Alan Once a year Pall Mall closes to traffic and fills with more than 150 cars, from Richard Burns’s and Colin McRae’s Subarus to veterans bound for Brighton the next morning. Alan Groom, who has sight loss, gets there before the crowds and finds two famous trophies that almost nobody queued for.
I raced cars in South Africa until I lost my sight in 2018. At Kartmania in Adelaide I had a plan to drive again: one slow lap behind two friends, then on my own. Then two large parties arrived, our session grew to thirteen karts, and I made the call to watch from the sidelines instead. My friend won his birthday race.
A brew tour at Coopers Brewery in Adelaide, five small glasses at the tasting table, and a smell I had met an hour earlier in a jar of malt. Headphones carried the guide through the loudest parts of the plant, the fish and chips were world class, and I came home drinking beer differently.
Real things in plain cases, close enough to see. A family day at the free South Australian Museum in Adelaide: a first mummy for the girls, animals displayed without fuss, and a wall of Antarctic-cold ice you can put your hand on.
A black butterfly on his arm, a dingo spotted before anyone else, and a dark wombat cave crossed by following a friend’s voice. Alan Groom, who has sight loss, spends a school holiday day at Melbourne Zoo with two young girls and finds a zoo that puts its animals first, and a reminder of why that matters.
Five hours at Melbourne Museum with two young girls, a hunting T. rex and a room of quarantined spiders. Alan Groom, who has sight loss, finds a museum that speaks in light, scale and touch, and learns what helps when the labels are out of reach.
The six-year-old found the touch pool before I did. A day at SEA LIFE Melbourne Aquarium with dear friends and their two daughters, in galleries built for the dark, with a reef shark circling overhead and a glass floor above a saltwater crocodile. A city aquarium that is compact, colourful and well worth the visit.
The best thing at a car show is a car that moves. At Blenheim I heard a Le Mans Jaguar go past at walking pace, and then somebody from TWR asked whether I would like to sit inside the Supercat.
For years I decided the Concours of Elegance was too posh for me and never went. I was wrong about the room, wrong about the crowd, and wrong about what a blind man gets out of an event judged entirely on how things look.
CarFest moved to Silverstone for 2026, seven festivals across one enormous site over the August bank holiday. I went on the Saturday, in the rain, with a press pass and no car. The event was generous almost everywhere I turned. The barrier sat outside the gates, in a bus that runs every two hours and stops a kilometre short.