Wednesday 28 May 2014

The last day, will Molly Porsche make it ?

Day 25 the last day.
This is always an exciting day in any rally. You have nearly finished but you still have to get across the finish line. Every knock, rattle and bang are heart stopping moments as you fear the worse and may be the car or you won't make it. its only about 400km what can go wrong?
There are two ways to go today. 
One along the main tarmac road and the other over the Cederberg Pass. Its worth looking this up and watching videos of guys on trial bikes trying to do this pass. 

We are doing it in very tired and battered rally cars. I have no idea what the scenery was like because I couldn’t take my eyes of this mountain goat track of a road. We think it is the final sting in the tail of this great rally and a way of eventually braking Molly. But no, she won’t give up, some of the gradient is so steep we are in 1st gear going up and coming down. We did stop every now and again and I must admit the scenery was stunning.
Alas one poor car the Jeepster of Dick and Matilde didn’t make it, they had to be towed and trucked out.
After this we eventually get onto tarmac roads and head for The Cape of Good Hope, passing through fantastic Alpine like scenery and some brilliant twisty turny roads and Molly has a rather spirited race with an MGB :)

There has been a competition to see if any car can finish the event without any mechanical assistance. Its amazing how many rattles and bangs you can hear and feel over the last 20km.
We drive onto the tip of The Cape of Good Hope at 4.00pm we have finished!!!!!  We have covered 9125 km not the 7000 we thought we were doing.
Having crossed the finishing line we then have to drive back to the hotel in Cape Town, the route takes us along Chapman's Peak Drive. I have taken an extract from www.dangeriousroads.org website, take their word for it not mine :) What a way to finish.
Situated on the Atlantic Coast, Chapman’s Peak Drive is one of the most spectaculars roads in the world. With a length of 9km, winds it way between Noordhoek and Hout Bay, at the south-western tip of South Africa. The road is part of the M6.
This short road, with 114 curves, skirts the rocky coastline of Chapman's Peak and offers stunning 180° views of the western side of the CapePeninsula. It is widely regarded as one of the most scenic stretches of road anywhere in the world.


We have had the most fabulous time, we have made great new friends and we have discovered a place called Southern Africa. Sometimes this rally has bought us to tears. These have been tears of laughter and tears of total joy and overwhelming awe at the beauty of this quite incredible continent. 
Thank you Endurance Rally Association for a marvellous event. We will do it again. Thank you to Gantspeed Engineering for preparing Molly and making her such a joy to drive. Lets see if Molly can reach 30,000km of competitive rallying without any mechanical problemsI I would also like to thank Molly for keeping us safe and my wonderful wife Julie who has now navigated us some 25,000 competitive rally kilometres without a mistake, all I do is do as i’m told and steer Molly. i wouldn’t have it any other way.
Porsche 356A in South Africa

Thank you for reading our blog, we hope you have enjoyed it and may be inspired you go rallying and have your own adventures :)
On to Bhutan our next rally in 2015.
Go, go, go Molly.
Nearly forgot to mention we came 9th overall, which is way beyond our expectations :)
Full results can be seen on Endurance Rally Association results
HOME PAGE
David, Julie and Molly Porsche 

