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Hello again to the people who believe the best shape for a car is a brick.

Our “Shetland Series 2a marshal ambulance rescue” project continues.
I’m sure there has to be a better name for this project.
I’m open to suggestions - rude ones are accepted if they make me laugh and don’t hurt my feelings.

Anyway, as was said in my last post, we had just prepared the Landy for transport and today we returned with the car trailer and winched it on.

After winching was complete, we had to seriously look at getting her ready to move.
Preparing a vehicle for transport in Shetland consists of watching the weather forecast the night before, then paying no attention to it as it’s usually wrong, then come the day transport we strap everything down excessively as the hilly landscape plus strong winds have claimed many experienced drivers for the ditch.

Shetland in itself presents a lot of other unique and different issues for vehicle restorations which I will cover as the project goes on, however the biggest one for us today was the fact we were having a day of “All four seasons” as it was Sunny, then it snowed, then it rained, then it hailed and then it repeated. Somehow annoyingly, it was always wet when we were outside.
The one aspect of the weather that remained constant was the strong winds.
So, to prepare (what’s left of) the landy for transport and to ensure there was still one left when we got there, we had to don it with a large salmon net (formerly used in salmon farming cages) to stop the landy blowing away just by sitting on the trailer even before we started moving.

James May once wrote an article on all the uses for a bin bag, I am very sure I could easily write one on a Shetlander’s uses for a salmon net, everything from protecting your bin bags from wildlife, to preventing an old Land Rover from disintegrating.

So, after braving all the elements the landy was gingerly loaded and heavily secured, after which we set off using smooth Tdv8 power to be as gentle as possible whilst being all too aware that one medium sized bump could turn it into contents fit only for clean up by a dustpan and brush.

Our careful drive took far longer than normal mainly because we stopped at a local attraction called, “the cake fridge” which, as it’s name suggests is a fridge full of Homemade cakes.
It works by means of an honesty box. Simply take what you like, write down what you have taken and put your money in the honesty box taking your change as required - this delayed things...
After buying all the cakes, we arrived at a place called “Wethersta” where we removed the Land Rover from the trailer (all quietly worrying to ourselves that it may snap)
But, with gritted teeth and clenched bums, we managed to get it off the trailer unharmed to where she will sit until the locals who are currently hiding their beloved boats, caravans and motorhomes from winter winds, remove them from the shed where we will get in and start work.
This happens roughly around April.
However, the project doesn’t stop for now, ongoing behind the scenes we currently have a galvanised chassis on order from a well known supplier and is currently being fabricated with a lead time of around 6 weeks which will hopefully will match in with when April comes and sheds all over the islands empty.

Thanks for reading my drivel you either are, or are becoming a Land Rover enthusiast. Get help.

Thanks, Callum & John.