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Sorry! The trip actually finished a while back, and it's been hard to admit that it's over, which has made it a little harder to get back to posting updates on here! I'll get back to it though! We had been living pretty remotely for the past while, so thought we'd try a more sociable hostel in Ljubljana. I didn't know much about it when making the booking, but it turns out that Metelkova is a bit more of a lively place than I had been anticipating. I won't go into details on here (I'm sure you can find many on google), but despite the nature of the place, it really felt incredibly friendly. Everyone was really interested in the car there. My favourite was one of the times when we were arriving back into the hostel after some dinner, and there was a group of lads leaving. As they were walking past the car, one of them, claiming to be the car nut, was telling the rest of them, with absolute certainty that it was a Morgan. Naturally, I pointed out that it was in fact a Westie, at which point he disagreed with me and tried to convince me it was a Morgan. His friends were delighted when I responded with "Oh really? I must have missed that when I was building it... Thanks for letting me know though!". Don't think he'll be living that one down for a while! The hostel was supposed to have a beer pong night, but I guess being out of season, they weren't running it. It was pretty quiet, so we went out for a few drinks with some of our room mates there. The next day, I had a full day of doing nothing, which was absolutely fantastic, and badly needed! After that, we set off up towards our next hostel near Triglav (wild camping is very much not allowed in Slovenia, so we were sticking to paid accommodation there), but not before I could snap a quick photo of the car in Metelkova!

As ever Mr Gadget is correct. Ask me why I now need a lowered floor......

Talk to @coolexperts (Steve Parker the MD of Coolex), I'm sure they'll help.

Out early again just before sunrise.. another beautiful crisp morning. 😎

Nice evening.

Selling my very low mileage XTR2, the car has done approx 3200 miles, it’s a 2002 model from new. It is road registered and has a mot on it. The engine was fully serviced and checked over by Rob at mistral developments and no issues were found. The engine is the standard hayabusa lump. According to the literature these weigh in at 440kg making the power to weight ratio very high, with the added downforce which you don’t get with a standard car it makes this into a very rapid car. The previous owner had this car for 14 years and only done around 500 miles in it! reverse box has been removed at some point. They are a waste of time! i bought this car on a whim to use as a track day car, I did not sit in it before purchase which was my mistake! I am not the smallest of guys and my body doesn’t quite fit in the car comfortably, lots of leg room but not enough shoulder room for my mere 17st frame! condition wise is very good, would need about £500 spent on it to make perfect. I bought it to use as a road legal track day car which is what it’s best at! not many of these around now, especially road registered ones! trailer not included £18000.00 NOW £16000.00 for a quick sale, note the wheels will be changed for a different set. collection from Benfleet Essex Tel 07879 404747, if I don’t answer send a text and I will get back to you ASAP regards stuart

So you want to go on a road trip around Europe for a couple of months. You have 3 vehicles: A nice, comfortable lexus IS200 estate. Mazda bongo campervan with full interior conversion and pop up roof. Westfield that's just passed its IVA after nearly 5 years of building. Let's be honest, despite the lack of heater, questionable weather resistance, and general noisiness, would it ever be anything but the Westfield? Doors and half hood on, my new steering wheel with quick release boss fitted, and a little practical storage added. Found a neat place to mount my jack in the engine bay. Very simply a strap riveted to the panel over the gearbox: I unfortunately didn't realise until after I'd cut chunks out of it that my boot box was for a short range tank, whereas I've got a long range one so I don't currently have a boot box. Only a plastic top which looks like it doesn't come off. This actually works out quite well, because it means I've got a place to secure my tools when road tripping. I made up a little frame from some aluminium box and angle section and riveted it in in front of the fuel tank. This holds an aluminium case which is good for the basic tools. Then my big socket set sits nicely on top of that. Other than fitting number plates when I get some post from the DVLA, the car is ready to go on a big road trip... And go on a big road trip it will. I've been keeping a little quiet about this as I was terrified of anything going wrong, but at this point, I've done everything I can. Pretty much as soon as I have registration plates on the car, I'll be hopping on a ferry to Holland, before driving to Germany, then Denmark, Sweden, Finland, and off down to Eastern Europe for a few weeks before coming back across the Alps at the end of October. The initial plan was for this to be a 3 month trip with me in the westie and my friend in his MX5, but unfortunately my build took longer than I had expected, so I've missed the first leg up through Norway to the Arctic circle. Once I hit the road, I'll be covering some pretty big miles every day to try to catch my friend up in Finland. Once I've got registration plates, it will literally be a case of finding somewhere to get my ride height sorted and wheels aligned, and then I'll be off on the ferry the next day. I'm hoping to get NMS to sort my alignment as they're not that far away from me and know Westfields, but if anyone has any other garage recommendations for alignment around the Midlands/Warwickshire, let me know!

