Going up!

Go on, tell me you said that in the ‘Are you being served’ voice.No not menswear, perfumery, stationary and leather goods, its Agy upgrades that are available on this floor. In fact, It’s Agy going up!

She’s a beautiful van, and as you know we love her, but she can be a bit, how can I put this politely?, wobbly at times. Obviously, we wouldn’t ever drive her at Formula 1 speeds round corners (or anywhere) but we do have to be extra slow on corners, not only because we have our possessions in cupboards that we want to stay there, but also because she just isn’t that keen on sticking to the road. It’s not terrible, but it could be better, and on this island there is rarely a flat or straight bit of road.

Having done a bit of research and following several YouTubers travels, we decided before we go on our next big trip we would upgrade Agy’s tyres to ones where we have less chance of getting stuck in the mud or skidding in snowy conditions, most have the additional bonus of better grip and handling too. A few people had made the same  recommendation, so having checked our existing ones and found a few cracks(!!!), we decided now was the moment. 

We’d been told  ATS tyres was the place to go for great service on the island, so after a bit of shopping around we agreed and booked her in. Luckily, almost next door to ATS is Richie's diner, a fabulous cafe that does amazing all day breakfasts, so it made sense to wait there. Oh, it was delicious, a proper old school cafe that reminds me of the East End Cafes that saved many a  ‘morning after’ in my younger London days. None of this fancy Avo on toast with a mochachino here. Good old fry up, enormous hunks of bread and a mug of black coffee… amazing! The walls are adorned with old 50’s movie posters and memorabilia, it’s the very best place to wait.

Now, Agy looked perfectly good with her old boots, but look at these bad boys! She looks feisty!   They come with the lettering in blue, as you can see here, but with a quick wash, it comes up gleaming white and totally changes her look. For those of a petrolhead persuasion, they are BFGoodrich KO2 All Terrain tyres (yes I know, you can read it clearly).

Obviously we hadn’t changed them for their looks, so we took Agy on a drive to try them out. We have some pretty sharp bends here on reasonably fast bits of road (ok, we only have one tiny bit of road that is a dual carriageway here, and it is so short with a busy junction at each end so is often at a standstill), but we can test them out on the main route to Newport, then up over the downs (an oxymoron if every I heard one). Oh, she stuck to the road like glue! It seems our limiting factor will now be the wine glasses surviving the corners.

We’ve yet to test the real reason for changing to these, we do get muddy roads when the tractor pulls out in front of you, but you know, not full on mud roads, but we will, soon.

With the hope of a trip over the Channel at some point, Ian added light beam deflectors.

Having sorted the tyres out ready for mud and snow we thought we had better prepare for sunshine too, so she got a new sunstrip and we replaced her reflective strips on the mirror guards to make sure people can’t miss them as they hurtle towards us on narrow roads. We also popped on a stone chip deflector on (which is a bit like a fancy bonnet bra).

Like any woman she needs a decent bra to protect her assets. We are hoping it will protect her from the impact of chips. If only my bras could protect me from the impact of chips! 

Her other recent upgrade was an undertray, again to help protect her from damage on more adventurous trips on stony uneven ground. It sounds so simple. Pop off a couple of bolts, slide the tray in, do them up on the first side, repeat on the other side. Let's just say it isn’t! But after a fair bit of wiggling, a few choice words and cramp in places nobody should know existed, it's on and she is ready for anything!