Tuesday 27 May 2014

Our own P2P or points and puncture, two very long days

day 23, A very big driving day of 587 km from Namib Desert Lodge to Fish River Canyon.
Sorry we have missed a few days but the connection was bad and we were pretty exhausted.
The last few days have been fairly dramatic with some of the lead cars having major problems. The other and very fast Porsche in the event had a major problem at the rear and had to be retired, the big Dodge Coupe developed an engine problem and missed a time trial, at the end of day 23 the car park resembled a Halfords Drive in Service on a Saturday morning. There were broken cars in all directions, luckily for me Molly was not one of them, but we had had a bit of drama on the way.
I had extended my mechanising abilities and changed Mollys points, she now flew along with no popping and banging. Remember in a previous blog i had said how to drive on gravel and look after your tyres, well I should have taken my own advice. We got a puncture in the middle of nowhere. Thankfully Jose and Maria stopped and lent us their ultra low jack. I had checked that my scissor jack fitted under Molly before we left the UK. What I hadn’t checked was if the jack fitted with a flat tyre and on sand :) Lesson learned.  Gianmaria and Rosella also stopped to lend a helping hand and moral support
Wheel changed and we headed for the next village. Here we found a garage but they had no power, but the guy said he could change our damaged tyre for the new one we carried by hand, using good old fashioned tyre levers. He spent about 40 min doing all this for us while all his mates came over to take photos.  He had to use our portable pump and puncture repair kit but fixed it all and off we went.
The first drama of the event.
The accommodation at Fish River Canyon was bizarre. The hotel was arrange as little lodges scattered around a huge rock outcrop in the middle of the desert.
To make it more strange there in the middle was a perfect natural grass crazy golf course. Unfortunately we didn’t have time to try and set a course record for most shots taken but would love to come back to this place.
Porsche 356A Molly Porsche at the Tropic of Capricorn

Porsche 356A with a puncture in Africa



Day 24 A huge driving day of 620km.  To give you a flavour of this rally and the roads the first part of today’s run is on an unmapped road across the desert to the Richtersveld National Park. This leads us to the South African border, easily crossed and then a long long drive to Clanwilliam. Thankfully all the repaired cars are back on the road and make it to Clanwilliam lodge. 
Along the route were endless roadworks. The South Africans seem to like closing one lane of great lengths of road. This means you have to wait about 10-20 min until its your turn to proceed. Then the locals try to drive at double the speed limit 0f 60km, if you don’t keep up you get overtaken on single lane roads and cut up.
These roadwork chicanes were some of the fastest ands hairiest driving we have done all rally. Quite good fun except for the speed trap on the last section, luckily they missed Molly but did catch some of the others.  
Endurance rally Association roads in South Africa
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 Some homes are not so fancy, but at least they have a pub. These is a town for the workers on the vineyards.

Over the past few days we have been lucky enough to stay in some great locations and have really good rooms. Clanwilliam Lodge was the end of the fairytale.
This was a very tired hotel, with some pretty poor rooms. Ours was OK except for being at the front in pole position for listening to the car alarms going off in the night and the hotel doors banging. Back to normality :)
We leave Clanwilliam quite quickly and set off on the last day.

Sunday 25 May 2014

Some assorted photos of the past few days

We have now arrived back in South Africa, we are about 400km from Cape Town and the finish.
Lots to report on the last two days but thought it was about time we had some photos.
Here is a quick view of the last few days.
Assorted hotel rooms and lodges, some good and some stunning.


And here are some of the roads we have just driven, some good, some stunning and one still being constructed :)


Full blog tomorrow, we have just driven 620 km today and a beer is urgently needed.

Friday 23 May 2014

Desert more desert and thick fog

Day 21 The first part of this day is only 1.21 km, we drive to a museum where we see the rock carvings of ancient man. Fascinating, its only 8.00am and its already very hot. 
We then drive across the desert to a place called Uis which is a mining town. This was only a shortish distance of 142 Km but it was a real problem for some of the bigger engined cars. There should have been petrol at Twyfelfontein but there wasn’t. This meant that the big cars just could not get to the next petrol stop, many ran out but with the help of other competitors and Greg and Jenny in their 4x4 everyone was able to beg, borrow and steal enough petrol to get to Uis and the next petrol stop.
In Uis there was an amazing cafe called the Coffee and Cactus a truly beautiful establishment with fantastic coffee and cakes all in the middle of nowhere.
We have two time trials today both of which Molly and her ever so slightly knackered driver and navigator managed to clear, that means no penalty points Hurrah !!
The day finished at the coast in Swakopmund. This is a relatively big town and right on the Atlantic coast. The desert meets the Atlantic and this stretch of coast is know as the Skeleton Coast because of all the shipwrecks caused in bad weather.
The temperature dropped from about 35 to 10 in a matter of a few km, very refreshing but actually a bit too cold. We even have to put the heater on in Molly.
Some very bad news today, Andrew and Gina have had to call it a day, the Crossley has terminal mechanical problems and can be driven no further. The car and crew have done remarkable well to get this far. Lets hope Andrew and Gina can hire a car to finish the trip.
Molly's still going but the petrol is giving us problems. We have just realised that the higher the grade the worse the actual petrol. To get a higher grade someone adds all sorts of chemicals (ethanol) and in these very high temperatures this evaporates before it gets to the engine and causes the car to misfire a lot.
Never mind we carry on and enjoy the journey.
The anticipated weight lose in these high temperatures is definitely not going to plan. The food and odd glass of wine has been exceptional and a little too freely available. Think some serious work in the gym will be needed when we get back. Well that’s what we say now.

