# The Grand Tour Guide to the World

Литагент HarperCollins

The world is a big place full of interesting things. And The Grand Tour has seen some of them. That’s why few people are better placed to lead you around this vast planet of ours than Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond and James May. As long as you don’t mind getting hot and lost. Welcome, everyone, to The Grand Tour Guide to The World.In this indispensable guide, you will find an abundance of information, most of which is probably wrong and possibly dangerous. As well as occasionally accurate guides to the places visited on the show, you’ll find exclusive interviews with the presenters and discover their favourite locations for car-based cocking about.As well as being a factually dubious encyclopaedia, The Grand Tour Guide to the World is also a travel companion for those of you who have been inspired by the Grand Tour circus. You’ll find tips on how to sing like a native in the Bahamas, how to speak Welsh (wrongly), and how to navigate the magic roundabout in Swindon. On top of all this, we reveal the world’s fastest cop cars and the greatest car makers. And there’s a picture of James May in an anorak.

Copyright

WARNING

Some of this book is factual but most of it isn’t. Many of the observations are incorrect and the advice idiotic. The Grand Tour accepts no responsibility for anything that happens to you as a result of following tips or imitating actions you read about in these pages. Basically, it’s your fault if you get thrown out of the first-class lounge/an aeroplane/France.


HarperCollinsPublishers

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www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published by HarperCollinsPublishers 2017

FIRST EDITION

© W. Chump & Sons Limited 2017

Cover layout design © HarperCollinsPublishers 2017

Cover photographs Stuart Pettican © Amazon Prime Video. All other images © Shutterstock.com

A catalogue record of this book is available from the British Library

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Source ISBN: 9780008257859

Ebook Edition © October 2017 ISBN: 9780008257842

Version 2017-09-27

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Introduction

Origins of the Grand Tour

Pit Stop 01 – USA

Motoring Facts from Around the World

Postcard from the Tent – Johannesburg

Pit Stop 02 – Portugal

The Greatest Car-Making Countries on Earth

Postcard from the Tent – Victorville

Pit Stop 03 – Jordan

Postcard from the Tent – Whitby

Pit Stop 04 – Italy

Postcard from the Tent – Rotterdam

Pit Stop 05 – Wales

Pit Stop 06 – Morocco

Postcard from the Tent – Stuttgart

Pit Stop 07 – Namibia

Postcard from the Tent – Dubai

Pit Stop 08 – Germany & Austria

Postcard from the Tent – Nashville

Pit Stop 09 – Barbados

Postcard from the Tent – Kakslauttanen

Pit Stop 10 – France

Postcard from the Tent – Loch Ness

The Celebrity Brain Crash Machine

The Grand Tour Puzzles

Series 2 … The Tour Continues

Index

Picture Credits

Corrections and Mistakes

About the Publisher

People often say, ‘It’s a small world.’ But if you asked them to walk from Berlin to Cape Town they’d probably make a huge fuss and insist on taking an aeroplane. That’s because the world is, in fact, massive. It can also seem a strange and daunting place, but not if you have the right guide. And that’s where we come in. No one is more seasoned at crossing the world than The Grand Tour. No one has been through more airports, stayed in more hotels, spoken to more local people and learned more indigenous words for ‘sorry about this’. That’s why The Grand Tour is uniquely placed to show you around some of the high spots of this huge world of ours and to share with you our wisdom, our skills and our holiday photographs. This book is not just an indispensable guide. In fact, it’s not an indispensable guide at all. A lot of the information in it is wrong and possibly dangerous. We’re not sure. Even so, whenever you’re travelling, be certain to keep this book close to you – and as long as you only look at the pictures you should be fine. Remember, it’s a big world out there, and we’re all somewhere in it. Except astronauts.

