The greatest driver's car of all time?

At Great Escape Classic Car Hire we live and breath classic cars. We like the well-known stuff like MGBs and Jaguar E Types, but we always like to seek out something a little different to bring our customers.
With our latest acquisition we think we've found a winner. In the 1990s Lotus built a brilliant convertible two seater called the Elan. It was expensive so nobody bought it. Now it's been virtually forgotten, except by diehard enthusiasts. They have discovered what we hope more will do now that one is on our fleet - the Lotus Elan M100 for hire in the Midlands is quite simply the best front wheel drive sports car of the last 25 years. That's a tall claim, but when you drive it you'll see why.
The M100 Elan is the Lotus you can confidentally drive more than 5 miles from home. It has bulletproof mechanics, it's built quite well and it is comfortable, spacious and rides superbly.
The latest addition to the Great Escape Classic Car Hire fleet is available to hire in the Midlands. Prices start at just £165 per day and include unlimited mileage, insurance and full breakdown cover.
"We're always on the look out for interesting cars to offer to our customers," explains Graham Eason of Great Escape. "One of the advantages of having a large fleet is that we can offer cars that are less obvious, such as the Lotus Elan M100.
"Anyone considering a car for the weekend or who wants to know what a great Lotus is like to drive, should grab the keys to this brilliant little car"
For more information call 01527 893733 or visit http://www.greatescapecars.co.uk/.

New MGB roadster in Suffolk

Great Escape Classic Car Hire has added a new MGB convertible in Teal Blue to its growing self drive rental fleet based in Suffolk. Available to hire from our central Suffolk location near Stowmarket, the 1975 original chrome bumper MGB convertible is available to hire by the day, weekend or week.

The new car is one of the last chrome bumper MGBs to be built at Abingdon by MG and combines Teal Blue paintwork with black leather interior. It has a standard 1800cc engine with stage 2 Oselli head (so it drives better than a standard car) and attractive period-style Minilite wheels. It also has the desirable manual gearbox with overdrive.

Great Escape Classic Car Hire's Suffolk fleet is ideally located for exploring the quite roads of the coast and countryside of Suffolk and within easy reach from London by car or train.

The new car joins the largest fleet of MG cars for hire in the UK, from Great Escape sites in Yorkshire, Cotswolds, Lincolnshire and Suffolk. Every hire day includes a full 24 hours use, unlimited mileage, comprehensive insurance for 1 driver and full UK AA breakdown cover.

For more details on the MGB visit http://www.greatescapecars.co.uk/ or call 01527 893733.

Big Cat in Lincolnshire

Great Escape Classic Car Hire has added a second Jaguar XK8 to its fleet of classic and performance cars. The new car is the only Jaguar XK8 convertible for hire in the UK and is based at Great Escape's Lincolnshire site near Grantham.
The Jaguar XK8 developed the excquisite lines of the Jaguar E Type to create a modern, extremely luxurious grand tourer. It is widely acknowledged as one of the most successful and beautiful Jaguar designs of modern times. It is a large convertible with an automatic gearbox and 2+2 seating layout.
The Great Escape Jaguar XK8 for hire in the East of England is finished in burgundy metallic with a cream leather interior. It has a power hood and is very easy to drive.
The Jaguar XK8 is available to hire by the day, weekend or week. Every hire day includes a full 24 hours use, unlimited mileage, comprehensive insurance and full UK breakdown cover.
Great Escape Classic Car Hire operates a fleet of 50 classic and performance sports cars. This includes the largest range of classic and modern classic Jaguars for hire in the UK. The company already has a Jaguar XKR for hire from its site in Worcestershire.
For more details call 01527 893733 or visit http://www.greatescapecars.co.uk/.
View external link