Thx guys..... Tillet’s on order.... great service .. and patience from David & Kelly at NTP 👍💪

Luke I might will check when I'm back home at the weekend

I'm also 6'4" and had the very same issue. I have the Turbo seat and I removed the slider and mounted the seat directly to the floor to get it as low and far back as I can and it helped a good bit. After using it this way for some time I replaced the seat with a Tillet and mounted it directly as low and far back as I could and this was a big change. The Tillet is so thin that it allows your butt and back to be further down and back. I now have plenty of room for my long legs and I can spend hours in the car without issue. And the bonus of the Tillet is that it's much lighter than the stock seat. In the end I think you'll find that mounting it direct, without the adjuster rails, will be your answer. dave

Im 6ft2 in a SW (narrow) using grp seats and am comfortable. Bit close to the top of the screen, and the side screens are worse, but also ok. However I wouldnt want to be any higher.

That'll be the first Boeing 737 off the line, shows how much progress they've made in 53 years, from a plane that wouldn't fly at all to a plane that might fly if you're lucky

had not seen this post until now - has to be said that's probably the best road trip post I have come across 😎

@Ian Kinder (Bagpuss) - Joint Peak District AO.. is an expert in this area, he may have advice

I’ll be there.

... all this "compensation" culture makes me sick. I'm wondering what you want compensation for... Its your life been any worst due your car having a few more grams of Co2 trough the exhaust? All this was only uncovered as a pay back for the fine that google had to pay to the EU few months before the Dieselgate. There are several devices in a car that are only focused on passing the Emissions tests, and is Known in the business. In fact when the diesel gate was uncovered... i though... SO... What?? I could not get the problem. AFAIK at least 4 other major groups that I've been involved with use similar strategies.

I find the Sports Turbo seats very upright and you can’t push them back as far as the boggo Sports seats. JK seats for me with the padding.

Hoping to come. I’ll drop you a note nearer the time to advise how negotiations have progressed.

Frankly, I think it's a waste of money. I'm buying these two instead.

Just stop in the coned area.

I dont really have "customers..." I'm the idiot who does all of it for free and for friends... send me some details across regardin the busa... I may know someone...

I suppose it qualifies as a hobby given how much money I spend on it, although I only do it on holiday - SCUBA diving. Discovered it late in life, but I fully intend to get some more dives done on this years trip, where I'll be "celebrating" my 60th.

I'm in the 5 mile high club. Solo division though......

I doubt 1609m high, Mike, is any more likely to be printed either!

The following morning, still very bleary eyed from the night before, we got the cars packed up and set off. Google decided to take us down one of the worst dirt tracks I've driven on to date, only to discover it was a dead end and we had to go back. It was so bad that both me and Chris, at the same time got the idea to keep 2 wheels on the grass for a smoother surface. Unfortunately, Croatia decided that wasn't OK, as they'd nicely camouflaged some bricks in the grass every 20 or so meters. I'm sure it would have looked comical from outside to see both mine and Chris's cars launched into the air in synchronisation when we hit a brick each, but it didn't feel good from inside! Fortunately, no damage was done to either car and we could carry on. At this point I had pretty much reached my limit with Croatia and was just short of skipping the day we had planned, but Chris was a little more patient and I didn't want to wreck it for him. We made it to Plitvice early, but it was already packed full of people. Fortunately we had booked our tickets in advance so could walk straight through, although we were immediately stuck behind people on the narrow boardwalks. I did my best to get as many photos as possible without all of the people in, but if you Google "plitvice lakes tourists" you'll get a taste for what a lot of the walkways were like. We took a slightly Convoluted route around though, which took us away from the large crowds for a good portion of it. The views were absolutely beautiful, although it was overcast and I'm sure it would have been even nicer on a sunny day. The relentless nature of the trip had been catching up with me a little over the week leading up to this, so we had booked 2 nights in a hostel (yep, 2 nights in one place - madness!) in Ljubljana so that we could have a down day, and honestly it couldn't come soon enough for me after the night before, so after Plitvice, we drove straight there. Literally the second we crossed the border into Slovenia, the world seemed to become a happier place though. The sun came out. The roads improved, and it just seemed happier. We got to the hostel, showered and went straight for the bar to relax for a bit before dinner!