Day 22
Off into the desert again past huge sand dunes to a place called Solitaire. The scenery on this drive starts as one long dead straight road straight through the middle of the desert. At 9.00 its damn hot and we try to keep Molly cool by dropping our speed and just cruise along at about 90kph. Suddenly the landscape changes into one of breathtaking beauty. Mountains, sand coloured grasses, blue skies and fluffy white clouds in all directions. The road suddenly turns into a gravel based Alpine road with stunning views at each turn, we have never seen landscape like before. There was meant to be a time trial today. Luckily it was cancelled due to road works. I say luckily because it gave us the chance to really see this amazing countryside and stop and take pictures as we passed the Line of Capricorn. 
We arrive at Solitaire and unfortunately my mechanic demon comes out to play and I decide it would be a good idea to air hose the engine bay and get all the sand out of it.
I finish doing a really professional job, go to start the car and no matter what I do Molly will not start. This is very serious for two reasons 1 we can’t go any further and 2 I may need to get help from the mechanics and lose the battle to see which car can go the furthest without their help.
I chat through what I have done with Rob (one of the mechanics) who suggests I look in the distributor and see if I have blasted dust into it.Once I have identified what a distributor is I take the cap off and find the desert in there. I give it a clean and another gentle blast with the air gun and lo and behold Molly starts and we are back in business, still untouched by a mechanic. I am now beginning to consider myself quite a bush mechanic, I changed a brake light on the South America rally, changed a petrol filter, tightened the exhaust and now fixed a distributor. Think that all deserves a beer.
Bit of a problem for one of the other cars today, the Jeepster driven by Ernie and Jeanne had a spindle give way and their wheel came off. They are OK and hopefully they can trailer the car back to town and get it fixed. It gives you an idea how hard these roads are if a Jeepster has this sort of problem.
We really like Namibia, full of contrast and lovely people. 
Sorry again for lack of pictures. The internet in the middle of the desert is a bit slow :)

Useful driving hints for desert roads :)

Day 20 from our wonderful lodge in Etosha to a desert camp in Twyfelontein. A mere 400km across the desert.
Fot the next 3 + days we are driving  across the Namib desert, this is winter so it’s not too hot just over 36 degrees which is about 100 degrees in English.
The roads we use are quite well graded gravel roads. Namibia has 5450 km of tar roads and 37,000 km of gravel, think we are due to cover most of the gravel roads :)
There is a definite technique to driving on these type of roads. A lot of them have been graded using a huge levelling machine which is dragged or pushed across the surface. This gives the road a serious corrugated effect which makes the cars jump, which in turn makes the corrugations even worse.
The technique is to drive at a fast enough speed that the tyres actual jump from the top of one ridge to another. This speed varies all the time and also depends on the size tyres you have.
Molly has very small wheels/tyres. We have to drive at over 80 and up to about 100km to get the car to fly over the corrugations. Anything below this and Julie starts to lose her fillings. Anything above this and I start to lose my nerve. Once you have obtained the optimum speed you then have to try and steer the car with only a fraction of the tyre touching the ground, and if you try to brake then the corrugations really hurt the car and us. You have to concentrate 100% of the time or you're in trouble. At the end of 300km + you know you’ve been driving.
Another thing you must do is pump the tyres up until the side walls are straight up and down, any bulge in the side walls and you will probably get a puncture. the rally had 9 punctures in one day. Its not fun fixing a tyre in the middle of a desert in 100 degrees.
Some of the cars run on truck or taxi tyres. These have very hard side walls and very thick casing, theses type of tyres are very good for rough track roads. Unfortunately they don’t make this tyre for Molly so we have to run on standard road tyres pump up as hard as we dare. So far so good.  
Twyfelfontein is an extraodinary complex built into and around a rock outcrop in the desert, the view from the room is as far as the eye can see in all directions, only broken by a herd of elephants walking across the plain to the next watering hole.
We had dinner at 6.30 and in bed fast asleep by 8.30. This rallying is very tiring.  

