Except it doesn’t. It has two major failings.

First of all, it can’t be used in two different places at once. This limits our progress through various chores at weekends, and means that if one of us goes out in the car, the other is marooned at the house. Also, if it breaks down, we are well and truly stuffed.

The other problem I’ve got with the 330d is that, capable as it is, it’s a bit dull. I really like cars, and I like them to be interesting – a bit special. There’s nothing special about the 330d in the way that my previous 5 ‘M’ cars had a certain following and inherent entertainment value.

So a second car was required, and it had to be capable of both entertaining me and carting the family around. E61 M5s were out of budget, and I just couldn’t get excited about an Audi. I’ve had an itch for an Impreza for about a decade, and when I found out about the run of just 100 limited edition GB270 wagons produced in 2007, I got more than a bit interested, so I bought one. I’m its third owner, and it arrived with just 29,500 miles on the clock.

Yeah, so it’s a bit brash. Twin spoilers and a massive zorst on display there. The GB270 has the Prodrive Performance Pack giving it 270PS and 420Nm, along with different suspension and a bunch more bling. The power figure isn’t particularly impressive when stacked up against the M5′s 400hp, but at only 1,425kg and with four wheel drive this is faster to 60mph in just 4.9s.

From the side the lack of subtlety in the colour scheme becomes apparent, as does the frankly ridiculous bonnet scoop.

Inside it is all a bit flimsy compared with a BMW, but it is all so light. The bucket seats don’t offer much adjustment but are certainly very comfortable and supportive. The car came with a standard CD and cassette (yes, cassette, in a 2007 car…) head unit. Fortunately Ben Smith still had his touch-screen head unit from his 2004 Impreza, so today he kindly both donated and fitted it. Thanks Ben!

This car is an absolute hoot to drive. It makes a fantastic sound, delivers power in such a playful yet competent way, and grips and grips and grips. It won’t oversteer, which in many ways is probably for the best! It’s certainly a welcome addition to the driveway.

A colleague (and long established Apple fan) was quick to snap one up, so it wasn’t long before I got to see an iPad in the flesh. Then, still, I mocked the device, and (carefully!) used it as a iBeerMat.

However, last Christmas I was fortunate enough to be gifted an original 32GB wireless iPad. Given my previous iPhone experience it didn’t take me long to get everything set up. After an initial period of fascination with what is certainly a very interesting gadget, its real benefits started to show.

A year on, this device (yes, this post has been written on my iPad) is used far more than the workstation, laptop or my mobile while I’m in the house. It doesn’t do any single thing well enough to warrant its price tag, but it does so many things that I’d now swiftly replace it if it ever broke.

On that topic, the screen is (understandably) fragile. I managed to crack mine during a spectacularly malcoordinated mishap. Fortunately I sourced a replacement screen kit for around £40 (thanks, eBay!) and while the outer edges of the device show the signs of my rudimentary intrusion, it’s all working okay.

Use cases

The various catch up TV apps mean I can watch television no matter where I am in the house, from the bedroom to the bathroom and of course the kitchen. On the subject of the kitchen, the web browser there is incredibly useful for recipes, and while the iPad is mounted on the wall the touch screen means the talented among us can even navigate the web with our noses while our hands are covered in sticky ingredients.

An iPad is substantially easier to take on holiday than a laptop, and is just as good if like me your only needs are to stay on top of email and social media while you’re away. Oh, and for taking your own films to watch (try CineXPlayer) on the plane or in the hotel room.

I’ve used the notepad feature a great deal, while studying or taking measurements etc. When our daughter came along, the iPad became an essential part of the baby feeding kit during the early days when it was important to note down all her intake – we still know the details of every feed she had during her first month at home!

While watching TV I’m often distracted by questions such as “what other film have I seen this guy in?” or “surely that’s not factually correct!” – well, the IMDB and Wikipanion apps come straight to the rescue there. Sure, I could look this up on the phone or the laptop, but (and I can’t believe I’m saying this now) the laptop is too big and slow to get going, and the mobile does have a rather poky screen.

The battery life is good too – the iPad craps all over both the iPhone and my laptop in that department.

I use the reminders application a lot to keep on top of my domestic to-do list. If I think of something while I’m out and about I can add the task from my phone and it’ll be waiting for me on the iPad when I’ve got time to crack on with things.

