London to Mongolia in a rubbish 1989 Nissan Micra

We set off early doors at 8.30am and drove through the day on a real mixed bag of roads, sometimes smooth and nice, other times barely controlable.

We stopped in some random town and were looking at the MIG aircraft proudly sitting by the side of the road.

Passing through some villages it feels like you have gone back a century or so. Ramshackle shacks with dogs, chickens and cows roaming around freely in the road.

We hit it big time today I put in the fist 300 miles and then Rich took over. We hit the bridge over the Volga in the evening. The stench of the fumes was sickening. The Russian driving becoming more outrageous each day. death is around every turn. Russians pay no credance to the brow of a hill or blind bend, they just go, if soemthing comes towards them they pull in, even if abeam another car and force them onto the dirt at the side of the road. The amount of times we went over a hill to be faced with a car coming at us head on. Crossing the Volga. Rich got pulled in for our first Russian checkpoint Police tug. The copper asked "Documents". Rich pulled out his licence and said with his native Kent charm. "I don't understand mate its on the back window what we're doing" the copper soon gotr bored and waved us on.

Again made the same mistake as Moscow. Driving into Samara, a big Russian city with no map, and no understanding of their language proved to be frustrating. We were helped by a lady who guided us to an a £185 night hotel. err no tar. With the help of my wife, we found a much more affordable Hotel the Aznat in the centre of Samara. We had smashed our previous record and done 530 miles in a day in 15 hours.

Samara is a beautiful old city on the banks of the Volga which has beaches. Hordes of trendy Russians in what feels a bit more Tenerife than Moscow. We sat at the bar and were talking to a really nice guy called Valerie, who makes a mean Long Island Ice Tea. Got a text from Jeremy asking how we are doing which was thoughtful.

Today we contiue east. Will hook up with the Scarz lads later. The other 2 teams Moon Unit and Fido are heading south into Kazakstan. Its 3O something degrees the sun is shining, Dave is dancing along. All turned out nice again.

Heading out of Moscow in the late afternoon, we picked up the M5 bound for Samara and later Chelyabinsk. The roads were some of the worst thus fas as it was lashing it down. After 140miles. We pulled off down a track behind team Scraz. behind some trees and had our first go at camping. We were accused of being the 5 star campers, as we each had our own 3 man tent, airbeds, pillows. etc. After a a glass of red and a few tinned heinz meals we hit the sack ready for the big push tomorrow.

Rich and I spent the day, looking around Moscow, did the Red square, Kremlin thing, the architecture in this part of the city is stunning. Moscow is an ecclectic blend of ultra modern, artistic masterpiece and ugly worn out.

In the afternoon we hooked up with Jay and Dave from Team Scraz and 2 other teams who had thus far convoyed together. Adam and James from team Moon Unit Alpha and Dan and Toby from team Fido.

Dave from Scraz is an Everton fan, someone's got to be, and he had contacted the Everton supporters club Russian branch, who's head Pavel had sorted him out an apartment and was doing a city tour.

After a nice bit of grub in an authentic Russian Restaurant, Rich and I were deliberating as to who would go with Jay from team Scraz to pick up our car from the Hotel Moscow and follow a cab to where they were staying and we would stay for the evening with the other teams. As neither of us could be arsed, it was rock, paper, scissors. I lost, which would later turn out to be a huge blessing in disguise.

With our car Dave moved to his new home. Jay and I walked down to meet the others in a Bar called Yak-Nuk, 8 Mongol Ralliers and 6 of the total 11 Russian Everton fans amassed round a long table. 7 of the ralliers had no idea of the carnage that awaited them. having lost rock, paper, scissors I made what would turn out to be a great decision by not going near the Vodka.

7 ralliers, where egging me on. "How can you come to Moscow and not drink Vodka" etc. I have had the previous misfortune of believing I could drink Vodka with Russians when visiting my in-laws, what starts out great always ends in tears, but these 7 all thought it was a great idea to knock back one after another interspersed with large jugs of beer. Many bottles later. The decision was made by one of the Russians to head back to our apartment.Jay had by this time lost his English phone and camera somewhere between being sober and out of the game. The Lonely planet guide says thats when drinking neat vodka, it often just sneaks up on you.