Tuesday 20 May 2014

Etosha National Park and Rhino watching in style

Day 19

Julie woke me in the middle of the night to announce it was raining. Quite amazing as we have not seen a cloud for the best part of 3 weeks, but it does remind us that we are on our way back to the UK.
Today is a transit day and we have all day to travel about 180km across the Etosha National Park some 80,000 square Km of true African landscape, salt flats, scrub, trees, elephants, lizards, tortoise, impala, ostrich, birds of prey, and most exciting of all a rare black Rhino.

The road is a rough track but we are limited to 60kph. This is designed to give you time to brake if an elephant or similar decides to cross in front of you. We were lucky and saw a Zebra crossing :)
Our stopover last night Mushara Lodge was probably the most naturally welcoming place we have stayed all trip, the staff wore badges saying how long the had worked there, some with over 13 years service, they loved the place and so did we.
Tonight we have arrived at Ongava Lodge, I know I have said it before but this place is just wow! We have our own thatched lodge overlooking a small watering hole teeming with wild life. We are hoping the hippos turn up later.
Molly is still going strong but we do wonder if we bought the right car. a lot of the driving is on dead straight flat roads. We try to keep Molly at 3500-3700 rpm which gives us a cruising speed of around 115km. The bigger cars are batting along at considerable more than that and we always seem to be tail end Charlie. Not that it's a problem, we are nearest the sweeps (this is the last car on the event and is manned by our highly skilled mechanics). What am I saying, we're in Molly Porsche and don’t need mechanics :)

Tomorrow there are a couple of timed stages but if they are anything like the last one there is no real point in us wrecking the car driving flat out. Our top speed on gravel is probably 120-125 kph and some of the guys are hitting over 150 kph. Think we may have to fit a 2.7 RS engine to keep up. 
We are on the homeward leg now, Africa is a stunning country and we can see why many of our friends in the UK told us we would love it. They were so right. The country and the people have been very welcoming. We have had the odd case of stone throwing by some of the kids but we get that in Sevenoaks :)
So far a fantastic journey and a great event.   Come rallying and see the world with a different pair of eyes.

STOP PRESS
we are sitting by a log fire, glass of red in hand and just below us at the water hole are 3 rhino, a Mum a baby and helper, above us the southern hemisphere night sky, think Molly may fail to start for a few days :)

broken screen and luxury lodge again :)

Day 18
Everyone seems to have had a good nights sleep. Kick off today is at 9.00 we have drive just under 600km. This is why these events are called Endurance Rallies. Luckily the roads in Namibia are very good. The  first part is lined with small villages and stalls selling wood carvings ranging from traditional canoes through to model aeroplanes and of course giraffe.
Its another hot day.



We somehow end up being last car in the rally. This is due to our limited top speed and stopping to take photos etc. We try to catch up a bit and pass a lorry who very kindly kicks up a stone into our windscreen. Luckily again, it’s on Julie’s side and we can carry on. When we get to a petrol station on the Namibia/Angola border we try to make a bit of a repair with Silicone. Strangely we acquire about 20 people all trying to help and all wanting payment, a rather large security guard with an even larger stick comes along and scares them away. Our patchwork is carried out in relative peace. Lets hope the screen doesn’t crack any more.
We have a time trial today, it was slightly misleading in that we were told at the beginning that it was set at 80kph. Some competitors then assumed that we had to average and not exceed 80km. We couldn’t make our minds up and just drove it as a normal piece of gravel road. Halfway along a wild dog or as they are also know ‘painted dog’ decided it had a death wish and ran out in front of us. We miss it and carried on but a bit slower. This section was over 40 km + it will be interesting to see what some of the big powerful cars do it in.
We are staying in another camp/lodge called Mushara Lodge. This is an old family run establishment and the second you drive through the gates you relax, it’s a wonderful place, beautifully cared for with very helpful welcoming staff. Just what you need after a very long hot drive. They make the best homemade lemonade in the world :)
As usual Molly going well and Julie and I have missed the tummy bug that has hit a few competitors, fingers crossed for the rest of the rally.

