The Grand Tour One For The Road Review – After 22 Years, It’s The Final Drive

Photo: The Grand Tour/Amazon

This is it, for the final time, it’s the end of an era. The Grand Tour One For The Road is the final instalment of The Grand Tour, and it’s sad.

The last show was released on Friday 13th September, and here’s what it’s all about, without any/many spoilers if you haven’t already seen it.

It is of course a special, following on from the previous episodes, and this one takes place where it all began: In Africa.

Ignoring the instructions from MR Willman, this time round the journey starts in Zimbabwe, and sees the lads take cars they’ve always wanted to own across the country. Jeremy Clarkson has a Lancia Montecarlo, Richard Hammond has a Ford Capri 3-litre, and James May opts for a Triumph Stag.

There are two backup cars, and when you watch you’ll see why. A Rover SD1 Vanden Plas and VW Beetle.

It’s a beautiful drive across the country, but of course there’s things along the way. In fact it starts as it usually does with old cars, breakdowns within the first few miles of the journey.

There’s a lot of talk about how this is “The end”, and how sad it is. There’s plenty of jokes and laughs in the 2 hours 10 minutes of the final episode, but this one is more about the journey, and looking back at the last 22 years.

It has Africa as a great backdrop, and it’s very cinematic. You get the feeling that they wanted to end it with happiness rather than jeopardy.

There were 5 star hotels and not death-defying hotel stays, it was more sentimental than scary, which it should be since it was the last show.

Breakdowns, fixing cars, car modifications…It’s like we were watching a car show! How can I forget we got to hear The A Team music too. And on the music, the soundtrack to the whole show was good too.

It’s not only the last Grand Tour, but (apparently) the last time they’ll ever work together too, which was said in the show, and joked about a few times.

“You never know the last time you’re doing something while you’re doing it”, which I think is a good quote from Jeremy. It is true, and of course they, and we do know that this was the last show.

“I hope we brought you a little bit of happiness” said James May. Yes, yes you did.

I will not spoil the ending, but it was good, and will be familiar to those who watched Top Gear.

So that’s that. The end of an era. No more car shows with Clarkson, Hammond and May to look forward to.

But it’s been a good journey, 22 years including Top Gear. 8 Years of The Grand Tour on Amazon which has flown by.

The final show was good, and there’s only one thing to do: Watch it again.