Getting Olde Schooled at Land Rover's "Spiritual Home"

Built in 1812, Eastnor is a "fairytale" castle. The label doesn't cancel its existence; it just means that it was originally built as a home, not for defense. The medieval style crib sits on a 5,000-acre estate west-nor-west of London near Ledbury. The scant remains of the original castle still reside on the grounds, though there's little left but one crumbling wall, and its conception is vaguely stated as "pre-Beatles".

Though a venue available for events such as weddings, the castle still serves as home to the handsome Bathurst family, and as a training and "classroom" location for the Land Rover Experience (LRE). Eastnor and Land Rover have a long history together extending back to the marque's earliest days, and engineering tests on the first Range Rover were conducted on the estate.

For our afternoon at the castle, Land Rover brought out nine of its Heritage Fleet vehicles, nearly all of which we drove. Test drives did not include the yellow Forward Control monster (left) which was featured in the 1995 Stallone film Judge Dredd , but we did get to sample the Lara Croft-spec Defender Tomb Raider (below) from the 2001 film of the same name. There will be no comment here about sharing the same seat as the taut posterior of a particular movie star, which may or may not have been the case, as there were three Defender Tomb Raiders built and used on set and on location during the film's production.

Even the oldest Heritage Fleet vehicles are all fully functional, having been nearly faultlessly restored, and are probably in better shape than any of the models they represent when originally built. The first Land Rover's were based on the U.S. military Jeeps, and once in civilian hands were oft described as "tractors you could drive to town."

We took a spin through the estate's dirt/gravel "deer park" loop in one of the earliest Land Rovers, a Series 1 80-inch wheelbase model built in 1949. Early on, Land Rover took the wheelbase thing to heart, and only recently gave up the measurement for its model names (Defender 90, 110, etc.). Hopping into the Series 1 can seem dated at first, as you have to reach aircraft-style through the sliding windows to unlatch the door, there are no seatbelts, and you'll need to pull the choke lever before trying to start it. This feeling fades however when you reach for the separate starter button, just like in the new 370Z.

Making only 50 horsepower from its 1595cc four-cylinder, there's plenty of grunt as the 80 lb-ft peak arrives at just 2,000 rpm. The four-speed gearbox lacks synchros, so beyond the notion that you were driving something nearly priceless, speed shifting was discouraged. Once under way, the power-less steering was light, and the permanent four-wheel drive setup is less intrusive to road manners than expected as a clever freewheel disengages the system, making it two-wheel-drive when off the gas or in reverse.

We also sampled the 1-Ton Forward Control 101, a 1978-model of a military truck that first went into service in 1975. This cab-over design had its steering wheel on the left, which (and how odd is this after only eight hours in the U.K.) felt weird. You sit up above the massive front tires in a shallow cab, and shift through a 4-speed manual transmission lever that's pointed forward nearly parallel to the floor like a wobbly, overgrown hand-brake. Power comes from a 3.5-liter pushrod gasoline V8 that makes 115 hp and 170 lb-ft at 2500 rpm. There's plenty of grunt if little speed, as even in hi-range, the gearing feels Barry White low.

Originally designed to carry a 105mm howitzer, the recirculating-ball steering would make this thing hard to hit as it zig-zags down the lane between a 1/4 turn of dead-play in the steering wheel, the theme song from Stripes playing in your head. The loosey-goosey steering makes any speed over 25 mph attention grabbing, but we did get all the way up through the gearbox, the stiff suspension and forward seating position making it feel as if you're sitting backward on the end of a see-saw.

Though limited to a tour around the castle fore-court, we also managed a couple enlightening laps in the Defender 4 Track. This is a 1996 military-spec Defender 110 Hardtop, with four track-drive units grafted where the wheels used to be (countless drafts of which have been appearing in study-halls around the world for decades). This sketch-doodle was brought to fruition for the "Transglobal Event," an expedition led by Sir Ranulph Fiennes (cousin of Ralph and Joseph). As part of an attempt to drive from London to New York, the tracks were added to prepare the vehicle to cross the snowpack of the Bering Straits.

The Defender's wheels have been replaced with Canadian-built "Mattracks" assemblies -- essentially snowmobiles for shoes. Power from the five-speed tranny goes through two gear reductions before reaching the tracks, and even when starting in second, gearing is short -- jumping right to third was still plenty slow for the car park. The 4 Track's increased height and incessant gear whine makes it feels as if you're piloting an amusement park ride, and steering effort lightens up massively once the tracks are spinning and you're under way. Keeping us corralled by the castle walls likely prevented a lunge for the North Pole.

Beyond the older iron, several 2009 Range Rover's were also on hand. Equipped with all-season tires, we were able to head off-road on several of the muddy LRE training tracks. The modern Rangie's weren't even breaking a sweat in the soft stuff, nor were we in the leather-lined and climate controlled cabin. If this sounds cool, you should know that anyone can head to Eastnor for any level of off-road training, which is available nearly every day of the year. -- Paul Seredynski, Executive Editor, Edmunds.com