Julie flies us home !

Day 17 was a very busy day we had to fly in from our lodge in the delta, because we were the first to the delta we were last out.
Another flight in a small light aircraft, no problem becoming quite a regular flyer now, soon we should be able to book our seats a month in advance and use the executive lounge.





We leave the airport parking at 11.00 we have to get to the Botswana / Namibia border by 6.00pm it was a distance of some 400 km. Not a lot in a modern day car but in a 1958 1600cc Porsche in 30+ degrees it was a long way. We made it along with all the other crews to find that the man who stamps the custom forms had taken the day off (it was Sunday) The office phoned him and he kindly came in along with his very young son to calm the chaos.
Through the border we all go and onto our nights stop at Popa Falls.
We really enjoyed Botswana, its a prosperous country proud of its roots. All the people we met were happy with genuine smiles and welcomes. The president does however bear a striking resemblance to Lionel Richie, its probably why the National Anthem is ‘Hello is it me your looking for” :)
From the border we have to drive 25 km to our lodge on the bank of the Okavango River. Great place but a bit overwhelmed as the rally road show hit them.
We are treated to a river boat cruise were we see Hippo and Crocodiles followed by a cheese and wine sundowner party in the middle of the river by the Popa Falls, all a bit surreal and very wonderful.
A very busy day with transportation by boat, air and road. Bed at 9.30.
Molly is still going well even on slightly iffy petrol. All the other crews are still running and having a brilliant time.
The roads are good but very flat and a bit too straight for my liking, but you can’t have everything.
Tomorrow is a very long driving day and a trial section thrown in for good measure.

Sunday 18 May 2014

Random photos of the Ocavango delta





two post for the price of one. Sorry no pictures very slow internet :(

Day 14

On this rally we are having a number of firsts - day 14 was the most exciting. We catch a very small helicopter ( a first) and fly straight over the top of Victoria Falls ( another first) As we got into the helicopter my claustrophobia kicked in and I was just about to get out when the door was slammed shut and a split second later we were airborne. Wow! Wow! 
The photos were in a previous post, sorry about the confusion.
Some of the other competitors found a very good hand car wash, they got their cars polished inside and out including the engine bay for $5. Molly however is still covered in rally grim, mainly to hide the big dent in the front wing. But she is looking and going very well.
The best news is that Greg and Jenny have managed to find a rental 4 wheel drive and have caught up with the rally. Their Mk2 Jaguar can be repaired but will not be used again on this event. Greg and Jenny have gone all soft and got used to the comfort and air-conditioning, which with a day time temperature of 30+ is fair enough. We are just jealous.

Day15
We drive to quite a large town called Maun, here we are to experience another first. We fly in a VERY small aircraft to our lodges at Moremi Crossing deep in the Okavango Delta.
This is quite surreal as we fly low over 1000’s of acres of the marsh land type delta.
We land on a dirt runway (another first) and are then taken by small power boat to our lodge. The rooms are all separate luxury tents over looking the delta.
In the evenings we are not allowed to leave our rooms on our own, we have to be escorted to and from the main lodge. When you see the size of the elephant poo by your front door you begin to understand why.
We spend 2 days here and i could write a small book on what we saw, did and ate, raw nature at its best.
I am sorry the post are getting shorter but the days seem to be to. Its difficult getting internet and when we do we all dive on it at once.
The main thing is we are all well, and having the time of our lives. Molly is still going well and has still not to have any attention from the mechanics, long may it continue.