We walked out. I was fine after just a few beers, Rich was gone, Jay was completely gone. James threw up for the first time of many and everybody was now feeling the full effects of their previous Bravado.

We walked across a park towards the Hotel Ukraina, and Rich was the first to disappear, it would end up with everyone, disappearing. Rich and I were at the back of the group. Rich was right behind me, I walked down some stairs following the crowd. Turned round and Rich was gone. I told a couple of the other Vodka'd up lads to wait for a couple of minutes as Rich was gone. I was legging around a busy part of the city shouting for Rich. He didn't appear. A couple of minutes later, I went back to where the others had been. Rich was there being man handled by a dodgy looking Russian guy, pulling on his coat. Rich was slurring back. and the crowd had disappeared completely.

So here was I with a well gone mate. No idea of what the address is and the only contact number we had was of a phone that had been lost. Rich didn't even know which city he was in at this point and it was now that my losing the rock, paper, scissors and vodka abstinence paid off. I had remebered walking down a hill from the apartment passed the World trade centre and along the River past the Russian Parliment building.

I could see the top of the parliment building a flag in the distance, So I walked 30 minutes towards it, dragging a stumbling wing man behind me and retraced my steps along the river, passed the world trade centre and into a few different apartement blocks until we found the cars. From there it was the choice of 1 of 2 doors, I couldn't remember which one except it was on the 6th floor and as you walk out the lift the door is to the left and is burgundy.

I gave Rich a bunk up and he clambered up through a first floor window and into the lift. He reappeared saying the door is brown. It was the other entrance. I was pretty livid the pack had walked off and left us behind, when we had no way address. It had taken me an hour to get me and Rich there, the walk to the bar took 15 minutes. It was 3am and after shouting and trying random door bells as there was no way in this block. We pictured them all sitting around drinking booze and us out in the street, eventually we said this is pointless and headed over to our car for an uncomfortable nights sleep.

Just as we were about to drop off in the car, from behind it appeared Pavel. " What the hell are you doing, where is everyone". we asked. "Those who are left are over there by the door" he replied. We wondered over and Dave complete with Everton shirt was asleep and snoring in the gutter. he was with only Adam and a still throwing up James from team Moon unit. Toby, Dan and more importantly Jay with the apartment key had all been lost and where now in Moscow in the early hours out of their trees.

Pavel had taken the guys into a supermarket and had been attcked by a security guard with an iron bar, because he walked in with a beer and the shop accused him of pinching it. The other somewhere around here had managed to lose the pack. As i was the only one with a working phone, I took the sim card of the other Adam and put it in mine to contact Jay's non English phone. He passed the phone to the taxi driver who spoke to Pavel and soon enough he was back. He had been driving around Moscow for an hour and a half off his head trying to recognise something. We all got in the apartment with Toby and Dan still missing and no means of contact.

Next morning around 7am the door buzzer goes. Its the lads. Turns out they had been stopped by the Police for walking around drunk in the road, they were bundled into a a cop car and taken to a cash point and relieved of an amount money they are not sure about by the Police, who then dumped them in a side street, to be awoken by some guy kicking Dan as he slept on a stairwell outside some flats.

And the Moral of this little tale is one I had already learned the hard way. NEVER EVER drink Vodka with Russians you have been warned.

Rich left on his own to drive to a local village 1km from our roadside motel to try and cash some dollars. He went into a tented market and everyone was gathering around Dave and having a look as he was the only car there. He then got offered by someone to show him where the bank is, so Rich had a Russian in Dave guiding him to the bank.

