Recently, I had the good fortune to be able to participate in the traditional Heritage Run.  Each year, a small selection of MINI’s of all ages travel in convoy to the Heritage Motor Centre at Gaydon for the yearly MINI Festival.  As always, the convoy is headed up by 621 AOK; the very first MINI ever built.  This isn’t the first time I’ve attended the fantastic MINI Festival, but never before have I been one of the fortunate few to have their MINI accepted onto the prestigious Heritage Run.

This year the Heritage Run departed from MINI Plant Oxford.  Once known as Cowley, this plant was where the MINI was developed and built by Sir Alec Issigonis back in 1959.  To arrive early, and be able to park my MINI next to the world’s most famous MINI, was perhaps the highlight of the day.  Thanks to MiniWorld editor Monty Watkins I now have a photo of myself stood between both MINI’s!  Being able to have a photo taken beside 621 AOK, as Sir Alec himself had on numerous occasions, has enabled me to tick-off one of my list of lifetime ambitions!  I’m not sure the astronaut thing will ever happen…

As you would expect, MINI rolled out the red carpet for us.  The museum was opened for us to explore, photo calls were arranged and we were waved off by a suitably important VIP!  The hour-long trip through the countryside to the festival came with only one instruction; “Don’t overtake AOK!”  Upon arrival at Gaydon were were driven into the paddock one-by-one for a brief interview and then all the Heritage Run cars were parked up outside the front of the museum for the duration of the day in pride-of-place.

You can see a gallery of photos here.