Our cars are the stars

The popular BBC2 series Antiques Road Trip is back for another gentle amble through the British countryside collecting antiques and driving some great classic cars. The series involves antiques experts touring around Britain in a variety of classic cars buying and selling antiques.
For the second year running Great Escape Classic Car Hire has provided classic cars for use in the series. This year the programme is using three Great Escape cars, including a Triumph Spitfire, Mercedes Pagoda (no longer on the fleet unfortunately) and a red Morris Minor convertible. The programme runs for 6 weeks every week day night from 3rd January. It airs from 5.15pm on BBC2.
Filming the series is a complicated task involving coordination of many different locations, cars and individuals. Great Escape Classic Car Hire worked with the production team between April and August 2010 to provide the three cars for every shoot. Due to the inevitable production changes we had to be extremely flexible and organised often complex delivery and collection logistics for the team at very short notice.
The Great Escape cars covered several thousand miles each during the shoot but proved very reliable. There were only a couple of minor issues that were resolved quickly and did not disrupt filming. However, while filming our beautiful red Morris Minor convertible was sideswiped by a bus, resulting in significant bodywork damage. Fortunately the car remained driveable and continued with filming. The incident was filmed and may appear in the series.
To find out more about Antiques Road Trip click here. To view the Great Escape cars used in the series visit www.greatescapecars.co.uk or call 01527 893733.


View

No business like snow business

As we huddle around the Jaguar E Type heater here at Great Escape towers craving warmth as the snow swirls outside, our thoughts turn to the best classic car for the snowy weather. We've been here before - last winter, without a 4x4 to depend on (the very dependable Larry the Jeep Laredo), we had to skid around in the Ford Capri. Fun at the time, and surprisingly effective as a snow plough.
The first question to ask, of course, is whether you should use a classic in the snow at all. In the face of salt and safety, the answer is probably no. Classics like to rust a lot and they are somewhat bereft of the nannying features like airbags, ESP, ABS and the like which keep modern drivers so well insulated from their actions. But if we just decided never to use them in the snow then it wouldn't make much of an article frankly so lets assume we're talking strictly hypothetically.
To work well in the snow, conventional wisdom has it that a car should be either 4 wheel drive or front wheel drive. This rules out most classic cars, which are resolutely rear wheel drive. And, to be fair, much more fun. The Great Escape Classic Car Hire Ford Capri may have been rear wheel drive but it was a lot of fun in the snow and coped extremely well. Which may be down to the second rule for snow driving success - narrow tyres and high profile rims. Our Capri runs on 175 r14 tyres, which might be laughable in today's world of 245 20 inch rims but it was us laughing as we sailed past the stranded BMWs and Mercedes. Narrow high profile tyres literally cut through the snow and ice rather than skate across it, as fat tyres do.
Snow-plugging cars also need to be light - or have four wheel drive. A light car needs less power to keep going and is inherently more nimble when the going gets tough. On a slippery hill a low power, light car will keep going when a powerful, heavy car gets stuck. Plus, it has the added advantage of being much easier to push out of trouble.
Classic cars also have the advantage over modern cars because they lack so-called driver aids like ESP (traction control), which prevents cars losing traction. ESP cuts power to a spinning wheel. This is great news on damp roads or sudden sharp bends, but unfortunately the car can't differentiate between these and a snowy, icy road. Consequently, when the going gets tough in the snow and the wheels need to spin to clear the ice and gain traction, the ESP system simply cuts power to the spinning wheels. So the car can't move.
The trick with maintaining momentum and traction in the snow is to select a high gear and manipulate the clutch and throttle. This tends to be easier in older cars which have mechanically operated clutch, gearbox and throttle, giving the driver greater feel and control compared to modern 'fly by wire' type systems.
So despite the onset of modern driver aids, perhaps classic cars are better in the snow than modern cars because they are simpler. But what classic would be best for snow driving? Pushing aside classic 4x4s because they're just cheating, at Great Escape Classic Car Hire we'd probably plump for a front wheel drive 1980s classic like a Golf GTI mk1 - light, fairly powerful, no driver aids and narrow high profile tyres. The problem is, we wouldn't want to take our mint 1982 example out in the snow!