Rich kicked off inbound Moscow, we left at about 1pm after a good kip. It was cold, raining and windy. The roads were still awful and the overtaking still dangerous, we actually did one overtaking manouvre around a truck and we thought we could see all the way into the distance, there was a dip in the road we couldn't see. This massive orange truck appeared in front of us and I thought we aren't gonna make it, Rich pulled in just as the thing went past, our heart rates had likely doubled, I will leave what was said as the lorry passed inches by to the imagination.

We came up behind another lorry and the joint decision was that 50mph average was better than death. We will leave out the overtaking for a bit.

Some way down the road Dave was getting thirsty, so we pulled into what looked like a museum petrol station. Wind up petrol pumps and a shop that used an abacus as a till. Weird thing here is you have to pay for petrol up front so you have no idea how much to order. Once you do they set or wind up the pump for the amount bought, in our case 10 litres. and then that amount will be delivered regardless. If you over estimate it will gush out the side of the car. So we are having to conservatively guess how much fuel we need.
We were chatting to some lovely children who spoke some English at the petrol station which made up for the disgusting hole in the floor toilet, we were both gagging at the smell.

Pressing on towards Moscow and about 40 miles out the road suddenly changed into British style, lovely smooth dual carriage way. One thing we had both noticed was the amount of car crashes we had passed, there are loads here.

We hit the Moscow suburbs with no room no map and no Russian language skills. A good combination, we drove around who knows where and eventually just stopped the car and got out to seek help.

What is amazing about Russia is the people, they are so willing to help and kind. We went into an entrance, turned out to be a bookshop and a guy with broken English tried to find something in a guide book. Then a young lady called lina, who speaks really good English offered to help. They spent an hour on the phone and speaking with friends who were looking on the internet to try and find us something. Eventually they said threre was a place nearby that was cheap, and we could follow a cab to get there. Lina jumped in the cab so that she could help us to check in. There was a funny moment, as our car was parked in front of the cab. Lina said we will come by you and you follow us. We hadn't seen which car she was in and the cities traffic is like London, a car drove passed and hooted his horn, something many cars do in Moscow anyway. We pulled out hard on it's tail and started to follow. After a few minutes, I said "Are we sure this is the right Car", Rich said No "we could be following the wrong car I habe no idea what she is in, anyway he knows where he's going even if we don't", we were cracking up laughing at the prospect.

It turned out it was the right car and after some aggresive driving to stay on the cars tail we pulled into the Hotel Moscow, an ex soviet grey bock that hadn't admitted decorators for decades. Rich had driven 268 miles.

We paid the £50 for a room with no hot water, and after some more forms were showed into our dwelling on the 11th floor. Floral carpets and wallpaper a knackered bed overlooking a contruction site, marvelous.

We got here at about 10pm local and with our failed expoilts at trying to drive in and spot something, were happy for anything. A quick cold shower and we headed off for the city. it's quite modern with loads of neon lights in the centre. We found a 24 hour buffet thing and ate at 12am as we hadn't eaten since breakfast. After our cold and overpriced food, we got a cab to a bar Rich had seen in the Lonely Planet guide the Karma Bar on Ulitsa Pushkenskaya. It turned out to be a good choice, walking down this weired back alley, we went down 2 flights of stairs into a basement. It was full of good looking young guys and girls and was obvioulsy quite trendy. We blended right in! A few beers later and it was back to fawlty towers at 4am. Today we are going to see the city. red square, the Kremlin and all that, meet up with Team Scraz and 2 other teams, spend a night with the Russian Everton supporters club (team Scraz contact), and spend the night on the floor of their apartment. Tomorrow we crack on towards Samara.

After our very early houred arrival we found an internet cafe for the last installment of the blog and left Daugavpils bound north for the town of Rezekne before turning east for the border. The roads, whilst still rubbish in places, were mainly empty and the daytime countryside in Latvia was stunning, we had made contact with team Scraz and they were an hour ahead of us, we hoped to catch them at the border.