CLARKSON, HAMMOND & MAY


Originally, a Grand Tour was a 17th- to 19th-century pursuit in which, say, three chums would find themselves at a loose end for whatever reason and would agree to travel together to foreign lands for the purposes of cultural and spiritual enrichment, and also to find out if the Aston Martin DB11 was any good. Before departing one of the friends might say, ‘Look, this isn’t completely convenient for me. I’m supposed to be making a Christmas special about 1970s toys,’ and the other two would reply, ‘Oh for God’s sake, James. How long does that take? Get a bloody move on,’ and then the two idle friends would wait for a bit, and then for a bit longer while their third friend spent a week packing his clothes very neatly into a leather suitcase, and then they would away on their travels.


‘WHAT DO YOU MEAN, YOU’RE OFF TO MAKE A PROGRAMME ABOUT PUTTING THINGS BACK TOGETHER??’


Their destinations might be many and varied, often inspired by a map on the wall of their new office in the Chiswick area of London, which they would look at until they found somewhere that sounded interesting, perhaps having checked what was to be found there using an information source such as The Encyclopaedia Wikipedia. Having established that somewhere was interesting, the chums would set off and before you knew it they would find themselves in Italy, where they would attend displays of local art and sculpture and visit the opera, apart from one of the friends who would perhaps behave like the kind of total moron who thinks Cosìfan tutte is ice cream.


for he did manie powre slydes


Perhaps soon after, the chums would find themselves in the north of France, which is very underrated actually, especially if you like drizzle, and here one of the friends might devote his time to visiting a local adult souvenirs emporium, where he would purchase a very rude item for the purposes of making an unhelpful directional aid for one of his colleagues while ignoring the gentleman behind the counter who was saying the French for, ‘Ah, hello, sir. It’s been a while since we’ve seen you in here.’

After this, the friends’ Grand Tour adventure of learning and enrichment and dicking about might take them to Morocco, where the noisiest of the friends would not shut up about terrible Italian things, or they might move on to the exotic climes of the Caribbean to do something that didn’t seem especially relevant, or they might even find themselves in Jordan, where they would challenge themselves and would say to themselves only a long time afterwards, ‘Oh heavens, this hasn’t gone down very well at home.’

The purpose of the Grand Tour was not only to educate and inform, it was also to generate entertainment, ideally about 12 to 13 hours of it. Having achieved this in a single year, the friends might then agree to do it again the following year but in different places, and perhaps the slow, slightly boring one would say, ‘I’d like to be the fast one who shouts for a change,’ and his friends would say, ‘Shhh, James. Don’t spoil it.’


PIT STOP 01

USA


a.k.a.

GOLDEN STATE

Former Governors of California include Ronald Reagan and Arnold Schwarzenegger. By 2022, Californians expect to welcome Governor Kardashian.

Population:

39 MILLION

If California were a country, it would have the sixth-largest economy in the world. If California were a country it would also, like, ohmyGurrrd, have way cooler bank notes and stuff.

THE OFFICIAL STATE SLOGAN IS, ‘OH, LIKE, WOW, HAVE YOU LOST WEIGHT?’

California produces most of America’s peaches, dates, avocados and insincerity.

Currency:

US DOLLAR

California has been immortalised in film many times with movies such as L.A. Story, L.A. Confidential, Beverly Hills Cop and Miss Marple Goes to Compton.

Famous people:

EVERYONE

Northern California is home to Silicon Valley whereas Southern California is home to silicon mountains.

Capital:

SACRAMENTO. NOT LA. DON’T SAY LA. IT’S NOT LA. OR SAN FRANCISCO.

BEHIND THE SCENES


Hundreds of cars, thousands of people, a legendary band, and three old men in shirts. That’s what made up the big opening for the first series of The Grand Tour. Oh, and months and months of planning. Sometimes, even this show plans stuff.


The Breitling Jet Team making one of three passes over the stage. Looked simple, actually required the main road in the background to be closed. To the right, this is James’s ‘Ooh, I’ve seen a plane’ face.


