Detour #299: Old Meets New on a Cross-Border Car Culture Drive, England-Wales
A drive from Worcester to Wales from a historic hill climb to the hottest cars and coffee spot shows the very best of old and new car culture.
In 2025 the Shelsley Walsh Hillclimb celebrates its 120th year. It’s Britain’s oldest motorsport spot and is as busy at it has ever been, as enthusiasts in cars as old as the venue or fresh from the showroom regularly take on the sinewy slope.
A few miles south in Malvern, Morgan has also been doing things much the same way for over a century, hand-crafting traditional sports cars for an audience that prioritises nostalgia above everything.
Or at least it did. Just six years ago Morgan introduced an entirely new platform for its Plus Four and Plus Six models, with a bonded aluminium chassis and power from BMW. It transformed Morgan motoring: the cars looked much the same as they always did, but the vintage driving experience was gone, in favour a genuinely modern drive.
Now Morgan has pushed things even further with its flagship Supersport. Under the skin there are a host of enhancements, but it’s the styling that surprises the most. Somehow, without losing its classic appeal the Supersport manages to look absolutely up to date. Streamlined, powerful, purposeful.
Its ability to mix old and new is genius and makes the Supersport the perfect vehicle to drive into the cross-border car culture of the region. From the historic paddock of Shelsely Walsh my route will take me across into Wales to visit the newest cars (and bikes) and coffee hotspot, Baffle Haus.
So, roof down, seat warmer on and eight-speed automatic in Sport mode, I head south on the narrow B-roads to Bromyard, then pick up the wider, more flowing A465. The Supersport is built for these roads, so it never feels out of place, never too large or too low. Too fast, perhaps, as when I call on the full 340bhp of the BMW Twin Power engine it takes off like a scalded cat.
Passing through Stoke Lacy where founder HFS Morgan lived and is buried, I briefly wonder what he’d make of the company’s transformation, before the pops and bangs from the exhaust bring me back to the present with a start.
It’s slower-going through Hereford and then the pace picks up again all the way to the Welsh border. To my left is the Wye Valley and to the right the Brecon Beacons beckon.
A detour south on the A4042 towards Penperlleni takes me to the original Baffle Haus, known as The Cedars, but it’s heaving with bikes and cars and I can barely squeeze in to grab a quick photo. Good for business, but not so good for my rumbling stomach.
I backtrack north then pick up the A465 again to Merthyr Tydfil and the A470 south to Abercynon. Dual carriageway and the epic overtaking ability of the Supersport make passing ponderers easy, and I can even hear the Sennheiser audio system above the road of the wind.
If I wasn’t quite so peckish I could make a pit stop at a castle or two, even discover how money is made at the Royal Mint, but instead I press on, following the A4119 across the busy M4 motorway south until it meets the A48.
Moments later I arrive at Baffle House, The Old Post, parking up next to a classic Ferrari Dino and a factory-fresh McLaren. The Morgan Supersport looks very much at home here, bridging the old and the new perfectly.
ROADBOOK
CLASS: Car Culture
NAME: OLD MEETS NEW IN ENgland AND wales
ROUTE: Shelsley Walsh to Baffle Haus Old Post
COUNTRY: England-Wales
Distance: 104 Miles
Mel Nichols takes the longer way to Tilba on New South Wales’ Wagonga Scenic Drive.