Just after Rezekne we stopped down a track for the now customary ham roll with sweet chilli sauce, our 25 min turnaround on the roof of the car and tried to sort the car out a bit, put on our new money belts and marched on towards the border. Just as we we passing a village about 10km from the Border town of Zilupa, we could see ahead of us what looked like 2 Mongol Rally Micras on the side of the road. It was the lad from the channel tunnel Ed, who took the wrong bag and the other car in the their tandem attempt. They had been pulled by the Police. We drove past honked the horn and waved and they pulled in behind. We all stopped about 1 mile down the road and there was much shaking of hands, sharing stories and having a good laugh for a few minutes. They were bound for Moscow before heading south for Kazakstan. We were now the lead car in a trio going for the border, about another 2km down the road, the man with the stick stands in the road and waves us in. I was driving again. It was the old bill once more. He takes a look round our car, starts laughing with his colleague and then shows us his speed camera in his patrol car. we were doing 74kmph. He showed me his Latvian highway code book as well, I knew I should have got one of these before we left. It showed that driving through a built up area, the limit was 50kmph, I think. But we were on a country lane. Anyway after a few minutes of not understanding what the other was saying he also thrust our documents back and I assume he said in Latvian "sling your hook".

A few more kms and we were at the border at around 5.30pm local, what a rigmarole. Firstly Latvian customs, some bloke who likely hasn't smiled in decades, asks us for documents, gestures to me to get out and open the bonnet, which I did. then without even looking in it, slams the bonnet closed and aggressively waves us through the first checkpoint. We joined the queue for the next bit behind the other 2 teams, some bloke in a booth, we are asked to fill in a landing and exit card and then just wait for about 1 hour 45 mins, with no idea why. Eventually he lifts the barrier and we move up to this other set of barriers with the Russian border crowd and we have to take everything out of Dave for them to look through, then put it all back in. Then the rigmarole and burocracy really starts, we have to go to a money changing place change dollars for roubles, pay 120 for something, we have no idea what it is. then go into this booth to buy some insurance, no mean feat when neither speaks the others language. What we are insured against, again we have no idea. After a fair while and with the insurance documents in hand and some slip we bought for 120r we have to go to get another form, once this form is complete we are sent to another booth, to fill in another form. With all these now done its back to the barrier where the car is for the man to key in all the info and go ballistic with his rubber stamp. From arriving this had taken 5 hours. It may not sound to complicated but when you have guards waving you away in Russian and absolutely no clue as to what you have to do, it was a challenge. Eventually the barrier lifted and we thought we were in Russia, we were in fact heading to another barrier. This time she just wanted one of the bits of paper and we were in.

We planned on driving for a wee while as we still had around 400 miles to Moscow. For whatever we wrote about about Polish and Baltic roads, they were clearly bonze medalists in the Olympic crap roads competition. This was a whole new ball game. Massive 1ft squared holes in the road, tarmac turning into gravel and the whole ride was bone shaking, poor old Dave.

It was raining, dark and dangerous. I managed about 117 miles when we found a Motel at almost 2am. It took us ages to get the room. I kept the telling the lady I speak no Russian and I do not understand but she just kept talking at me. We eventually put some money on the top and after a few more forms we had a place. They love their forms here. The room was fine but the water had sulphur in it and the whole bathroom stank of rotten eggs. Daily total was 220 miles.

Awakening at about 11.30, We decided to try and put the photos on Richs camera onto the laptop, so we can get them on the web, We could not get his memory card reader to work, after over an hour of faffing about, we thought sod this, we'll buy another one.

Rich choose the first sector.

As we started off Dave had his first fault, a failed indicator bulb. Dave after over 1000 miles, you're out of order. We bunged in a new one and he was right as rain.

The drive into the rain lashed Warsaw was slow. It's big and busy, we got lost asked a taxi driver, who guided us to the write road and eventually picked up the city transit north bound Bialyastok. Just as we hit the nothern suburbs we stopped for a bit of lunch on the roof of the car, it had been slow progress. It was 4.30pm and we had done around 75 miles in 3 hours.

