’m not going to do that in a beaten up 5 Series diesel, if I can help it.
So, if not the 5 Series for this Grand Gesture Final Journey through Europe, then what else?
As I had been lucky to have been wisely advised about probate when dealing with her will and because there were a number of smaller amounts coming through from savings policies and insurances, money wasn’t likely to get in the way; It was never a case of having money to be frivolous with, but I could afford to be able to do the journey for her properly, in a good degree of style. The notion was to acquire a car, as opposed to hiring one, keep it for at least a couple of years and then see what happens next.
Initial thoughts strayed towards Mercedes as they were the marque that I was most familiar with at that point, specifically an old style 1980s W107 300SL or 450SL.
I read up on these cars in the Classic Car press but found that the ones that had the right history that I was looking for and that would have been appropriate for this mission would be in a very small number and would likely have some age related issues that may prove to be troublesome. The other adage that kept on coming up that I saw a lot as general buying advice for a classic car was “Buy The Best That You Can Afford”.
This made the pool of prospective vehicles even smaller.
And, the Classic Car magazines that I was looking at during this initial sift also brought to my attention another car which I had always had a soft spot for and would often jokingly say to the late Mrs F whenever we saw one, particularly one that was up for sale “can I have one?” to be met with the usual laughing reply and answer of “No!”.
And that car was the Jaguar XJS. The connection of the marque of Jaguar with my home city of Coventry was quite a strong one and there were some late 80s ones that I considered looking at until I read an article in a classic car magazine which included a sub-article by a man who was an XJS specialist, a man called Dave Clarke. I took a look at Dave’s website which showed that he and his business lived and breathed XJS’s; this was their raison d’etre.
So, in early November 2011, I made an appointment with Dave and took a drive in the 5 Series down to his dealership in deepest Sussex, near Lewes in a tiny little hamlet called Cross In Hand. The office building looked like an old wooden lodge and there was a long workshop barn next to it and two freely roaming and quite affable German Shepherd dogs mooching around the premises. Dave explained that to him and his son, this was all they did. They did indeed, live and breathe XJS’s and the barn was full of them and every single one of them had a story as to how they came to be there and Dave knew every single one of those stories inside out.
I explained to Dave what the purpose was, what I wanted the XJS to do and what the objective of the trip was, but I no mention of budget yet. He sat on the other side of his old desk in an old fashioned leather office chair with wooden arms and was thoughtful for a moment… and then broke into a warm, but shallow, reassuring smile.
“I think I’ve got just the thing for you. Come with me, let me introduce you”.
I followed him and his son into the Long Barn and just as described, there were two lines, down each wall, left and right, of cars under full dust covers, as if they were all asleep under blankets.
About 5 cars deep into the rows on the left hand side, he stopped and motioned to his son to help him remove the dust cover on one particular car. “OK, Mr Fubar. I think this is the one. This is a 1994 XJS4.0 Coupe, second facelift, from the Ford era. The last of the straight six, four litre AJ6 engines before they went to the AJ16. The colour is Moroccan Red. See that subtle metallic sparkle under the lights? Shall we take her for a test drive?”
He climbed in the drivers side and inched the vehicle out of its slot and out of the barn and I got in the passenger side, being surprised as to how low down the seating position was, but despite that, relatively easy to get into.
I dont recall where the local roads around Lewes that we went around with Dave driving, but I do remember him getting to a mini roundabout, and doing a 180 turn on it and sticking his foot down. “You’ll run out of nerve before she ever runs out of grip, trust me”, he grinned. By the time we had got back to the barn on the relatively short test drive, I was keen on the car, it was hard to deny. It was an honest car, not a concours winner by any stretch, but someone had given this car a lot of love.
“Let me tell you why I think this is the one” said Dave. “This car has been with us about 6 months. Before that, it belonged to a hotelier in the South West.” He passed me the folder of extensive documentation including the original sales receipt from the official Jaguar dealer in Exeter. “He had a number of small hotels in and around that part of Devon and he bought the car for his wife and she kept it until she passed away unexpectedly. Thing is, at that point in his life after what happened, he just put the car in the garage, locked the doors and left it there. He couldn’t bare to face it. Too much.”
“The car was left there, declared SORN, in this guys garage for about 5 years, under a dust sheet. In the end, his kids kept on saying to him, Dad, you’ve got to let it go. Its not the cars fault, it needs to go to a new home. You’ve got to let it go”.
“Well, eventually” continued Dave “he did let it go, which is how we came by it. We bought it from him and did a lot of work on it; there were issues with the rear suspension, new disks all round, there was corrosion on the underside as was typical of some of the cars of this era, so we had to treat that and underseal it and there was an overhaul of the interior as well and the leather was re-Connolised. She’s a straight honest car, she’s not a concours vehicle there are some surface scratches, there are some signs of her age, she’s nearly 18 years old; 49,000 genuine miles on the clock, full service history from ourselves and from the Jaguar dealership in Exeter where she was bought from and when we dealt with the suspension rebuild, we put her on Aston Martin DB7 springs, so she doesnt wallow in corners, she stays absolutely flat.”
“I think this is the one. She still has a lot of life left in her and I think for what you are looking for, for what you’re looking to do…. this is the one. Take your time, have a think about it. Running costs… if I were you, I would budget around £1500 per year for things like servicing, consumables like tyres, MOT’s, and so on. Insurance, if you have it on a limited mileage policy through a Classic insurer, you’ll find surprisingly affordable. Its not as expensive as you might think, she’ll go further on a tank of fuel than you would believe, but if you work on that figure of about £1500 a year, you should be fine.”
By which point the decision had already been made. This was the one.
I agreed a price with Dave and for delivery within the month. It wasn’t as much as you might have thought it was, but then again, with the benefit of hindsight, it was nearly 13 years ago that this happened. Some may say that Dave was just doing what a good salesman should do, taking a prospective customer into his confidence and providing them with the opportunity to buy his products and services and that anything is fair game to achieve that objective.
At the time, and in many ways still now, I wasnt quite that cynical and maybe for some things, I still like to believe in people who strike me as genuine and who have not only appear to have integrity, but also a burning passion for what they do and Dave and his son struck me as that kind of people. So, I was happy to buy from him, shook his hand, arranged for the bank transfer to be made and the deal was done.
© text & images Fubar2 2025
