Night rider

WINTER IN SCOTLAND IS AWAY TURF FOR A CONVERTIBLE PORSCHE. BUT WHEN IT’S A 911 SPEEDSTER, YOU TAKE YOUR OPPORTUNTIES...

-  KYLE FORTUNE

OPPORTUNITY. IT ARRIVED as an ordinary press invite, if being asked if I wanted to join Porsche UK at Langley Castle, Northumberland, to drive its most focused open cars can rightfully be described as ordinary. The location piqued my interest as much as the cars. Northumberland was a quick dash to the Scottish Borders, to roads I drove frequently as a kid. The cars, and specifically a car, had a sizeable bearing, too, Porsche promising to have a 911 Speedster in attendance. Ever since the launch I’d been looking for an excuse, absolutely any excuse, to drive it again.

It would be busy; the Speedster being used as part of a regular press event. Other people would want to drive it, rightfully so. Still, nobody would be mad enough to drive it through the night, right? It’d be sat outside, idle, while everyone slept. A loose plan is formed: a border run, at night, on roads I love, to my old hometown, Edinburgh. A hook, not that it was needed: the Cannonball restaurant by Edinburgh Castle – a Cannonball run if you like – which, coincidentally, is located at 356 Castleview, a number that’s significant if you know your Speedsters.

Photographer Richard Pardon is game, though an injured back, not to mention too fine a hairstyle to ruin with a woolly hat means he’ll be following in a Macan. Preparations are scant. I pack thermals, hat and gloves, and drive the 400 kilometres to Northumberland to collect Porsche’s last hurrah for the 991 series 911. I’m knackered, it’s cold, and there’s talk of rain. Even so, Edinburgh’s only 160 kilometres further north, via sensational roads, and I’m in Speedster 305 of the 1948 built. With the roof down.