We picked up the comedy express road north, and watched the latest installement of "Polish deathwish". We were overtaken on a single carriage way road by one car who was been overtaken by another, 3 wide and with traffic coming in the opposite direction. By now our 24 hours in Poland was enough, beautiful country but not great for driving.

Passing Bialystok, on towards a lovely little town called Augustow, with lakes and a nice town centre. we would like to have stopped. We had updated our position on the Mongol Rally website in Warsaw, but we were slightly behind the teams doing our direction, due to the late departure in Prague. We crossed the Lituanian border, and drove passed the longest queue of Lorries I have ever seen. It was literally 5-6 miles long to cross the border back into Poland. Chin up.

The one thing we noticed about Lithuania instantly, apart from the even crappier roads was the lack of lighting, it was was so black you could hardly see anything. We heard that team Scraz, one on our route had stopped in Kaunas for the night. That was 165km from the border, we'd make it that far.

Somewhere about 20km from Kaunas the road went into a diversion, we followed the signs, took a right diversion sign toward Kaunas (no lorries over 8 tonnes) and I was doing 55mph on the tarmac when it without warning turned into a potholes dirt track, it was about 5 miles of 20 mph in the pot holey mud, until it turned into tarmac again. The road joined onto the northern edge of the city.

They have had some serious downpours here recently as many roads were flooded. After asking in a petrol station where to find the E262 towards Daugavpils in Latvia, we headed on for a bit more. It was now around mignight. We drove passed the turning for Kaunas airport 500m to the left, so we sopped for a quick photo or 3 as both Rich and I have flown there with Ryanair.

On towards the town 1/3 of the way to the border, Ukmerge. we planned that would be our stopping point. It was raining the roads were rough, it was pitch black and you got this real sense of being in the middle of nowhere. Ukmerge was big enough to make it onto our map but was not big enough to warrant any accomodation. So now really knackered it was onto the next town 2/3 of the way from Kaunas to the border and 60km in front of us. They had one guest house but it was firmly locked at 1.45am.

We were both now exhausted and would of happily camped if it were not blowing a gale, raining and freezing outside. Onwards, hardcore towards latvia. We crossed the border at 2.35am. Daugavpils was another 17km.

It's a much larger place and we new we'd find somewhere, we had to as we could hardly stay awake. Entering towards the city we could see a big blue HOTEL sign in the centre. I got to a junction that I thought was a fork going left and right over a bridge, with the hotel just the other side. as I turned left, the blue light went on behind me. It was the Latvian old bill, like some sick joke, with the hotel a couple of hundred metres away. I had been pulled. At this stage I was considering abuse or assault on the officer, for nothing more than the guarentee of a bed, even if it's in a cell. I actually grovelled, saying sorry. "yes of course sorry" said the angry looking copper. He showed me a Latvian highway code and I had gone through a no entry sign and was suppossed to go around a road island rather than cut the corner to get on the bridge. He eventaully just gave us our passports back and said "you go". Yes sir, no sir, 3 bags full sir.

We got into the hotel at what we thought was 3.30am EU time, turns out Latvia is 2 hours ahead it was 4.30am. We had done exactly 500miles in 14 hours on dog awful roads. Now this was hardcorre. Today we march on the Russian border. bring it on.

I cabbed it up to Rich's side of Prague having said goodbye to Lena in the city centre. We had spent 24 hours in Prague and wanted to get in a few hours that evening. After a bit of deliberation as to which way way to go we decided on heading east then northwards towards Wroclaw and then on towards Warsaw. We found our way out of Prague easier than we had our way in, and joined the road dual carriage way toward eastwards. The roads were now getting more bumpy. The dual carriage way suddenly ended with no warning into a T junction, we were now on single carriage way bumpy roads.

Passing through that part of the Czech republic the countryside is beautiful. We hit the polish border after a couple of hours and into Poland. The roads we rubbish and winding and the overtaking going on around us was at times frightening. Towards Wroclaw we passed a petrol station that had caught fire, there were burnt out cars a few ambulances and fire engines and hordes of locals looking on, as we passed over the brow of a hill someone overtaking was heading straight at us on our side of the road. I hit the brakes hard and stopped as there was a 6 inch curb beside us and the idiot Schumacher wannabe just pulled in with inches to spare.