Victoria Falls

day 13
Good straight forward drive to Victoria Falls, lovely old grand Hotel The Victoria Falls Hotel with its grounds overlooking the falls.The falls were not as we imagined.
The water falls into a deep S shaped gorge so you can’t really see the full effect of this incredible feat of nature, but you can certainly hear it and see the spray. Stunning.
I will not bore you with the story about our room being next to the entire air conditioning plant of the large hotel next door. I decided that the noise was being produced by the falls and had a good sleep.

Glamping Zimbabwe style, and mine bigger than yours !

day 12
Sorry but some of the posts have got a bit out of order because I get a bit too keen to tell you about the fantastic sights we are seeing.
Day 12 was not really about the sights but the location and accommodation again. Having left Barney and Fred’s place we arrived at what was termed a luxury camp site.
Julie and I had seen pictures of ‘glamping’ type tents and this version in Zimbabawe was not quite up to Goodwood standard. The tents were just that, green army type tents complete with a hole in the ground and a bucket of water on a string for the shower. Unfortunately our bucket did not have any string so that did not work so well.
The big plus was the tents did have very comfortable beds and even a turn down service complete with a hot water bottle and chocolate.
The camp chief produced a truly remarkable meal all cooked on open fires and we were treated to some national dancing by the staff. This time we did not have to join in. Zimbabwe has been saved from my dad dancing routine.
The night was really cold but comfortable. In the morning all the boys meet up to have a ‘mine is bigger than yours’ competition. As with most boys ’size’ competitions there was a fair bit of exaggeration going on. In the end a dead heat was announced we had all had ’the biggest spider in the world’ in our tents.
This is the first time Julie and I have camped and I must say we really enjoyed it.
The roads in Zimbabwe are all tarmac which is just as well as we were travelling on their A roads but the surfaces are unreal. You have to watch every foot of it in case you disappear down a pothole. There are police check points about every 100km. As we were always in the middle of the rally we did not have too many problems.
The cars are all still going well, some too well and setting a blistering pace.
We leave our camp site to drive to the luxury of The Victoria Falls Hotel.

I can't see a thing !!

Important advice.
I keep forgetting to advise all travellers that Deet (mosquito spray) and glasses with an anti scratch film do not go together.
On the 3rd day of this trip I thought I had completely overdone the giggle juice. I put my brand new glasses on after dinner and could not focus on anything.
Tried cleaning the glasses with everything available, no improvement.
On closer inspection we could see that the anti scratch film had crinkled rendering the glasses useless.
I had covered myself in anti mosquito spray, then picked my glasses up and put them in my pocket. I had the spray on my hands and that got onto the lenses.
Moral of this story is keep any mosquito spray containing deet away from glasses with any sort of protective film on them. Any contact will ruin them.
Luckily I had packed a spare pair and could carry on seeing all the amazing sights Southern Africa has to offer.

Thursday 15 May 2014

Bye bye Zimbabwe hello Botswana

Day 13 and 14
This rally is quite amazing. We have seen some fanatic sights along with some terrible poverty.
We did not think much of Zimbabwe, the country appears to be very poor. There are a lot of burnt out houses, terrible roads and the people seem to be very subdued. The main form of employment appears to be traffic police.
Having been done for speeding in South Africa we were very careful not to be "done" in Zimbabwe.
As it happens we were one of the very few cars not to be pulled over for one reason or another,
all those stopped were fined for various reasons ranging from speeding to not having a white reflector fitted to the car. The amounts ranged from $5 to $30, some crews even managed to get stopped 3 times.
We left Zimbabwe this morning and entered Botswana, what a difference a border makes.
The roads are great, it's clean, and the people are happy and smiling, even the police are giving us friendly waves.
All the cars are going well. The competition has now been calculated on the overall times. We are in 13th place, mainly due to our slow time on the last stage. We are only 5 minutes off the lead so all is not lost and our actual rivals are well within reach. We will never catch some of the 5 litre monsters :)
We do have a little competition going on as to which car can go the furthest without the mechanics looking or working on it. We think there are 3 of us still in the running. Let the best Porsche win :)

Yesterday we were at Victoria Falls, and for the first time ever we flew in a helicopter. It took us up and over the falls, absolutely breathtaking. Might have to get one and avoid the London traffic :)
We are now at Nata Lodge in Botwana, a fanatic place but because we are in the middle of nowhere the internet is very limited. Sorry for the very short post.
Tomorrow we fly to the Okavango Delta in a small light aircraft another first. Not sure there will be any internet for a couple of days.
Here are some photos of our fantastic adventure. If you have never been to Africa you are missing a whole new world. Better still get yourself a classic car and really have some fun. We simply cannot recommend this enough.