We've got another Alfa - what to look for when buying one

There's just something about Alfa Romeos. When I founded Great Escape an Alfa Romeo Spider was one of the original two cars on the fleet - it's still on the fleet and despite covering over 50,000 kms in four years it has never broken down and needed very little maintenance work. That's quite different from the usual Alfa reputation for rust and dodgy electrics. Maybe it's because this particular Alfa was assembled by Pininfarina...

So it made sense to add a second Alfa Spider when we expanded into Suffolk - that one is a 1989 Series 3, a carburettor version with the arguably sweeter 1600cc twin cam engine. Many Alfisti poo-poo the Series 3 Alfa because of its 'aerodynamic' restyling but these are really great cars - inexpensive, reliable and, in the right colour like our Medio Blue example, I think they look great. Particularly riding on nice Cromodora alloys.

Our latest addition is another Series 4 Alfa Romeo Spider in metallic burgundy. It's identical to our original Alfa Romeo Spider but is a slightly earlier Series 4 and features the allegedly superior Bell and Colvill right hand drive conversion. What makes the Series 4 so great is the creature comforts - power steering and electric windows.

The Series 4 Alfa Romeo Spider is the easiest of the 1966 to 1993 105 Series Alfa Romeo Spiders to live with because of these relatively modern features. It is also fully galvanised, which means the rust that ravages the early Duetto, Kamm Tail and Series 3 cars tends to be held at bay for longer. That doesn't mean that these cars don't rust - the spare wheel well, rear arches, headlamp surrounds, windscreen scuttle and front valance all rot out. The interiors are also notoriously weak wearing and replacement parts, although quite easily obtained, tend to be expensive and only available new or refurbished. Mechanically the Alfa Romeo Spider is very reliable, being fitted with fuel injection and engine management systems. The twin cam engine is legendary and long lasting so parts are easily available and generally it is a hard wearing engine. However, it does not particularly sustain high mileages, particularly if a very strict servicing regime has not been maintained using high quality oils (Alfa recommends Selenia). The usually sweet five speed gearbox has generally weak synchromesh, particularly on second - this is often caused by swift changes from cold before the fluid in the box has had time to warm up properly. Engine and gearbox rebuilds are not particularly expensive but can render a generally cheap classic car scrap.

Our original 1992 Series 4 Alfa Romeo has completed 50,000 kms in 5 years without major incident. The car has never broken down on hire and has only suffered minor and routine maintenance issues including clutch and starter motor. Mainly this is due to regular servicing and careful cleaning before and after every hire - we jet wash underneath and around every wheelarch before the car is parked up and we Carcoon it over winter. When we purchased the car we also invested in wax injection to prevent rust - this cost just £100 (by the company that wax injects all Morgans) and has definitely helped the car remain rust free.

Prices for Alfa Romeo Spiders are a mixed bag. The classic car market has finally recognised the original 'boat tail' Alfa Romeo Duetto as a bonafide classic and prices have risen considerably in the last three years - it is difficult to buy one for less than £10,000 today. Series 2 Kamm Tail Spiders are the next most desirable but prices still float around the £7-8,000 mark for a reasonable car - there are a lot about and condition is everything. And often very hard to judge on these cars because the shell contains so many hidden rust spots. The Series 3 car is the least loved, mainly due to its spoilers (derived from Alfa's 'aerodynamica' styling project in the 1980s). Although they share the rust problems of the mechanically and bodily identical Series 2 Kamm Tail cars (in fact a retro-conversion is available in Germany for them), they are generally much better built and significantly cheaper. As a low cost way into Alfa Spider ownership (prices start at around £3,000 for a reasonable car), the Series 3 is recommended if the looks don't matter to you (and they have mellowed with age - we quite like them at Great Escape) - it is as fun to drive and the 1600cc, often overlooked, is sweet and peppy.