After witnessing a few more comedy overtaking manoeuvres, we hit Wroclaw, which was a fair size, and Dave didn't like very much as it is nearly all cobbled streets and loads of tram lines, it was very bumpy.

In the town, I was driving, Rich and I both saw something on the road, I asked "what's that" thinking it was a can and Rich thought it may of been a stone, I tried to put it under the middle of Dave. Only when we were on it we saw it was a Hedgehog rolled in a ball. As Dave it sitting low at the back he didn't pass underneath as hoped, we heard the sound of the poor little thing as he went under the back. I was gutted I had killed a Hedhehog.

Picking up the E67 towards Warsaw, we swapped drivers and Rich took is go, somewhere southeast of Lodz we had had enough and decided to find a hotel. Except there were none. We were guided by some bloke in a 24 hour bar, towards one place that looked so dodgy and seedy, that we elected to continue. Eventually after over an hour we found a nice place about 100km south of Warsaw at 3am. A glass of 1 of our 3litre cartons of Tescos Red wine and we hit the sack. We had done 318 miles in just over 8 hours and were knackered.

We got into the venue, a fair few had made it, I didn’t notice the lads from team Scraz who are doing the same route, hope they made it, it was a riotous crowd drinking beer to some dodgy Jazz band. Hmmm great. I think we would have won the award for most civilized night in Prague, a truly stunning city. We went off to a lovely restaurant called Kogo and in light of our imminent feasting on fermented horse milk and pickled testicles, I went for the beer and seafood risotto. Rich and Jana joined us with an old friend from Ryan air Jordi, who was night stopping in Prague, bound back for the huge party.
Jeremy had texted to ask if we were well and had made it, again thanks to you Jeremy for your continued support, you have been amazing without you we wouldn’t have been here for sure. Deep down though I reckon you’re slightly jealous. You maybe a high flying manager but you really want to be driving to Mongolia in a banger. Go on admit it.
Most of the party was now outside on the street, we stayed for 10 minutes drank an awful watered down warm beer at pants party number 2 and went off in our party of 7 to the old town for a couple of night caps. That maybe the lat time we will see any ralliers till we reach the end, assuming we get that far.
It’s now Monday lunchtime and Rich and I are going to spend the afternoon with the ladies, before we extricate ourselves from the thumb prints and again become the big tough global adventures, if we're still allowed. We head off at 6pm for about a 6 hour stint.

I awoke at 9am and within an hour we were showered, coffee'd and frickadella sandwiched up for the long drive ahead. As we left at 10am the Irish Lads car was still there with no signs of movement, I wonder if they’ve awkon yet. Rich elected to drive first and we set off toward the 122km to Frankfurt, loads of the public, were honking horns and one young lady was leaning out the window taking pictures of our wheels.
A good sing a long to Simon and Garfunkel in the warm sun and we passed Frankfurt with 220km to Nuremburg. Rich seems to have a habit of picking the wrong sectors, as again we kept hitting traffic jams. We were having a laugh with a some lads in a red micra in the outside lane, we were on the inside as we kept passing each other a few times in the slow traffic with V signs as we did.
Just before Nuremburg, we re-fuelled swapped over and I took the wheel. Driving from east of Nuremburg the scenery was stunning, beautiful countryside and forest and now only 280 kms to Prague. We new we were near to the Prague turn off, but we suddenly bought up the fact that most teams cars had names and ours didn’t. After a few lame attempts, I suggested Dave. Richard said yeah we’ll call it Dave, after Rodney. we were cracking up as we drove passed the Prague slip road. On up the motorway for a bit before we turned round, at least we now had a name for our motor.
Crossing the Czech border was easy, we had completed one half of all the flags on our bonnet and the car had behaved flawlessly. We still had 180kms to Prague and arranged to meet Rich’s girlfriend on the city limits. We arrived on the edge of the city around 6pm and around 450 miles later, we again got lost and had to stop for them to find us as we got caught in a 1 way system. Jana turned up with some of her family and we headed to their place, Rich and I were looking at the map on the back of our car, considring the monumenatal effort it had took to do over 800 miles in 27 ½ hours. London to Prague was nothing it was just a soeck at the beginning of this huge red line. I think we now realise what we signed up for, can we come home now.
My wife had flown over and had traveled up with some friends to meet us. We emptied Dave of essential items, and team 24 the road split temporarily to become team 2 4 under the thumb, I went of with Lena Dima and Sasha and we arranged to meet later for the HUGE Prague party.

