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Amphibious Land Rover "Lands" at Portpatrick

AT FIRST glance, it looks like this driver may have taken a catastrophic wrong turn.

In truth, however, Steve Burgess is very much in control, as he steers an amphibious Land Rover into Portpatrick Harbour on Monday.

Landing on the shore to applause from a crowd that had gathered, Steve, and his co-driver Dan Evans, both from Yorkshire, cracked open the champagne to celebrate their successful crossing from Donaghadee in Northern Ireland. Speaking about the five hour trip, Steve said:

"It went really well, and we got perfect weather.

"We averaged about 4.4 knots which exceeded our expectation of 4.2."

Steve admitted, however, that there had been a few worrying moments on the 22 mile jaunt. He said:

"We snapped a fan belt just about half a mile out of Donaghadee, but, fortunately, we had a spare.

"There was also a nasty electrical smell a few miles out from Portpatrick, but we made it."