If your budget won't stretch to the Duetto we think the Series 4 is the best of the rest. It is useable as a daily driver in the way that neither the Series 2 or 3 are due to rust and lack of power steering and, we think, it looks great. The Pininfarina makeover may have introduced plastic bumpers but it is a remarkable piece of styling that managed to turn a 30 year old design into something classic but contemporary.

The Alfa Romeo Spider really is the perfect getaway car. So now we have three - one in the East Midlands, one in Suffolk and one in the Cotswolds. For advice on buying a Spider call Graham on 01527 893733 or if you want to discuss hiring the car, just let us know as well.

Milestone for Alfa Romeo Spider

It's time to raise a glass to our long-serving Alfa Romeo Spider. This car has been on the Great Escape Classic Car Hire rental fleet since day one nearly four years ago - it was one of the first two cars we offered for hire, alongside our Jensen Interceptor. And now it's passed a landmark - 100,000 kms. Ok, so its only 62,000 miles but we think the little car deserves its moment of glory.

We bought the immaculate Alfa Romeo Spider in 2006 when it had just 51,000 kms on the clock. In the intervening years it has been one of our most popular hire cars with glowing feedback from customers. And it has been utterly reliable.

Belying Alfa Romeo's reputation for building fragile cars with electrics designed and assembled by people who apparently don't know their AC from their and DC, our Alfa Romeo Spider has been the most reliable car on our fleet. It probably helps that the car wasn't built by Alfa Romeo - it was assembled by Pininfarina, who executed the elegant Series 4 redesign of our car - and that it is relatively new compared to some of our cars. But 50,000 kms in less than 4 years at the hands of hundreds of enthusiastic drivers is testament to what a great car it is. The Alfa Romeo has never broken down on hire and has only needed a clutch, starter motor, brake pads and discs and an electric window motor.

We're so impressed by the Alfa Romeo that we've added a second Alfa Romeo Spider located at our base in Suffolk. Although we've added a couple of MGBs in the intervening years, we still have a soft spot for the British roadster's Italian rival. To find out more about the remarkable Alfa Romeo visit http://www.greatescapecars.co.uk/ or call 01527 893733. Prices start at £165 for 24 hours.

MGB Buzzes into Worcestershire

Great Escape Classic Car Hire has added a sixth MG to its self drive rental fleet in the UK with the addition of a MGB roadster to its Cotswolds fleet. The 1971 chrome bumper teal blue convertible is the fourth MGB on the company's hire fleet and complements the company's MGBs in Dorset and Yorkshire. Great Escape also has a MGA in Dorset and MG TD in Suffolk.
The MGB is arguably Britain's most popular classic car with a huge owners club and strong following. A few minutes behind the wheel of the Great Escape car and it is easy to see why - simple to drive, powerful, stylish and engaging, the MGB is everything a weekend getaway car should be.
"We only began adding MGBs to our fleet hire fleet in late 2009 in response to customer demand," explains Graham Eason of Great Escape. "But I've been amazed at the popularity of these cars - customers love them and we like them too because they are rugged and reliable."
The Great Escape Classic Car Hire MGB roadster for hire in Worcestershire is available backed by the company's normal comprehensive hire package. Prices start at £165 for 24 hours and include a full 24 hours use, unlimited mileage, insurance for 1 driver and full AA breakdown cover.
Great Escape operates from five locations in the UK - Cotswolds, Shropshire, Yorkshire, Suffolk and Dorset. For more details on the MGB click here or call 01527 893733. or visit http://www.greatescapecars.co.uk/.