Pulling out onto bayswater road, in a long line of Logo’d bangers, my mobile rings, a rather stressed sounding Sonia from BALPA, had had all sorts of difficulties on the underground and was now outside Lancaster gate tube station, a quick 180 swimming against the tide of our compatriots and we met with the lovely Sonia and her hubbie and proceeded down a side street where she took a fair few pictures of us and our steed. She said that we are going to have an article in the next Log with a couple of page follow up in a later edition. After giving the pair a couple of cans of our free case of extreme energy drinks, sponsor supplied, we tried to find our way back onto Bayswater road, a few wrong turns later in the pouring rain we were in Fulham with no clue as to where we were going.
As I had taken responsibility of the camcorder work on the start line and Rich was the official photographer, I asked him how many shots he’d got, er I forgot. Never mind, my wife had taken a few, so we’d have to use them, (below).
With the heavy traffic it took us around 2 hours 45 minutes to get to the edge of London in the stop start traffic. thanks to the expert help of our man in London once man he guided us by mobile to the A20 bound for the M20 and Folkestone. We were now around 1 hour 25 mins from our tunnel crossing and wondering if we’d even make it there.
Bolting down the M20 at a lightning 65mph, we passed hordes of other ralliers, a customary hoot of the horn and a wheey and we in Folkestone with 40 mins to spare. the actually said we could go on the earlier train at 17.20, result. We drove on and in our little bit with 4 cars there was another rallier in a newer shaped Micra he’d only bought on Thursday, due to similar engine troubles with his old chariot.
David the driver had a funny tale to tell, he was asked by his comrade in miles, to stop at his house, as he wasn't there and to pick up his bag in the garage. They had just realised in Folkestone that he had in fact picked up a bag belonging to his driving partners house mate, that contained such rally essentials as a kite, a pair of size 11 boots an umbrella and assorted bric a brac. The tunnel was really quick and we were soon in France.
As we now needed gas we pulled into the first petrol station to be greeted by Jack Osbourne sitting on the roof of his Fiat panda, doing a piece on the design of French petrol pumps or something similar, complete with his huge 4x4 support vehicle, traveling doctor and back up. Guess that’s 1 team guaranteed to make it.

We joined the road towards Bruxelles and soon we were in Belgium, we passed a few ralliers with the customary honk and wave, when passing a red Citroen 2cv, a rally favourite, we honked the horn and the 2 lads did a Mexican wave thing which cracked us both up.
Now getting slightly hungry we decided, to try and get some grub and some Euro’s, it seems Belgium is the land with no cashpoints. We joined fellow ralliers Dillon and Chris and rather than going hardcore and eating locusts and grass we opted for the Pizza Hut express.
On toward Bruxelles, I was now driving. Rich had done the bit down to Folkestone and he was now the nav man. Having been around Bruxelles a few times, I was aware there are many potential wrong turns, but hey we are paid to navigate around Europe and we had a full colour AA road map and route finder print outs. What could go wrong. We realised something might of when we started to approach Charleloi almost due south of Bruxelles, when we need to be going east and slightly North.
We elected to just follow the sign towards Liege and then try and find the road back towards Aachen and Koln. We managed after our scenic trip of Belgian motorways and now with he time about midnight local we crossed into Germany.
I said to Rich “ We haven’t seen any rally cars for ages", not surprising with our detour, when literally 20 seconds later we could just about make out the shape of what looked like a 2CV in the distance, as we got within a few hundred metres, we saw the UK plates, it must be, ever closer and we could see it was the same one we’d passed at the start of Belgium, driving past I honked the horn and the both the driver and his half asleep front seat passenger, sat up and did the Mexican wave thing and a large wheey. We were now again in high spirits and cracking up laughing.
Koln came and went and we found the road towards Frankfurt, we decided to turn it in around 1am as we were now hanging, we saw a sign for a petrol station with a motel 20 kms ahead, that’s where we are stopping.
A couple of lads had elected to kip in their cars for a few hours. We were now willing to pay anything for a bed for a few hours. Up to the Motel and a couple of Irish lads in one of the rooms were knocking back spirits and leaning out the window chatting to us. We elected to hit the sack straight away. It was now 2am local. We had done 375 miles.