It’s also my home device of choice for staying up to date with Twitter and Facebook, although the lack of synchronisation between Twitter apps gets quite tedious (ooh I’ve got a new mention; oh no, I saw that hours ago on my phone). Some web sites are better to read on their free iPad app than the original web version due to fewer adverts – Mashable is a good example here.

Finally (for now!), it’s a great portable radio which I use a lot for radio 4 and cricket commentary.

Overall then, I can’t believe what a fan-boy I’ve become. The iPad is a great device. There, I said it.

The government claimed that the FiT scheme had been so successful that it had brought down the cost of installations to the point where they are far too profitable. They wanted payback to take about 16 years, but reckoned some systems would payback in only 8 years. Fortunately for me, my solar system has been registered well within the approved period, so unless the government breaks their existing agreement, I’m tied in to the more favourable rate of payback for the next 25 years. Time will tell as to how long it’ll take to reach payback!

Consumption

My wonderful Wattson energy monitoring system has been measuring both our consumption and generation since the PV system was installed. In the graph below, it should be noted that the values for August and December are not complete, as the system was brought online late on the 23rd August, and the last measurement was uploaded yesterday morning.

The blue bars are our consumption, and the green line is our solar PV generation. I’m pleased to note that in the final week of August, we very nearly generated enough power to meet our needs – hopefully that’ll be the case in from May to August.

Our consumption has increased month on month due to the fact that a part of the house (a north facing extension) is heated by electric storage heaters, so as winter has drawn in it has been necessary for us to put a lot of energy in to keep us warm. The remainder of the house is heated by gas fired central heating, which isn’t included in our consumption here, but we need to use that surprisingly little – my theory here is that a combination of a heated northern edge and the heat from kitchen appliances goes a long way to maintaining a comfortable temperature.

Another key change in our consumption has been caused by the arrival of our daughter in mid-October. Suddenly we need to run bottle warmers, sterilisers, and electric heaters on cold nights. Also we bath her nearly every night, and as our water is heated overnight we generally need to run the booster immersion heater for 15 minutes or so every evening – something we rarely used to do.

On the other hand, when compared with the same period last year, our consumption is well down. This is partly due to a milder winter so far (we had snow twice by this time last year!), and also due to the solar generation offsetting our consumption. These two factors are reasonably easy to separate as our night readings are down 40% (milder winter) and our day readings are down 54% (due to solar PV assistance), causing an immediate saving in outgoing bills before the generation payouts listed below are taken into account.

Generation

Generation has faded as I’d expect as we slipped into winter. Given an even spread of cloud throughout the year I’d expect the green line to be roughly sinusoidal, with a peak in June and a trough in December.

On the 23rd November I submitted my first quarterly generation reading: 817kWh. There’s an agreed 3.1ppkWh export payout, plus the 43.5ppkWh FiT. The trouble is there’s no export meter – when we are generating more than we are consuming my consumption meter simply stops, so there’s an assumption that we use half and export half of what we generate. I’m therefore paid (3.1/2)+43.5=45.05ppkWh, so was pleased to receive my first cheque for £366.42 this month.

If every quarter gave an identical yield (which of course they won’t), I’d achieve payback in a little over 8 years. Nice. Perhaps though things are even more optimistic: the majority of that quarter was actually winter-side of equinox, so it should be below average. Time will tell – perhaps the government were right to make a hasty change after all, although I am inclined to suggest that 6 weeks notice wasn’t at all reasonable on both prospective consumers and those businesses that had cropped up around this industry.

Getting the rear wheels off the 330d was a real bitch, a combination of the cold and a lack of copper grease ensured this job took me hours. The new tyres are 225/45 R17  Pirelli Sottozero Series 2s which I mail  ordered from Oponeo. Below the difference in tread style is obvious when compared to one of the 255/35 R18 summer tyres (Falkens).

The tread blocks are much bigger and further apart, which should make them far less liable to clog up with snow. Also the rubber is slightly different – far softer at lower temperatures.

So the car doesn’t look quite as purposeful on these smaller wheels, although the brakes really do look like they’re bulging out of the wheels now! The ride quality has certainly improved thanks to the higher profile tyres, but then the 18s demand such skinny tyres that even the M5 rode better.

I can’t be too critical of the performance just yet as the tyres haven’t had a chance to bed in, but so far things feel pretty good. There’s slightly less stability when I grab the car by the scruff of the neck, but any misbehaviour is entirely controllable as breakaway is less sudden that on the 18s. When out and about in the wet in near freezing conditions, the car is certainly at least as capable as on the 18s. Due to the camber matters have always noticeably improved as tyres bed in on the 330d, so I’m hopeful for some serious winter performance. I’ll report back when I’ve got some mud, snow and ice experience!