Day

Wednesday 14 May 2014

Fred and Barney Flinstone invite us to their place

Day 10
We leave Agatha Coach House and continue driving through mile after mile of farmed forest offering some stunning scenery.
We arrive at the only time trial of the day, this is on a red dirt track through bits of forest and logging areas. I must confess not feeling 100% after all the excitement of yesterday, but we line up, the count down begins 5,4,3,2,1 and we are off against the clock. We come across some pedestrians and a local car driver, who was not impressed to see us belting along in the other direction but on his side of the road. We decide that all things considered we should back off and eventually cross the line outside of our allotted time. We now have 1 penalty point and are no longer in the joint lead. But if you read the results carefully and with a bit of party political type swing, we can still say we are in joint second place :)
We arrive at the recommended lunch stop to find that the Bel Air has hit a Guinea fowl and smashed its windscreen, the Guinea fowl was not so clever either.


Scott and Salome have had terrible luck with their car.  The master brake cylinder went going down the Swartzberg Pass not a good place to lose your brakes, they bought a brand new one, unpacked it, fitted it, and it didn’t work!
As they live in Johannesburg when the windscreen broke they were able to have a spare windscreen bought over to them, 5 hours later they were back in business.

Tonight we are staying at a place called Mapungubwe, I expect you have heard of it. It means ‘city of gold’. Hmmm!
Our route book says ‘ there is a serenity you cannot ignore’ I think whoever wrote this must have had extensive training as an estate agent. 
The serenity is absolute, mainly because we drive along a rough dirt track for 40 min to arrive at a group of round brick built, thatched buildings and no people, nothing. Its a bit like Fred and Barney’s houses in the Flintstones. You keep expecting Dino to coming jumping out at you. (hope you remember this cartoon ;) )
The route book again says ‘your lodge hosts will have details for you'. What hosts? It suddenly feels like "I am a rally driver, get me out of here”.



After a while we do find two ladies who helpfully advise that they don’t know anything about our supposed BBQ and sundowners experience.
One of the crews phones the organisers and things start to become a little clearer, basically don’t panic it will all be fine.
Our homes for the night are actually really comfortable, the outside shower is brilliant and at 7.00 the BBQ is in full swing and everyone is having fun.
The huts are set amongst some incredible rock formations which glow in the bright sunlight, maybe this is where the city of gold phrase comes from. Some of the rocks are balanced on top of each other as if they have carefully sculptured, but it's simply nature that has created these incredible balancing acts.
This location does turn out to be quite special, and one i would come to again preferably driving a 4X4.
All the cars are still going well and everyone is having a fantastic time, but I do wish the other crews would stop asking how Molly is doing with her new body design and such comments as ‘David try turning the steering wheel before the bend, not after it’ are not really appreciated it. We are still going and have had no mechanical issues at all, Go Go Molly.

Oh no, Molly has a new front end, and a speeding ticket.

Day 9 and we are off on our journey again, it’s really hard to drag ourselves away from here. In fact Molly really does not want to go and refuses to start for about half an hour, but with a bit of coaxing and hitting with a branch she reluctantly starts.
We drive about 100 yards from the lodge, down and up a deep gully I turn the steering wheel sharp left and because all the weight is in the back of the car (Julie’s luggage again) Molly decides to go straight on.