After 2 months of hard work, countless stressfull engine calamities and a pants party, we were finally off to do this thing called the Mongol rally. We had to be there between 9-10am and it's a 45 min drive from rich's. We'll leave at 9.15 then. Fluked our way all the way to Hyde Park without a single wrong turn and with a little bit of help from our man in London on the mobile (Rich's dad David), we entered into hyde Park to be greeted by the sight of varied colourful wrecks and some rather rough looking drivers, Rich and I decided who ever felt the effects of the previous night the least should drive first. Right then Rich your driving. We joined the long queue for the admin tent to get our official mongol rally stickers, a free case of this Extreme energy drink, from one of the official sponsors and some other varied bits. We were joined in the line by Jeremy from the cars donor. Cheapestcontracthire.com. He had just returned from a soiree in sunnier climes, and he hadn't even shaved, I mean really Jeremy. He was telling us his tales of various mad driving adverntures that make the Mongol Rally seem slightly tame, the mans done everything. Next came my Dad and step mum caz, Friends Matt, Zoe, Jeff and Maskura, My mum, sis Hannah and brother in law Charlie and Rich's parents David and Mary. Quite a crowd was packed into our bit of Hyde Park, we got a lot of praise for our rear windscreen map made by Ian at Signsdirect-uk.com, everyone loved it. We had great difficulty in getting our badly designed Mongol rally Stickers onto the car, but thanks to Matt at least the bonnet one looks good witht he doors being rubbish. After some announcements and some Mongolian folk music thing that sounded like drowning cats in a bag, the drivers were called to assemble in their hot rods for the off. I was slightly disappointed that Sonia from BALPA hadn't turned up or Robbie from C Dart whithout whom we wouldn't even be on the start line. Some Lads pulled a great stunt they had a mini smoke machine in their car and everyone thought they were on fire. After much hooting of horns and general bravado, we were off, it was great to have so many of our loved ones and our un-official third member of the team, Jeremy at the start line. We were out the exit behind a couple of mad Aussies and off down Bayswatwer Road.

Friday afternoon, i set off bound for Rich in Kent in monsoon like conditions, coupled with the rush hour throng and the journey took the best part of 4 1/2 hours from East Midlands. Good News was the car behaved herself. Arrived at Rich's parents for a hearty meal and the two of us were off with my wife and a few good friends to pants party number 1. The party was billed as huge by the organisers. the only thing huge about it, was the venue. An assorted bunch of weirdo's, us included, were congregated in a warehouse thing on brick lane drinking Fosters and watching Jack Osbourne disco dancing. A couple of lads thought it would be a hoot to take there trousers off and we were chatting to various Ulaan Batar wannabes. Some American lad was telling us of his route through Iran and then Afghanistan. Nice bloke, doubt he's coming back alive. After a few hours we had enough and decided to head back ready for off tomorrow.

Having now left home for the road and having linked this blog to my website, which I cannot now enter as software at home. i realise this BLOG site only has the ability to read from the bottom upwards. A touch inconvenient, apologies.