So in the above photo, the top item is a replacement window regulator, and the lower item is the broken one I removed. There’s a steel cable that’s wrapped around the central drum, and that had burst off the drum, and the noise I’d heard was it flipping around the drum and hitting the window glass.

Replacing the item isn’t especially hard. I found a good guide here: http://www.bmwgm5.com/Rear_Window_Regulator.htm

The part is BMW B51.35.8.212.099 which currently retails at £75.84 ex VAT.

I traced the problem to the item described above as “Radio/Car Amp”. It’s a Becker BM54, and a short trawl of the internet quickly revealed that the amplifier’s output stages are a fairly weak link. Replacement units seem to cost several hundred pounds. Hmm.

There were some eBay sellers willing to effect a repair for a couple of hundred quid, mentioning reflowing solder joints. While consulting various forums though I saw a recommendation that caught my eye. It seems that Cartronics, a firm based just a few miles up the road from me who did a decent job of installing a Thatcham approved immobiliser in my second E30 M3, offer a warrantied repair for similar money. They claimed their repair involved entirely replacing the amplifier’s output stages to both ensure this wouldn’t happen again and provide a superior sound. I concluded that while the £210 they were asking was a bit rich compared with the cost of a standard head unit, the sound quality certainly couldn’t get any worse, and they were at least a devil I knew.

I dropped the unit off late on Saturday, and they called lunchtime today (Tuesday) to say it was ready. I understand they also provide a service by mail. This evening I’ve verified the repair, and also concluded that the sound quality certainly isn’t any worse.

So, if your BMW (or Range Rover) speakers are cutting out, locate your amplifier module and get it sorted. While mine is a B54, it replaced the B24 which also suffered in a similar matter, and I noted Cartronics had a couple of those also in for repair at the same time. In e46-land, to remove the module, start by lifting up the boot floor:

Remove your rude-boy sub, tow hook and spare wheel cover. Then using a 10mm socket release the two black plastic nuts and open the flap to the comms deck. I found a 3/8 extension a useful prop to hold the flap up.

There’s a big black block connector that can be unclipped. Before going too much further though I’d trace that to the nearby (and just out of shot below) black connector and make sure all the pins in that are firmly home – I’ve lost sound before due to those working loose.

In the above picture I’ve got two unused white connectors. The lower left one is from the old CD changer – my rather primitive iPod kit actually replaces that in the black block connector. The loose white connector at the top by the TV module is the old A/V connector – my DVD player has replaced that. So, remove the black block connector, the aerial (on the left) and the 8mm nut, and whip out the unit.

Send it off to repair, and it should come back with one of these stuck on it.

Plug it in and off you chug down the road. Boom-tish, boom-tish, etc.

I’ve not got a history of being especially green, yet I’ve just done something (apparently) rather “eco”. I’ve sold the M5, and rather than replacing it I have invested those funds along with some savings into a fairly noticeable set of solar panels for the house roof. There are three good reasons to do this:

1) It is ecologically preferable. Just 3 years ago we were a 3 car family, totalling nearly 10 litres and 700hp of motoring genius. There were all sorts of excursions such as trips to the Nűrburgring etc, but since then we’ve moved to larger house and become more invested in our local jobs and making a nest for our imminent family. It makes sense to try and put something back in. That said though to be honest I’d be quick to buy another large V8 if I thought I’d have the time and money to drag it sideways around circuits all weekend. Hmm.

2) More convincingly, there are substantial financial incentives currently in place for solar PV installations. Install after March 2012 and these incentives start fading annually, but install before April 2012 and there’s a tasty government backed, indexed linked “Feed in Tariff” (FiT) that should provide ROI for 25 years.

3) Most interestingly, this is some geeky apparatus. I’ve got some rather cool kit and can produce lots of stats and graphs. Fruity!

Research

So anyway, all this started at the beginning of the year when the cost of heating water here at home was starting to get to me. At that point I was interested in solar thermal (and I still am), but my research from that point forward suggested that it would make sense to get solar PV first (to get in before the April 2012 deadline), and worry about solar thermal once I’d recovered from that. I’m fortunate that my friend Henry’s (of three peaks fame) father is the project leader for Rushcliffe Solar, and was able to point me in the right direction on many of these matters.