There’s quite a big bang and crunching noises as we have gone straight into a very big rain ditch.
Julie says we can’t get out of the car because of the lions and leopards, but I think the noise has scared anything like that away. It certainly scared us
I get out expecting to see the two front wheels pointing in opposite directions. We have been very lucky everything mechanical is ok its just the front wing which is now badly bent.
We get Molly back to the lodge, bash out the wing, with the aid of my big hammer, ( only tool I really know how to use) and car jack for bending the wing away from the tyre and a very strong park ranger. Front wing modifications complete we set off again. 100 yards from the lodge, same bend we nearly do the same thing again, now that would have been seriously embarrassing, we make it round the corner and set of for the rest of the day’s drive.
Our bad day does not end there. We come across two not so friendly policemen who decide we are speeding. I ask for proof and he points to a 60km speed sign hidden behind a bush and the radar gun 50 yards past it. He also adjusts the holster of his gun. He now has my full attention and I am 100% certain he is correct.  After a lot of chat and pleading we get down to the nitty gritty, paying the fine. The fine can either be at the police station or a spot fine. The kind policeman advises me a spot fine would be better for both of us. We part with 200 rand ( about £15) he seems to find a safe place to put it in his trousers and we drive off. He promises to send the receipt on in a few days. He must having an amazing physic powers as we didn’t tell him where we live :)  He catches other competitors that day, all have a similar story.
The route is around the edge of Blyde River Canyon, one of the biggest canyons on earth. The viewing point we stop at is know as Gods Window, and thats a very good description of the view.


The day ends at a marvellous old hotel called Agatha Coach House, its so quaint and olde worlde that not a lot works, but the bed is comfortable and the views over 1000’s of hectares of forest is spectacular.
We lose another car today. The old Mk2 Jaguar, The Dowager, has a terminal engine problem and retires hurt, what a shame. Lets hope Greg and Jen can get a hire car sorted and catch us up.

The oldest car in the event a 1925 Crossley is still going along very well. It's had a few overheating problems but is now in fine fettle and keeps a steady 60MPH.
Being able to drive the Crossley these distances on these roads is a great achievement for car and crew. You try it with only front drum brakes and a hand brake for the rear. Great effort by Andrew and Gina,  mind you a Crossley was the first car ever to cross from one side of Africa to the other.


Blog posts are like buses, nothing for ages then 3 at once

day 8 We have a day off, and go hunting The Big 5

We have arrived at Sabi Sands and are staying in the most stunning thatched lodge. Its about the size of a 3 bed semi with a 2,000,000 hectare garden.
2,000,000 hectares is the size of the game reserve here and to put that into perspective thats about the size of Wales.
We have 3 safari drives out into the wilds with our expert guide Mac and highly talented tracker Colbert.
These guys really know what they are doing and within 10 minutes we are right beside the most beautiful leopard basking in the sunshine.


All visitors to a game reserve want to see the Big 5. 
Big 5 means the animals that are the most dangerous animals for a hunter to track and kill on foot. They are elephant, leopard, lion, buffalo and rhino.
Mac is keen that we should try and track and see as many of the Big 5 as we can. The only shooting we’ll be doing is with our ‘box brownies’ 
It is quite normal for visitors to see one or two but we have obviously arrived at a good time.
Over the next couple of days we get up close (to damn close if you ask me) to leopard, lion, lioness, elephant complete with 3 baby elephants, rhino, and buffalo.Thats all of the big 5.
We have seen India elephants before but nothing can prepare you for driving round a corner and coming face to knee cap with a huge African bull elephant.They are very scary and not to be messed with.
We also get very close to hyena, hippo, giraffe, zebra, springbok,dwarf mongoose, and the sight that got all the rangers most excited, a pack of wild dogs.
The day is rounded off with a fantastic outdoor dinner, think Michel Roux in deepest Africa and you get the idea. The staff also put on a traditional dance show, which we all join in with. I excel at my famous day dancing routine.
Note to self, must come again.


Friday 9 May 2014

Sabi Sands photos

These are all our own photos of our visit to Sabi Sands.
Sorry no cars in any of them just wild animals (except the first photo) :) as we saw them.
A truly life changing experience and a privilege to be here with these beautiful animals and surroundings.
Even Julie was happy to get up at 5.30 to witness the wilds of Africa.
The reason the lion has green eyes is that it is still quite dark and the flash went off.
The kill he has was bought down by the lioness. She has to wait for him to finish before she gets a look in.
This experience has changed the way we view this rally, perhaps we will slow down and spend more time looking around us, or may be we will have to stay here.:)