The specially made sign of fire for what Jeremy christened the ‘Burning Van’ festival. Because what you need in the desert are more hot things.


Yes, that’s a Merlin aircraft engine in a vintage Rolls-Royce. As you can see, it’s pure May bait.


Looks like a hellish vision from an apocalyptic near-future. Actually built by a bunch of bright, articulate and super-polite engineers. So maybe the apocalyptic future won’t be so bad.


The audience get excited. Apart from that bloke with the beard and sunglasses.


Before filming starts, Jeremy gets inexorably drawn towards a man with a massive V8.


A rat-rod truck behind a fleet of new cars. The up-to-date stuff was sourced direct from manufacturers.


Our triumphant trio get up on stage in front of the crowd for the first time. An insults contest broke out shortly afterwards, much of which had to be edited out of the final show.


A dragon with a petrol engine. Obviously. Much of this stuff usually stars at the Burning Man festival.


Clarkson spots The Grand Tour photographer, May does some light flamenco.

LESSER-KNOWN SONGS ABOUT


The Golden State has inspired a great many musicians over the years. Here are some California-themed songs that you might not have heard of.


THE GRANDEST OF OPENINGS

IN JEREMY’S HEAD (PHONES)

The very first sequence of The Grand Tour episode 1 might well be one of the most enormous opening scenes ever attempted by a television show.

Yet the origins of this massive spectacle came from a very small place, which was the music player on Jeremy’s phone. Normally this is a dark and unsettling place full of rock dinosaurs and 19-hour flute solos but in this case it yielded gold.

Clarkson had been wrestling with how we should announce the arrival of the new show until the moment he clicked upon Hothouse Flowers’ version of ‘I Can See Clearly Now’. From there the whole narrative – leaving London in the rain, arriving in sunny LA to a bright new beginning, a drive through the desert, the gathering up of a huge flotilla of vehicles, the arrival at a massive cars and music festival – flowed from his mind, as a fully formed and inspired thought. Having a thought is one thing, however. Making it all a reality wasn’t so easy. Organising all the cars that would make up the amazing Mad Max cavalcade took several months of work inside a ‘war room’ at GT HQ in London, its walls covered in pictures, maps and diagrams. And it wasn’t just the cars themselves; it was finding people who could drive them, and who could be schooled in the discipline of holding position while camera cars and filming helicopters swirled around them in a thick pall of dust.

The presenters themselves would be in a trio of supercars, starting with Jeremy in the new Ford GT. But when that car wasn’t available in time the team hatched a plan B involving three tuned Mustangs. Well, we were in America.

Then there was finding a desert location for the ‘festival’. A suitable spot was found and all the relevant permissions granted, only for it to become clear that even this vast tract of land wasn’t big enough to secure decent shots of the entire flotilla blasting across the landscape. So what you see in the final cut is the convoy driving across two different desert locations, stitched together by TV magic so that they appear seamlessly to pull up to the stage and the crowd around it.

Getting the timing right for this last segment wasn’t easy either. In one smooth movement the convoy had to come to a halt while Jeremy, Richard and James continued through the crowd in their Mustangs, got out and walked up onto the stage just as Hothouse Flowers wrapped up their song. Get it wrong, and the whole sequence would need a time-consuming re-set of cars, cameras and people.

To add another layer to the mix, the show got wind that the Breitling Jet Display team were at an air show down the road and asked if they’d mind popping over for a fly-past. Or rather three fly-pasts, since this gave more opportunities to get the shots.

Over 200 people were involved in the filming of that day, not including the vast and heroically upbeat audience who stood in the heat all afternoon, whooping and cheering long after their voices had gone hoarse.

Thankfully everything went to plan and the sequence played out just as it had appeared in Jeremy’s head, back when he first randomly found an old song on his phone.