Still it wasn’t until July, when amidst British Gas’s announcement that they were going to significantly increase energy costs from mid-August, that I took a slightly different route to work and noticed a couple of nearby homes had recently had some panels fitted.

The above photo neatly highlights both the different styles of panels available, and the restrictions that roof size can make on an installation. Personally, I don’t like those silver trimmed efforts on the right, and I really like those black panels on the left. Also, the house on the right was clearly restricted to 12 panels by the size of their roof. With a good panel yielding around 245W, that installation on the right can at best produce 2,940W, whereas the 16 panels on the left could produce 3,920W. Systems under 4kW are eligible for the most favourable FiT, so I wondered if the installation on the left was exactly what I was looking for.

That evening on the way home from work I decided to visit the house on the left and see if they wouldn’t mind giving me some details. I was lucky enough to find the owners extremely enthusiastic and more than happy to pass on as much information as I could digest. Those are 245W Solar World PV modules, and they were installed by a company called Eco Fusion. Later that week I called up and soon had a site survey booked in.

Installation size and pre-requisites

I also realised that I’d probably have to do something about my house’s original 1975 fuse box:

So I booked an electrician from Diane’s business group to come in and replace that. As it happens he arrived on the same day as the PV survey, which handily allowed him to confirm their requirements. Once he had finished the fuse cupboard looked rather more satisfactory:

Anyway, back to the PV survey, which is where things got interesting. I’d roughly measured the roof, and had feared that we would only be able to have a 2×7 panel array up there. The survey guy explained that in order to protect against wind and to ensure running water doesn’t surge over the gutter, it’s necessary to ensure that the panels are at least 200mm from any roof edge. Consequently, we could only fit a 2×6 panel array on the main roof. He therefore suggested that we put 4 panels on the extension roof. Let’s put this into context with a photograph:

Yeah, it’s an ugly house. At least there’s no beauty to lose by coating it in solar technology! The house faces a little east of south, so the extension roof would be okay in the morning but would be shaded by the main house roof later in the day – not ideal. Still, the surveyor left and I mulled things over while I waited to hear back from them. I went out for a run and, having memorized the roof and panel dimensions, pondered the situation.

Suddenly I had a Eureka moment – what if the panels could be mounted in landscape rather than portrait? I knew the panels were 1001mm wide and a 20mm gap is required between each panel. So for panels + gaps + run-off the roof would need to be (4×1001) + (3×20) + (2×200) = 4464mm from ridge to gutter. There was only one way to be sure, and that was to get up there and measure it with a tape measure, and I was pleased to note it could be managed with a few mm to spare! So I called the shop and put this suggestion to them, and after and hour or so they came back to me and said it would work out.

I should note here that since then I’ve done some reading around as to what the minimum recommended distance from the edge is, and I’ve seen a variety of responses from 200mm to 600mm. So it would seem that my supplier (perhaps predictably) was willing to (literally!) sail a little closer to the wind than most. Still, there’s plenty of room from the left and right, and the panels can’t be seen over the ridge at all from the rear of the house (the danger point for wind-loading). We’ve had heavy rain and haven’t suffered with water flowing off the panels over the guttering at the front either.

Final specification

I had been quoted for 16x245W Solar World SW245 Mono panels (3,920W), and a Fronius TL 3.6 inverter (max input 3,800W, max output 3,600W). Obviously I questioned this – there’s the potential for the panels to overdrive this inverter. I was assured this was standard practice and that the inverter could cope with it just fine. I’ve pondered this and concluded that peak output is extremely unlikely to be delivered by the panels for long, and these inverters are designed to sense overload and shut down. If that happens, or if it’s damaged, I’ll hold Eco-Fusion accountable, but it does seem like a sensible approach.

The panels do degrade with time. Their specification sheet (linked to above) states they carry warranty to produce at least 90% of rated power after 10 years and at least 80% of rated power after 25 years. After 3% degradation they will match the inverter.

Installation

So, before the installation we had some scaffold arrive:

Now, that evening I decided to make use of this. Note the yellow tinge on the roof – there was a huge amount of moss and general roof garden up there. So I decided to get up there and blast it all off – with some kind assistance from Robin the second and Ben the first. The roof was cleaned by nightfall.

The following morning the house roof looked rather different.