Great Escape stars at Jaguar Drivers Club event

Great Escape Classic Car Hire's beautiful Old English White Jaguar E Type convertible was one of the star attractions at the recent Jaguar Drivers Club national event held at Althorp House in Northamptonshire. The car was provided by Great Escape for the Footman James stand as part of a competition giveaway by the insurer involving a weekend prize package developed by Great Escape.
Footman James ran the competition exclusively for Jaguar Drivers Club members to win a weekend away, with accommodation, in one of Great Escape's fleet of classic cars based in the Cotswolds. The competition winner received their prize at the show and the E Type was paraded around the show ground.
"We have developed a unique range of weekend getaway packages through our Getaway Driver brand," explains Graham Eason of Great Escape. "We were able to provide Footman James with a complete weekend package prize involving our cars and our local accommodation providers.
"We are very pleased to be associated with Footman James and the Jaguar Drivers Club."
For more details on the Jaguar E Type for hire from Great Escape, click here or call 01527 893733. For more details on The Getaway Driver click here.
View external link

The Jaguar XJS rocks

The Great Escape Classic Car Hire Jaguar XJS V12 convertible has been chosen by up and coming heavy rock band Jett Black to appear in the video for its new single 'Two Hot Girls.' The band wanted a four seater convertible that would fit the retro 1980s style they were looking for and the classic Jaguar fitted the bill.
The band collected the Jaguar from Great Escape's base in Worcestershire and used it on set in London overnight.
Great Escape supplies a lot of cars to TV, film, production and advertising companies for music videos and photo shoots but the Jaguar XJS is usually selected for traditional English roles. This is the first time that its quintessentially 1980s style has been used to effect. The Great Escape Jaguar XJS is best known for its role in the 2009 first series of Antiques Road Trips on BBC2.
A Jaguar XJS convertible also features in Swift Cover's current advertising campaign with Iggy Pop, so clearly its rock credentials are on the up.
You can find out more about the Jaguar XJS here and Jett Black here. The Jett Black video for Two Hot Girls will be out in about 6 weeks.

Alfa Romeo Spider now available to hire in Suffolk

Great Escape Classic Car Hire has added a second classic Alfa Romeo Spider to its hire fleet. The new car is based from Great Escape's site in Suffolk, near Stowmarket, and is the only classic Alfa Romeo for hire in East Anglia. The car complements the very popular Alfa Romeo Spider for hire from Great Escape in Worcestershire.

The new Alfa Romeo Spider for hire in Suffolk is a 1989 Series 3 car finished in the rare colour of metallic Medio Blue with a black interior. It has a manual gearbox and is fitted with the classic 1600cc twin carburettor, twin cam Alfa Romeo engine that featured in the original Alfa Romeo Duetto launched in 1966.


The new car can be hired from Great Escape Classic Car Hire in Suffolk on a daily, weekly or weekend basis. Every hire day includes a full 24 hours use, unlimited mileage, insurance for 1 driver and full UK AA breakdown cover. Prices start at £165 for 24 hours. Gift vouchers are also available.


The Alfa Romeo Spider was an expensive two seater convertible when it was launched in 1966 and competed with the Jaguar E Type convertible. Today the Alfa Romeo Spider is more comparable with the MGB convertible but is generally considered to be a more sophisticated and better handling alternative to the popular British car.


To find out more about hiring the Alfa Romeo Spider in Suffolk click here or call 01527 893733.

Great Escape Trumph Stag is in Vogue

Great Escape Classic Car Hire regularly provides classic cars for hire to TV, film, media and production companies. In the first two weeks of July 2010 our 1974 Triumph Stag for hire in the Cotswolds has been used for a photoshoot for Italian Vogue magazine and a new advertising campaign for clothing brand Lyle & Scott.
The Triumph Stag is low and stylish and a quintessential 1970s British convertible, so it fits perfectly with the reinvigorated fashion for this era. The Great Escape car is finished in Old English White with a black interior and a walnut dashboard with manual gearbox.
Great Escape provided the car to location at short notice with a dedicated driver. Our cars are fully valeted before despatch and then provided with cleaning materials so that we can clean off any travel dirt before the car is photographed or filmed.
Great Escape Classic Car Hire has the largest fleet of classic cars for hire in the UK and provides cars for film and advertising work on a weekly basis. Several of our cars have appeared in national advertising campaigns and prime time TV programmes and in successful music videos.
To find out more about our work for film and advertising companies call 01527 893733 or click here.