TITLE SEQUENCE CAR LIST


When planning the massive opening sequence for the start of a brand new television show, it’s important to have certain things. An epic desert location. A stage upon which a band can perform a classic and catchy song. A fast Mustang for each of your presenters. But it’s also a good idea to have other cars. Lots of other cars. Lots and lots of other cars. So that’s what we did. These are they…

Alfa Romeo 4C, Arctic Cat Wildcat X, Ariel Nomad, Aston Martin V8 Vantage S, Audi R8, Baja Jeep, Bentley Continental GT V8 S, BMW i8, BMW M5, Cadillac CTS-V, Cadillac CT6, Class I Baja buggy, Dodge Challenger Hellcat, Ford F-150 Raptor, Ford F-150 sand rail, Ford F-450, Ford Focus RS, Ford Ranger off-road truck, Freightliner Pikes Peak, Jaguar F-Type SVR, Jeep Crew Chief 715, Jeep FC-150, Lamborghini Aventador SV, Lotus Elise, Mazda Miata Super20, Mercedes-AMG GT S, Mercedes G65 AMG, Mitsubishi Evo X Battlecar, Morgan 3-wheeler, Morgan Roadster, Need for Speed Porsche 911 Widebody, Nissan GT-R, Porsche 911 Carrera, Rolls-Royce Ascot Tourer, Vuhl 05, and the off-road Dodge Charger, Fast Attack Buggy and Plymouth Road Runner from the Fast & Furious movies. In case you’re interested, the presenters’ cars were: Jeremy: Galpin Fisker Ford Mustang Rocket; Richard: Ford Mustang Shelby GT350R; James: Roush Stage 3 Mustang. Oh, and the planes were Aero L-39C Albatrosses flown by the Breitling Jet Team.


3 MINUTES WITH …

JEREMY CLARKSON

A rapid-fire Q&A with the former local newspaper journalist turned Grand Tour presenter


HELLO, JEREMY.

Yes, yes, yes, hello. Have you seen my reading glasses?

Aren’t they –

This is literally the millionth pair I’ve lost. Where do they all go? It’s James, isn’t it. James is stealing them. He’s a thief, you know.

But I think they’re –

It’s literally impossible for any human being to keep a pair of glasses for more than 10 seconds and I’ve realised this is literally all the fault of James May.

They’re on your head.

Most things in life are, when you get down to it, the fault of James May. War, pestilence, disease, being unable to find the place where they keep the teaspoons in someone else’s kitchen – all May’s fault in some way or other that we’ve yet to fathom. I know I’m right on this one.

Yes, but in this case your reading glasses are on your head.

What?

They’re on your head.

Yes, I knew that.

So, first question …

Yes, he is.

What?

Yes, he is. James May. Is he a thief? Yes, he is. I assume that was going to be your first question. Is James May …

Um, Richard Hammond …

What? Is James May Richard Hammond? What a stupid question. Did you go to journalism college?

No, the first question was going to be, ‘Richard Hammond: can you describe him in three words?’

Can they be swear words?

Not really.

No.

I’m sorry?

My answer is no. Can I describe Richard Hammond in three words? If they can’t be swear words then, no, I can’t. Literally impossible.

Oh. What about James May?

No, I imagine he wouldn’t be able to either.

No, I mean, can you describe James Ma-

Oh for God’s sake, where are my glasses?

You’ve put them back on your hea-

May! MAY!

Jeremy leaves the room. From the office next door there is some shouting. Jeremy returns to the room.

He says he hasn’t taken them, but I know he has. A thief. A common thief, that’s what he is. Right, what were you saying?

Well …

From outside there is a protracted clattering sound.

What was that?

Don’t worry, it was probably just Hammond falling down the stairs.

Falling down the stairs?

Yes, he does it all the time. Nothing to worry about.

Are you sure?

No, but I can’t be bothered to get up again.

Oh, okay. Um, shall we get back to the questions?

Okay, to answer your question, yes, Richard Hammond is a type of swear word. At least, he is in this room. I’ll give you an example of what Richard Hammond means in this room: ‘Oh no, I’ve just stepped in a Hammond.’ By which I mean, ‘dog turd’.