It was suggested as a result of this process being documented on Facebook that we had removed a protective layer on the tiles by pressure washing them. Certainly there was a fairly radical change in colour which suggested some kind of staining had been removed. I inspected them carefully and compared the way they handled water being poured over them with the tiles on the back of the house (that we didn’t clean). There was no difference. I consulted an experienced roofer and trusted friend on the matter, and he seemed to think there was no issue. Still, to be safe I gave the roof a couple of coats of transparent tile seal.

Installation day itself was miserable – overcast with pretty constant drizzle. Did this stop the installation? Hell no!

At about 10am a 3 man team arrived – two for the roof and an electrician. There was work to be done in the electrical cupboard, and the inverter was to be installed in the loft.

On the roof the rails went up first, and then the panels were fixed in place.

In the loft:

In the electrical cupboard:

By 3pm they were finished – very impressive given what they had to achieve and the weather. The panels are connected into two groups of eight and then feed into the black (DC) side of the inverter. From the inverter a cable runs to the roof edge and then subtly down the side of the house and into the electrical cupboard where the distribution board is driven.

Measuring

The installation came with a Wattson energy meter. This is a fantastic piece of kit, especially if it is installed correctly, which it almost was. It comes with a couple of sensors which clip around live cables, and by measuring the EMF it knows how much current is flowing in those cables. Sadly though, it doesn’t know which way the current is flowing. It is bright enough to understand that one of the sensors may be for generated input power, which makes it ideal for the job.

It was installed with the generator clip in the right place, but the usage clip connected to our main feed from the grid. Under circumstances where we were generating less than we were using it worked a treat, but as it always assumed that the current sensed between the house and the grid was inbound (not export), when we generated more than we used it got things wrong. I fixed this by installing that clip within the distribution board on the feed to the RCDs (post-generator input), but that meant that it knew nothing about our night-time only circuit which powers things like our storage and immersion heaters. Fortunately the Wattson can have additional inputs, so I invested in another clip and now the system works perfectly.

The Wattson logs all data and I can access it via USB using my laptop and the inevitably named software “Holmes”.

I’ve also got an Environ Current Cost meter and internet bridge. I’ve connected this in such a way that it measures only our generated power and it logs this every 15 minutes on the internet. This means that from anywhere in the world, I can at any time see how much energy the house is generating. Which, as a geek, makes me very happy indeed. So for instance, here’s our generation stats so far today:

Isn’t that wonderful! The blue line and scale on the right are the temperature in the office here at home. Here are the two meters next to each other earlier today:

That’s 3.17kW of energy being harvested from the roof on the left, and an export (hence the minus symbol) of 2.7kW on the right. From that we can deduce that the house is using a little under 500W, which is about right (fridge, freezer, server, laptop, computer, 2 screens, modem, router, switches etc). I have even seen generation figures of just over 3.6kW which is nice and proves that everything is certainly working as it should. To drive all this the electrical cupboard has a couple of wireless transmitters and a total of 4 sensor clips:

Financials

So as you can see from the generation meter above, in the ten days since this system was brought online we’ve generated 146kWh. At the current FiT rate of 43.3ppkWh, that’s £63.22 I’m owed. Put into perspective against the massive capital outlay required to install this system that’s not much, but it’ll continue to grow with no additional effort. There are also other revenues. Firstly, my supplier pays 3.1ppkWh exported. As they can’t tell exactly what was exported they assume 50% (which probably suits them more than me), but that’s another £2.26 off my next bill so far. If that is averaged over the quarterly cycle that’s a more meaningful £20 saving. More importantly though, our daytime usage from the grid has more than halved since these panels were installed, so especially in the summer months those bills will be drastically reduced.

As I’d expect from such a big financial outlay, this is a fantastic toy. However, compared with say a car (and I spent more on the 330d when I bought it), it should prove to be rather more profitable! As it happened it was installed on my 32nd birthday, and it is my hope that the capital expenditure will have been recouped before I am 40. I will post again some time around late October when I’ve got statistics for the system being active either side of equinox – hopefully from there I’ll be able to extrapolate with enough meaningful data to make a more accurate prediction. Until then, here are some photos of the completed system:

Looking back over the near three years of ownership, I have thoroughly enjoyed this car. I’ve spent less time with it recently, but at first there was a flurry of activity including a trip to Curborough, and a DIY clutch change; my favourite photos from those to follow:

I had dearly wanted to take this car to the Nurburgring. I imagine the M5 would intensely contrast with the E30 M3; I’d love to see how the extra weight hurt in the tighter corners, while I’m sure 400bhp and 500Nm would help immensely at times, especially up Ex-Mϋhle. More recently there was the epic three peaks weekend:

As is common, this car leaves me in far better condition than it arrived, and yet worth a lot less. That’s motoring for you. Even so, I think I’ve owned this car at exactly the right time. Any younger, and I would either have crashed it or just been arrested, any older and I wouldn’t have been likely to really use it to its potential.