Police using Rover SD1 again

We were very interested to read in today's Times newspaper (17th June 2010) that the UK police have gone back to using trusty Rover SD1 V8 saloons, like the one we hire out here at Great Escape. Apparently with felons to apprehend nearby and a dearth of modern patrol cars in the car park, officers at Ruislip in Middlesex had to use a Rover 3500 SD1 kept in the police car pool.

The Rover SD1, in full police livery complete with blue flashing lights, apparently belongs to one of the officers at the station and is one of three police-liveried cars that he owns. He also has a 1962 Jaguar Mk2 and a 1956 Wolseley. In similar circumstances with the long arm of the law to extend, for us it would have been a toss up between the Mk2 and SD1 - the Jaguar Mk2 is more powerful (220 bhp according to Jaguar, versus 155bhp for the Rover) but the SD1 copes better with taking corners on the doorhandles. We are told.

Full marks to the police and we hope the miscreants were apprehended. Perhaps they gave up - after all, who'd want to miss a cosseting ride in the big 80s Rover?

You can imagine recreating the scene with Great Escape Classic Car Hire's 1986 Rover SD1 Vitesse - the ultimate high performance limited production Twin Plenum model. You can hire it by the day or weekend with classic car hire prices starting at £165 for 24 hours, including insurance and unlimited mileage.

Make your Great Escape in Dorset

Now you can enjoy the best views in the New Forest, Hampshire and Dorset this summer. From the new Great Escape Classic Car Hire site in Christchurch, Dorset you can enjoy the region while staring down the curving bonnet of one of our new fleet of great British convertible and coupe classic cars.

The new venture launches with a choice of five cars, includings MGs, Jensens, Triumphs and Austin Healeys. The cars are already proving very popular and Great Escape has already secured a contract to supply cars to the BBC for a new TV series being filmed in the region.

The classic cars for hire from Great Escape in Dorset are available to rent for weddings, weekends and weekdays. The hire package is designed to be comprehensive and transparent and includes insurance, unlimited mileage – so you can travel anywhere – and breakdown cover.

The new business is a joint venture between Great Escape, which operates four locations across the UK, and local couple David and Lorraine Nutland, who own several of the cars.

“Dorset is a great location for enjoying a classic car,” explains Graham Eason of Great Escape. “because it has the Jurassic Coast and New Forest on its doorstep. We aim to provide an interesting range of cars in a convenient location and backed by a fair and transparent hire package – so you pay one price with no hidden extras.

“We’re backing Lorraine and David’s local knowledge with our own experience of successfully hiring classic cars. Our location is the reason why the BBC has chosen to use our cars.”

Great Escape operates four sites in Dorset, Suffolk, Yorkshire and Worcestershire. The company has a fleet of self drive and chauffeur hire classic cars from the 1930s to the 1990s including coupes, convertibles and saloons from Bentley, Jaguar, Alfa Romeo, Jensen, Rolls Royce and Morris as well as Porsche. Classic car hire starts at £125 for 24 hours and every hire day includes a full 24 hours use, unlimited mileage, insurance and breakdown cover. For more details visit http://www.greatescapecars.co.uk/, call 01527 893733 or email info@greatescapecars.co.uk.

Figaro Figaro For Hire

Great Escape Classic Car Hire, the UK's largest specialist classic car rental company, has introduced a retro-style Nissan Figaro to its fleet of cars for hire in the Cotswolds. The stylish two door soft top convertible was built in small numbers in the 1990s in Japan. Over the last 10 years it has become very popular with people who appreciate its quirky style and easy to drive nature.
The Nissan Figaro is available to hire from Great Escape's satellite site in the Cotswolds near Evesham. This is easy to get to from London or Bristol or Birmingham and very close to popular destinations like Stow on the Wold, Broadway and Winchcombe.
The car is finished in beige with a cream leather interior and features a power hood, automatic gearbox and electric windows. It is a two seater with space in the rear for children, or adults on a short journey. It is available to hire backed by Great Escape Classic Car Hire's usual comprehensive hire package - which gives you a full 24 hours use for every day you book, unlimited mileage, insurance for 1 driver and full breakdown cover included within the price.
"We have classic cars for hire from the 1950s to 1990s so the Nissan Figaro is a perfect addition," explains Graham Eason of Great Escape Classic Car Hire. "It is stylish, easy to drive and perfect for touring the Cotswolds. We think it will be popular with couples who want a great car for the weekend that is as easy to drive as a modern car, and with many people who just love the Figaro."
You can find out more about the Nissan Figaro for hire in the Cotswolds by clicking here.
View external link