Why would there be a dog turd in this room?

An actual dog turd, or Richard Hammond?

No, I … never mind. Next question, can you sum up The Grand Tour in three words?

Yes. ‘The’. ‘Grand’. And ‘Tour’. It’s already three words. You’re really not paying attention, are you?

Well, it was more of an abstract question.

I literally don’t know what you mean. Literally. You’re just wasting time.

Speaking of which, I think our time is up.

Good, because I need to find my glasses. I put them somewhere safe.

They’re on your head.

Yes, I know. Now please go away.

MOTORING FACTS

FROM AROUND THE WORLD


IN ITALY A DRIVER MUST KEEP AT LEAST ONE HAND ON THE WHEEL AT ALL TIMES, UNLESS EATING A HOT MEAL.


In Senegal you must have a hat in your car at all times, although not for the normal reasons.


In Uzbekistan it is illegal to run over your mother, unless it is a weekday.


If you stop at a T-junction in northern Sweden you must remember to shout ‘BRONCO!’ out of your car window.


When driving in New Zealand, don’t forget your Car Jennifer. If you don’t know what a Car Jennifer is, ask a Police Peter.


In the Chinese province of Ped Xing it is illegal to touch the steering wheel.


In Norway every extra horsepower over 100 is taxed at a rate of two horsepower. As a consequence, the Norwegian-market Ferrari 488 has minus 1100 horsepower.


The actor Daniel Day-Lewis always encounters problems when visiting Indonesia as his name literally translates as ‘Call me a taxi’.


The South African driving test is the only one in the world that contains a section on fighting off an attacker.


If taking your driving test in Chile, don’t forget your Driving Owl, which should be relatively clean and presented without hesitation or wiping.


The oldest person ever to pass their driving test was Hector Esposito of Monclova, Mexico, who was awarded his licence at the age of 103. Four years later he was disqualified from driving after a routine police stop discovered him to be dead.


In Tonga the king has not heard of cars and as a result everyone else must pretend they have not heard of cars either, even though they have.


In 1976 Sweden passed a new law stating that all motorists must throw a fresh fish out of their car window at 1km intervals. The law was repealed eight months later when it was discovered that the country had accidentally elected a herring gull as prime minister.


In Malaysia the penalty for being caught speeding is that you must eat your entire car, even the hot bits.


In Finland the driving test includes a requirement for new motorists to ‘prove they can hover in a stable way’. That’s because the Finnish word for ‘car’ is the same as the Finnish word for ‘enormous helicopter’ and the government can’t be bothered to sort it out.


In Arkansas it is illegal to drive with your eyes shut, unless it’s raining.


For most people Ford Escort is a car, but not for the people of Uruguay who, in 1987, elected a man called Ford Escort as their president. His first act was to ban the sale of the Ford Escort in his country on the grounds that it was ‘confusing’.

In Japan denting another car is punishable by feeling very embarrassed for up to three years.


IN COLOMBIA IT IS ILLEGAL FOR A GOAT TO DRIVE A CAR, UNLESS IT HAS PASSED ITS DRIVING TEST.

POSTCARD FROM THE TENT


Came to Johannesburg to record the first show in the series, even though it’ll be the second to go live. That way if it all goes wrong, we’ve got more time to fix it.