So, what’s next? As soon as I put it up for sale I was asked that question a lot. The answer is… nothing just yet. Yes, that is partially because I’ve got a baby on the way and that changes priorities, but the main reason is that I’m frankly tired of trying to use Britain’s roads. Barely anyone else can, and having a decent car is really, really frustrating! So for now at least, I’ll just chug around in the tractor.

Anyway, let’s not let such depression detract from such a great car. Here it is, the most ridiculous car I’ve ever owned. Hurrah!

So above we have this story’s cast, from left to right: The M5, Jonny, Neil, Henry and Ben. This photo was taken in Woking at around 6pm on Thursday evening, as we set sail for Carlisle. Needless to say we immediately came to a standstill on the M25, so took the opportunity to take a cheesy in-car photo.

The trip to Carlisle took nearly 5 and a half hours. We passed the time with a mixture of foul jokes and excellent music from our iPhones. Needless to say we also ate a lot – sandwiches, sausage rolls, chocolate éclairs etc – all most civilised. Having got so far north and west we marvelled at how late light faded as we neared the top of the M6 and Carlisle – a moody shelf of cloud covered most of the sky but left the horizon free to reveal dusk.

We checked into the Carlisle Travelodge to discover that Ben had indeed carried out his threat to book two double rooms. He claims that was all that was available. It certainly was by the time we got there, so we decided a few beers were in order to ensure a near-instant passing out.

The following morning we rose early to continue our journey to Fort William. I love the Lake District, but Carlisle isn’t a city I’ve got much inclination to spend time in – there are certainly prettier places nearby.

Still, that didn’t matter because we were soon back in the M5, on the M6 and then into Scotland. Once north of Glasgow, Scotland offers some stunning views, and we were in high spirits.

By midday we had found a McDonald’s for various preparations, and were at the foot of Ben Nevis to start our ascent at 12:35.

We were blessed with a clear day, which made for glorious views throughout our ascent.

The fine day did mean we were rather hot though, and this combined with our general lack of preparation meant we found the going quite tough:

After over 2 hours we were high enough to find a patch of snow.

Finally, after 3 hours of hard ascent, for the first time I reached the top of the UK.

This vantage point offered some seriously impressive views – here’s a quick 360:

Here we all are – on top of Scotland, and indeed the entire land-mass!

Here are a couple of other stills:

Frantic iPhone social media updates from the summit!

So after 3 hours of climbing it was time to descend:

Henry and I then thought it might be a nice idea to run the rest of the way down. That bright idea lasted maybe 20 minutes, but in that time we covered a huge amount of ground and had a lot of fun. A few close calls and general creaking of ageing joints made us realise that such activity on day one was foolish, so we slowed to a brisk walk.

The entire team managed the Ben Nevis section in 5 hours. I had climbed Scafell Pike and Snowdon twice previously, and can safely say that Ben Nevis really took the game up a level – the sheer scale of the Highlands is just that much more serious than the other peaks. Climbing Nevis had been a personal goal of mine since I first drove around its foothills in 2004, so I was delighted with this achievement. We were shattered, but managed to locate our B&B, and popped out to a local pub for a much deserved slap-up meal with beers. Here’s Jonny’s “monster burger”.

That marks the close of the first full day’s adventure. I was delighted to note that Henry and I were in a twin room rather than a double which was far more civilised. Worryingly though, Ben had ensured he once again got the chance to share a double with Jonny…

Saturday morning was overcast; a weather system had arrived on the west coast of the UK which was to set the tone for the day. Still, our B&B had a beautiful view:

Ben took the M5′s wheel leaving me free to snap away and marvel at the car’s overtaking prowess.

We estimated that the car’s total weight was around 2.2 tonnes, yet that magnificent V8 beat away sending us from corner to corner, around truck and minibus, with incredible ease. This was the super saloon in its element, and Ben in his. Henry was suitably impressed:

Much as I love the Highlands, trips there involve Glasgow. Which in my humble opinion, mings mercilessly.