I guess that's probably what I should have done. I assumed I'd need to do it in the future but foolishly expected that it would be pretty well treated from the outset. Just crossed over into Sweden. Gutted the weather has been so changeable today. Went over one of the bridges towards Copenhagen and it was spectacular. The sun was coming out so I decided to pull over and take a gamble on taking the hood off and setting up the gopro. Then a few minutes down the road I saw a rather unhappy cloud... Before I could get to another exit to get the hood back up, it turned into a very unhappy, hailstoney cloud... I might complain about the hood, but for cases like that it's better up than down! Sadly this meant the hood stayed on for the Øresund bridge so I can only show you the stock Wikipedia photo for it: What a spectacular piece of engineering. 4km tunnel followed by an 8km bridge. The toll booth operators at the car side even offered me a cup of tea when I jumped out of the car to pay them!

Alarm set for 4:30 this morning, loaded the car and set off at 5:06. Nicely heavily laden with tent, sleeping bag, air mattress, hiking gear etc. The drive down was cold and noisy, but it didn't stop me smiling like an absolute muppet the whole way! Had to resist the urge to wave at random cars as I passed them a few times! (before anyone worries, the below photo was taken using my phone in a mount, with a timer and the shutter pressed while stationary) The car is absolutely fantastic. I'm so happy with the little changes I made to deviate from the standard car - Freewheel is so good for night driving, being able to switch between dip and main beam mid corner without taking your hands off the wheel. The quantum suspension is just incredible too. I took my friend who drives an M3 for a spin yesterday and he said the Westfield soaks up the bumps better than his car. When I take it on a track too, I can just dial up the damping to wherever I want it. Very glad I asked JK composites to put heater pads in the seats as well. They really make a massive difference and they're so comfortable. A heater in the car would be nice, but wrapped up as I was and with heated seats, I don't see any reason I couldn't drive this car in the middle of winter. When I arrived down at the port, the security guard at checkin directed me into the lane to have my car searched, although I think he did it just to confuse his colleague who was carrying out the searches! "eh... Eh... Can we have a look under the bonnet?". He then proceeded to ask me a few details about the build rather than anything security related! All safely boarded on the ferry now. Car is up to 798 miles now, less than half way through its 4th day with registration plates, although, granted more than half of those miles are from the trip up to Carlisle for the IVA test! I've taken a couple of pictures but the WiFi on the ferry is pants and there's no signal in my cabin so I'll have to edit those into the post later tonight when I get to Düsseldorf! Edit: managed to upload them eventually!

Out walking this morning before sunrise. Beautiful winter morning, blue sky and frost.. perfect!

.. dam those delighted shepherds!

'nother one.. Red sky at night, Shepherd had a cracking day at Croft chasing his sheep.

Red sky at night, Track-dayer's delight? Off to Croft in the morning.

Sailors are even happy in Rochdale tonight!

Last night's sky.. more delighted Sailors & Shepherds?

@Julie Hall - Peak District AONot sure if I'll be there yet, my coolant leak isn't as straight forward as I hoped.. Is it ever!? 😂 It looks like my 3 month old coolex rad has failed. Seems to be the core itself (rather than my fitting skills!) but I'm about to take it off for a closer look. Just weighing up getting another or refitting the original Polo radiator