First time we’d seen the tent put up since we gave it a trial run on a damp farm in Hertfordshire a few months ago. Looks a bit better here. First night, sent James off to go spinning. He came back to the hotel bar covered in dirt and stinking like a tyre fire. Decided having a beer was more important than getting changed, even though bar was packed. Maybe people think he always smells like that. Lion costume delivered, to ‘eat’ a star guest. It’s been hard to find a realistic one. Ignored Jeremy’s suggestion to ‘use a real lion’. Next day we filmed the show. Presenters liked the idea of first studio recording being here because they’ve performed live shows in South Africa before and the audiences are always amazing which makes everything go with a swing. Sure enough, they were great. Everyone on the crew happy, had a small party back at the hotel at which Richard bought half the bar and Jeremy made our Dutch tech team race around the hotel garden. Up late this morning, about to go to airport then remembered we needed to make short film for very important American TV critics’ conference apologising for not being there. Remembered animal costume used yesterday so got one of crew to put it on and deliver message to camera as a talking lion while presenters sat in the background. American TV critics will think we’re a bit strange. Oh well. See you soon,

THE GRAND TOUR


PIT STOP 02

PORTUGAL


a.k.a.

REPÚBLICA PORTUGUESA

(If you are Portuguese and also very formal)

Portuguese inventions include peri-peri sauce and therefore also the invention of teenagers going on crap dates to chicken restaurants.

Population:

11 MILLION

The Algarve International Circuit at Portimão is famed for its challenging, technical design, which has been known to make Jeremy Clarkson’s house explode.

Capital:

LISBON

THE MOTTO OF PORTUGAL IS ‘MMM, CUSTARD TARTS’.

In 1373 Britain and Portugal signed the Anglo-Portuguese Alliance, which is still in force today. This agreement promises that each nation shall defend the other in the event of war, as long as they’re not too busy and it’s not a bank holiday or anything.

Currency:

EURO

Portuguese explorer Pedro Álvares Cabral was the first European to discover Brazil, although he also found it was too big to bring home with him.

Famous people:

CRISTIANO RONALDO (FOOTBALLER), LUÍS FIGO (FOOTBALLER), RUI COSTA (FOOTBALLER), JOSÉ MOURINHO (FOOTBALL MANAGER), VASCO DA GAMA (NOTHING TO DO WITH FOOTBALL)

From the sixth until the eighth century, the Iberian peninsula was under the control of the Visigoths, who really liked both The Cure and wearing reflective bands on their black clothes if cycling at night.

BEHIND THE SCENES


Before The Grand Tour had a name or indeed any other ideas, there was this. A trip to Portugal for the ultimate hypercar shoot-out. That’s why no one in this film mentions the name of the show. At that point, it didn’t have one. Although James suggested ‘Nigel’.


Setting up this shoot took many, many months, not least because McLaren and Ferrari were very particular about the location, the back-up provided and the tyres the cars used. Porsche, less so.


Richard experiences a moment of severe underpant damage at the wheel of the insane P1.


Something we might never see again: James May powersliding. Oh, also, three hypercars together.


The location for this test was the Algarve International Circuit in Portimao. It opened in 2008 and is sometimes used for Formula One testing.

PORTUGAL – LAND OF INADVISABLE BETS


‘IF THE MCLAREN P1 ISN’T FASTER THAN THOSE OTHER TWO CARS YOU CAN KNOCK MY HOUSE DOWN … OH BUGGER’

– JEREMY CLARKSON


‘IF THERE’S SUCH A THING AS MALARIA YOU CAN HAVE MY VICEROYSHIP OF PORTUGUESE INDIA … OH BUGGER’

– VASCO DA GAMA


‘IF WE DON’T BEAT THESE NORWEGIANS IN THIS CHAMPIONS LEAGUE MATCH I WILL STOP MANAGING CHELSEA (BUT THEN COME BACK AGAIN IN 2013) … OH BUGGER’

– JOSÉ MOURINHO

‘THERE’S NO WAY THIS SPICY CHICKEN RECIPE IS GOING TO WORK AND IF IT DOES YOU CAN LET A SOUTH AFRICAN MAN USE IT TO BUILD A SUCCESSFUL RESTAURANT CHAIN … OH BUGGER’

– EVERYONE IN PORTUGAL


‘I PROMISE YOU LAPU-LAPU WILL WANT TO CONVERT TO CHRISTIANITY AND IF I’M WRONG YOU CAN STAB ME WITH A BAMBOO SPEAR … OH BUGGER’

– FERDINAND MAGELLAN


GO AWAY MAY

When planning your next holiday, why not consider the advantages of GO AWAY MAY, the only holiday company owned and operated by that James May man who is sometimes on your television.