As such I was delighted to escape back to merry England.

That delight was short lived. Carlisle was full of traffic, and the weather at Wasdale was rather inclement.

I’d like to thank Henry for this particularly unflattering photo:

As we started climbing, visibility became somewhat reduced:

At one point we had to cross a stream which proved to be quite a challenge:

We ended up in thick cloud. In stark contrast to the previous day’s climb where we found loads of people milling around at the top of Nevis, there was a lone member of Mountain Rescue at the top of Scafell Pike, and he was about to call it quits for the day. I tried to take a picture of the view:

And this is the only picture of any of us up there:

Despite being so stiff, it took us just a couple of hours to reach the summit. It was so unpleasant that we stayed there for just a few minutes. I then chose to run down – I had no wish to stay out in the cloud any longer than necessary! It was pretty hairy – I had a couple of slips and a minor dunk at the river crossing, but I managed it in 51 minutes keeping my total time under 3 hours which was pleasing. I also ran iMapMyRun, so have a crafty little elevation graph:

From Wasdale we had to move to Ambleside to locate our bunk house for the night. As luck would have it, this permitted me to fulfil another personal goal – to pilot an E39 M5 at full chat over the Hardknott and Wrynose passes (check those Wiki links if you don’t know what those are, especially the Hardknott one as it contains good pictures). Sadly, four up with luggage and minimal visibility weren’t ideal conditions, but it was a great run nevertheless. The M5 is an absolute animal, and it just ate up the 30% gradient hairpin bends – not without expending some effort mind – it’s rare that I know the LSD is hot, for instance! I really had to concentrate!

We had a few beers that night and an excellent meal in Ambleside – nice tasty local lamb!

We spent that night in a bunk house. Our room slept 10, but only 2 unfortunates were sharing with us. It was certainly preferable to sharing a double bed(!), but still a little weird. I took a top bunk and was pleased not to fall out. I was less happy to be photographed in the morning:

So I thought I’d return the favour:

So, it was Sunday morning, and time to blast to Snowdonia. That didn’t take too long:

That was a lovely little B&B, and the weather was nothing short of fantastic. After a quick bite to eat, we embarked on the Watkin path. As it says in that Wikipedia article, the Watkin path is “the most demanding route direct to the summit of Snowdon” and “starts at the lowest elevation of any of the main routes”. We had conquered Ben Nevis, so why not?!

Stunning views soon followed:

Towards the top the Watkin path gets rather hairy. Yes, this is a path – can’t you see it?!

We went the wrong way at one stage, so reaching the summit took 3 hours.

No group photo at the top – just this reverse iPhone shot of Jonny and me standing at the top of Wales:

A special mention for Jonny at this point. Our friend Ben was supposed to be joining other Ben, Henry and me for this trip, but unfortunately he couldn’t make it. I drafted Jonny in, and I may have failed to convey quite how much effort would be required and what sort of kit should be brought. Ben, Henry and I had all climbed Snowdon and a few other hills in the past. Poor Jonny didn’t have much hill climbing experience, no water pack, not even a ruck-sack. Ben Nevis certainly made an impression on him, and he had incredibly painful legs for the remainder of the trip (as did we all for that matter). Even so he soldiered on (with extremely entertaining wit at times), and has now really earned his stripes. So, Jonny – well done!

Soon after starting our descent we realised we had failed to take a group photo, so we took one near the top:

We opted to take a more interesting route down – along this ridge:

The overall Snowdon time was four and a half hours – not bad given we took a wrong turn on the way up and deliberately took a long way down. That night we feasted like starving animals in a rather average Chinese restaurant:

And so we returned to Woking on Monday afternoon – all safe and sound and in one piece:

So to summarise, some stats:

• 1,278 miles, at 25mpg, at an average of 51.2mph (£305 of fuel)
• 12.5 hours climbing time
• 10.5 hours transfer time from Nevis via Lakes to Snowdon
• 12 meals (significantly more than the fuel spend)
• 1 epic weekend

A massive thanks to Ben, Henry and Jonny for making this such an excellent weekend. It was a shame that more couldn’t join us – Ben and Robin were certainly missed – so here’s to them too. This trip was the M5′s swan song (and a mighty fine effort too) – it’s now on sale, so it makes sense to end this blog post with my favourite two photos: from Woking to the top of Ben Nevis – what a team!