Rewind to the 1980s

When your business is running a classic car hire fleet you can end up spending quite a disproportionate amount of your time ruminating on what's going to be the next classic car that everyone will want to drive.

At Great Escape we like trying to second guess what cars people will want that we don't already have. Certain cars like MGBs, Jaguar E Types, Morris Minors and Jaguar Mk2 will always be popular. But for many customers in their 30s and 40s these are cars from an older era. What we've realised is that people love the cars they grew up with.

So here at Great Escape Classic Car Hire we've rolled up the sleeves on our collective white jacket, pulled up our white socks, smoothed down our rumbled Stay-Press trousers and donned our comedy baseball cap with cap-mounted beer and drinking straw to ponder the 1980s.

The decade that fashion apparently forgot is now actually extremely fashionable. Pop stars have raced to revisit the age of gold Bacofoil jumpsuits and frightwig hair. And we're racing to cars like the Rover SD1, VW Golf GTI, Porsche 928, Jaguar XJS, Ford Capri and Ford Granada Ghia X. These cars epitimosed motoring 1980s-style and if you're like us you'll remember seeing or being in these cars when shorts were something you wore rather than something to help you unwind.

We've spent the last 12 months developing our fleet of 1980s cars and several iconic classic cars from this list are already on our fleet. If you fancy rewinding the clock and either getting behind the wheel of a car you've always loved or reliving your first car or your dad's car, call us on 01527 893733 or visit the Great Escape Classic Car Hire website.

Jaguar E Type versus Morris Minor Traveller

Great Escape Classic Car Hire has created the perfect antidote for classic enthusiasts pressurised by the credit crunch. Its new Tortoise and Hare Weekend package is designed to let customers vent their frustration in the company’s rapid Jaguar E Type V12 roadster, then spend a day relaxing and taking in the scenery in its sedate 1957 Morris Minor Traveller.

From Great Escape’s base on the edge of the Cotswolds customers can head in any direction and enjoy some great driving roads in Wales, Shropshire, Worcestershire, Gloucestershire and Warwickshire. The Tortoise and Hare package includes 24 hours use of each car, unlimited mileage and free delivery and collection to local hotels. The package costs a remarkably stress-free £390. Readers can claim £25 off the cost when they quote ‘Tortoise’ when booking.

The Great Escape E Type is a 1972 Series 3 5.3 litre V12 roadster in Old English White with black leather interior. The Morris is an unrestored one-family-since-new car fitted with the 1000 cc engine and features very rare Dark Green paint, which was only used for a few years.

The Tortoise and Hare Weekend brings together two of Great Escape’s four new cars. Alongside the E Type and Morris, Great Escape has added a metallic blue Jaguar XJS V12 convertible and a Sable 1974 Jaguar XJ6 long wheelbase. Great Escape also has an Alfa Romeo Spider and Jensen Interceptor available for hire.

The credit crunch has become a media obsession and inevitably it’s getting people down. This package is our contribution to making it all a little easier to bear.

There really can’t be a much better way to get away from it all than driving a great car on a great road in the sunshine in the Cotswolds. By bringing these two cars together we’re hoping to create a few smiles.

Great Escape provides classic cars for self drive hire for daily and weekend use. For more details visit http://www.greatescapecars.co.uk/ or call 01527 893733. Great Escape is the only classic car hire company with full online availability check, reservation service and online booking and payment.