A holiday from GO AWAY MAY takes away all your normal stresses and replaces them with new stresses, such as the kind brought on by realising that your flight home leaves in 20 minutes and you are still on a coach driven by a shaggy-haired gentleman who believes this is the correct direction despite the exhortations of the other passengers and the local man we ran over a few miles back.

But that’s all to come. A GO AWAY MAY holiday starts from the moment you leave your house and have to stand outside it for 47 minutes because your taxi driver is James May and he’s had to go back to get your tickets, which he forgot when he left his office.

Once aboard your aeroplane you really can relax, knowing that up in the cockpit the controls are being smoothly operated by James May, who is a fully qualified pilot AND knows the names of two other airports, though neither is where you’re supposed to be going.

Finally, you reach your destination hotel, usually within two or three days of the stated arrival time. As you wait for news of the other people in your party, you can sit back in a brown corduroy chair, sip on a pint of bitter and reflect on how the relevant authorities will probably find them soon.

Then it’s time to check in to your room, personally organised by James May and containing everything he himself would look for in a hotel, by which we mean two bottles of warm ginger beer and a massive switch that turns all the lights off at once.

As evening falls it’s time to visit the restaurant, where you can peruse a high-quality menu knowing that James May has curated the selection personally and that, as a result, it’s just a single piece of cardboard with two kinds of pie written on it.

Your holiday starts here. Where it ends, no one knows. James has lost the bit of paper with your details on it.


SAMPLE ACTIVITIES ON YOUR GO AWAY MAY HOLIDAY

The Lazenby-Ruddock transmission overdrive system. A brief guide.

(Running time: 9 hours)

Stripping, inspecting, cleaning and rebuilding a Thrubson 8J-80 carburettor.

(Running time: 14 hours)

Radial-engined aircraft of the inter-war years. A brief history.

(Running time: 19 hours and 2 days)

THE GREATEST CAR-MAKING COUNTRIES ON EARTH

USA


Current annual production: 12 million

Epicentre: Detroit

Most famous cars: Ford Model T, Ford Mustang, Chevrolet Corvette, Ford Thunderbird, and lots of others

Best current model: Ford GT

The USA has two solid claims to being the greatest car-making nation in history, the first being that mass production of cars was perfected here. The second is that, from the Model T to the Mustang, it’s made so much memorable stuff. Detroit’s best days might be behind it, but the old town rose from the dead after the financial crash and isn’t done for yet, even if a lot of the assembly of stuff in the USA now happens under foreign ownership in un-car-y places like Tennessee and Alabama. Even so, the fact remains that America still builds and buys a lot of cars. And some of them are even quite good.

GREAT BRITAIN


Current annual production: 1.8 million

Epicentre: Birmingham

Most famous cars: Mini, Jaguar E-Type, Range Rover, Morris Minor, Jaguar XJ6, and so on.

Best current model: Range Rover

Great Britain was once the world’s second-largest car-making nation after the USA and once boasted the world’s largest factory, the Austin plant at Longbridge in Birmingham. Britain came up with ground-breaking new models like the Mini, which showed that front-wheel-drive was the way to make a small car, and the Range Rover, which showed that 4x4s weren’t just for farmers. But that was all a long time ago. What does Britain have now? Well, it’s got over 30 factories, from the vast mass production of Nissan in Sunderland to the gentler pace of tiny companies like Ariel in Somerset, and they’re making more cars now than they have in two decades, from the Mini and Honda Civic to the Morgan Three-wheeler and McLaren 720S. When it comes to designing, developing and building cars, Britain is still officially ‘quite busy’. And ‘quite good’. Any more would lack British understatement.