Simon de Burton

There are few sports cars as quintessentially English as Morgans. They speak of World War Two and flat-capped Spitfire pilots driving home to their sweethearts through leafy country lanes, taking the bends at maximum speed but courteously slowing down for horses and to wave at the vicar. But now the 113-year-old firm, which has operated from Malvern Link in Worcestershire since day one, has produced a model designed to be as capable of taking-on a crossing of the Gobi desert as it is of negotiating the parish hall car park after a particularly nasty fall of autumn leaves.

'I got it in the days when movies moved slower,' says Hollywood A-lister Tom Hanks of the Airstream caravan that served as a home-from-home while shooting some of his biggest hits of the past 30 years, including Forrest Gump, Apollo 13 and Sleepless in Seattle. But now Hanks is offering the polished aluminium 33-footer at a Bonhams classic car auction in Carmel, California, on August 13 - where it's tipped to realise up to $250,000. He's also selling the vast Ford F450 Super Duty pick-up truck ($70,000 - 100,000) that he bought to give the Airstream 'a kinder, gentler tow' than usual movie crew vehicles, as well as his customised Toyota FJ Land Cruiser ($75,000 -125,000) and a Tesla Model S P85D ($70,000 - 100,000) - all of which are up for grabs 'without reserve'.

If you've tried to buy a second-hand van any time in the last 12 months, you might have noticed that the popularity of these humble commercial vehicles has travelled from the tradesman's entrance right around to the front door.The word on the street is that 'pre-loved' vans have become highly sought-after for two principal reasons: firstly, that the Covid-induced spike in on-line shopping has created a thriving jobs market for delivery drivers, and secondly that the 'staycation' trend has led to a surge in DIY camper conversions. I experienced the population's growing affection for the previously much-mocked 'white van' when I set-out in search of one of Ford Transit-sized proportions last August.

With the emphasis on staying on home turf this summer rather than enduring the risks and administrative tribulations of holidaying 'overseas', many of us are heading out in search of parts of the country that we previously never bothered trying to discover. And what better way to find pastures new than by motorcycle? That's the thinking behind a fledgling business called Superior Motorcycle Adventures that aims to give riders, be they experienced or relative novices, the chance to explore rural Dorset on roads that are distinctly less travelled - in other words, the tracks and byways that were once plied by cattle drovers and journeymen but which, in a surprising number of cases, remain legally open to vehicular traffic.

Some say it not only looks like something you might be encouraged to down in order to soothe an irritating cough, it tastes like it, too. But that hasn't stopped the Negroni - the vibrant concoction composed of Campari, red vermouth and gin - being adopted as the drink of choice among the more chic members of the Instagram generation.  The true origins of the somewhat fey but often deceptively punchy 'standard' Negroni are as hazy as you're likely to feel in the morning after one too many.

James Bond might have served as Aston Martin's greatest ambassador for the best part of half a century, but the Prince of Wales isn't far behind. He's been an Aston man ever since mum and dad gave him a Seychelle Blue DB6 for his 21st in 1969, when a gallon of leaded four-star cost a reasonable six shillings and tuppence.He still owns the MKII 'Volante' (that's Aston-speak for convertible) and allowed the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge to use it as their post-wedding 'getaway vehicle,' complete with cringe-worthy 'JU5T WED' fake registration and droll 'L' plates with hearts in each corner.

When the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge arrived at Holyrood House to watch a drive-in screening of the Disney film Cruella with NHS staff last month, the Daily Telegraph reported that the couple 'paid tribute to the late Duke of Edinburgh' by travelling in one of his 'beloved' Land Rovers - which, as any Landy fan will tell you, was a long wheelbase station wagon in Bronze Green with glass 'alpine lights' in the roof and, unusually, a colour-co-ordinated hard top and bumper.Judging by the royal couple's un-dishevelled appearance - he in a dark two-piece, white shirt, no tie; she in a belted, ankle-length coat of muted blue tartan with military style buttons - they hadn't travelled far and nor, I imagine, would they have wanted to.

This morning, as I was attempting to adjust my 17-year-old Audi's LED clock which was 11 hours behind as a result of a flat battery, the sage words of F. Scott Fitzgerald sprang to mind: 'Let me tell you about the very rich. They are different from you and me.....'Which succinctly explains why the very rich couple who commissioned Rolls-Royce to build them a bespoke car from the ground up didn't have to cut corners with a digital clock. Instead, they asked the designers at the proudly British, German-owned marque to collaborate with Swiss watch house Bovet 1822 to make not just one 'timepiece' to grace the car's 'fascia' (as the very rich call the dashboard), but two.

How far the world of electric vehicles has come in just a decade. Back in 2011, the most prevalent 'EV' to be found on the streets of London was probably a G-Wiz, the Indian-built microcar that was so light, small and slow that it was officially deemed not to be a car at all, but 'a heavy quadricycle.' But the 2012 launch of Tesla's Model S proved that battery power wasn't just for speed-fearing tree-huggers whose idea of excitement was to potter to the shops at 15mph in what was widely regarded as one of the least attractive automobiles ever made. No - electric cars could be fast, fun, glamorous and covetable.

House sales have always been among the things that the major auctioneers do best, especially when those sales involve dispersing collections amassed by 'great' families that have spent generations living in equally 'great' properties. In the halcyon years they happened on site, the viewing days giving the local proleteriat what might have been a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to infiltrate 'the big house' in order to discover how the other half lived.

On April 23, 1946, Enrico Piaggio filed a patent with the Ministry of Industry and Commerce for 'a motorcycle of a rational complexity of organs and elements combined with a frame with mudguards and a casing covering the whole mechanical part'.In less formal terms, the machine in question was called a Vespa - and this year the marque celebrates an impressive 75 years of unbroken production with close to 20 million having been sold around the world across a range of at least 50 variations on the theme.All can be traced back to the day Piaggio came up with the idea of saving his father Rinaldo's bombed-out aero factories from demolition by converting them into production lines which would churn-out cheap transport for the masses.

Once mainly associated with portly, middle-aged men of a certain social standing, cigars - along with single malt whisky, fine wine, decent watches and interesting cars - have become part of the arsenal of interests that anyone who aspires to be a 21st century gentleman is almost required to hold dear.  But the current enthusiasm for cigar smoking is merely the latest stage in a slow burn of popularity that can be traced back to the so-called 'loadsamoney economy' of the late 1980s, when flash city boys saw a top quality Cuban as just another hedonist's accessory on which to splash a large amount of cash.

Anyone who has recently tried to buy a second-hand van will know that they have become difficult to find at sensible money – so much so, in fact, that a leading British broadsheet recently felt moved to report on the boom in sales, citing one of the major ‘drivers’ being the increase in people turning to courier work after being laid-off from their previous jobs due to the economic downturn caused by Coronavirus.

It’s official – in the words of ’60s R ‘n’ B duo Sam and Dave, I’m a Soul man. A Kia Soul man, that is, after driving the decidedly impressive new electric version of the funk-laden four-door which became available to buy….. just as we were told not to make any journey not regarded as ‘essential’.