Capital gains

Octane joins the third Vintage London Rally, the motoring equivalent of secret cinema

- 

Until just after 10pm, it was a normal Saturday night at The Spaniard's Inn on Hampstead Heath. Glasses clinking, the background radiation of chatter and high spirits, staff dashing to and fro because it was busy, very busy, with a boisterous table of 30 youngsters outside under the awning and the hubbub of a similar number of slightly more mature folk squeezed into the private upstairs dining room.

Then, at 10.03 precisely, everything changed. First a slow, heaving whirr followed by a cough, then an uneven bellow, a burst of Gatling Gun rapid fire diminuating into a slow, steady chug to the gasps of a table of surprised revellers. That was followed seconds later by another startup, higher-pitched, more yappy, a four, and then an unmistakably taut straight-eight, more lumbering sixes until there was a cacophony, a choir of eager mechanical voices. The upstairs room and the long table under the awning rapidly emptied, abandoned coffees steaming, spoons lying across half-eaten desserts. At 10.09, the first car – a Bentley, naturally; they are in the majority here – pulled out of the car park, followed by a stream of others as the choir became marching band through some of the more majestic North London streets. The third Vintage London Rally was under way.

The format is simple: vintage car enthusiasts meet for dinner, drive through the centre of London when it is at its busiest for people on the streets and, in theory, less busy for cars on the road, and then wind down before heading home. The objectives when this 'raid' started were to enjoy their cars in London in a manner that has become near-impossible, to share that camaraderie, and simply to do something a bit different. It has come to represent rather more, now a beacon for the joys of vintage motoring, sharing such joy with the teeming Saturday night streets and creating and cementing a link between younger enthusiasts and vintage cars.