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This is our on the road map...
Day 34 Thursday, 26 August 2010
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  at 16:16 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said If you have been following our progress, please visit our website www.gcgb.org.uk and click on the charities tab to donate to one of our charities. We still need to reach our target and every little helps! |
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| at 14:04 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said two ambulances we overtook 3 days ago, just showed up: 'I can't believe you two are here. When you passed us, you were in mid-air, and we all said- those two aren't gonna make it!' |
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| at 13:17 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said so this morning, this scenario occurred: 5 englishmen woke up in a field in mongolia. An irishman then landed on the road with his paraglider, and a scotsman in a rally car drove past and asked 'what's the joke here then?!'@ |
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| at 10:39 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said We've done it! First to arrive at the finish line today, 96th on the whole rally. All of a sudden feeling very tired, but important things to do like sort out flights, car registration, hotel and then hopefully, tuck into a beer. Tomorrow there's a football tournament. Well, the fun just doesn't stop! The car, tired and hurt, is currently in a secure compound next to the finish line. We have completely ragged it in all honesty, but the engine and everything under the bonnet sounds exactly as it did when it crossed the line at goodwood a month and 2 days ago. What an awesome car.@ |
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| at 08:10 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said well, should have been smooth getting to ulaanbaatar, but last night we decided to see how far we could get up a hill compared with the landrover. We finished second and with a blown tyre, and a slow puncture. Why make life easy eh? Stopped to take a photo of a high tech ger with satellite and solar power... But got invited in for a drink of carbonated camel's milk, and the lady wanted us to marry her daughter- well she was pretty enough that i'm sure some rich person will stop by and make them happy some day- not today though, cheers for the milk. Almost there now... |
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Day 33 Wednesday, 25 August 2010
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| at 11:14 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said arrived in a town filled with tarmac roads! Apparently it's tarmac all the way to ulaanbaatar now, which means we've effectively done it unless some pothole takes us out. Convoying out of town with 'bristol to baatar', who are driving a landrover ambulance. We're all going to camp up on a mountain together... |
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Day 32 Tuesday, 24 August 2010
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| at 16:21 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said so having made it here to bayanhongor, bought 2 new tyres so now we have spares, and a new hydraulic jack. Also found a local bathhouse so we had a proper shower. Met up with some rally teams who we saw parked up at a hotel, and we decided not to leave town as there's a river to cross as soon as we get out. Would be better to do that in daylight. I can't believe it but the car has had no problems in the last 300km. Oh no wait, the rear suspension fell out again. |
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| at 12:09 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said Left altay a couple of nights ago and headed into the desert to camp, but burst another tyre on the way. This morning another tyre went leaving us with no spares, and the jack crossthreaded too. All that with 300km to go, but we managed it. Also helped a man change a lorry tyre for a carton of apple juice. Managed to almost write olly's ankle off when i smashed it with a sledgehammer, but a bit of cream and a plaster made him A.O.K. Also found a man stranded with his wife on top of a big hill in his ford scorpio, needing some coolant top up, so we saved his day too- though quite why he drove up there is beyond me. Just had a brilliant man describe the sound of bad mongolian roads compared to good ones! |
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Day 31 Monday, 23 August 2010
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| at 10:13 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said 2 new dampers fixed in by ourselves, they had a new damper at the garage, and we were carrying a spare. Also got 2 tyres replaced. Full of confidence now. Time to hit the road! |
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Day 30 Sunday, 22 August 2010
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| at 03:38 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said surely all you english hunters with your guns and your hounds need to 'man up' knowing that the mongolian hunters use trained golden eagles at high altitude in the mountains?! so our usual convoy hasn't turned up, and we don't know where they are because there's no signal in the mountains. Last night listened to some traditional mongolian music- not sure i'll buy the album, but that's another tick in the box. Also net some locals in a tent who fed us some very raw mutton soup... Infact they got drunk and overexcited by our presence and tried to get into our tent when we were asleep... Just like being back at work really... Oh well the adventure continues...@ |
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Day 29 Saturday, 21 August 2010
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| at 13:06 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said drove off without any companions this morning, and hammered the car through the mountains, up to 3000 metres above sea at one point... Spectacular scenery and young boys training to be shepherds everywhere. Hunters with eagles were dotted around the highest areas. Next big grassy valley and we've arrived at a rally-sponsored campsite with gers set up. They're cooking beef stew this evening so we decided to stop and camp. AND it has a proper english style toilet. Expecting all the other teams to catch us here in the next few hours... But for now we've net some new ones- and a fire engine which is travelling around the world...@ |
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Day 28 Friday, 20 August 2010
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| at 14:58 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said first night in mongolia, staying in a ger! 19 of us actually- infact 19 of us got a table at a restaurant, and 19 of us took the 10 minute walk to the local bath-house for a wash! Roads are predictably poor and mountainous, infact sometimes there is no visible track at all. Just grassland with rocks scattered about.
About to see what mongolian nightlife is like... |
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| at 08:53 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said finally through to mongolia after our final border crossing took 42 hours, but we were with 12 other teams, and had a pretty good evening in the concrete compound playing football with about 25 mongolian children who showed up, despite the freezing temperatures. Noone had anything stolen which was good news.
NW4 badgers, the team we abandoned at the poland/ukraine border cos they didn't have the documents, were also here! In desperate need of a wash now, and a stock up on washing water. |
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Day 26 Wednesday, 18 August 2010
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| at 17:10 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said mark of 'let's get ready to mongol' has been renamed 'ditch' since he so spectacularly put the kia rio in another ditch for the 2nd time! Under no pressure whatsoever, he just drove into it so badly that the car almost rolled over! A 4x4 turned up and towed them out- chris however, just slept through the whole scenario in the back of the car. We are now at the mongolia border camping with about 8 other teams. Shared some stories and cooked up an awesome curry. C2M are camping 200km back- we lost them earlier, but will catch them tomorrow. Scenery still out of this world. |
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Day 25 Tuesday, 17 August 2010
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| at 11:12 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said bizarre thing this morning. Accidentally got out of a lift on the wrong floor and some crazy russian bloke invited me into his tattoo parlour where he gave me a calendar with a sort of treasure map of north mongolia/russia. Don't think we'll use it though. Olly is currently driving for the first time since almaty, his eyes have got better. He must have reset himself. |
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| at 08:07 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said met back up with cornwall to mongolia last night, and also 'jim' from 'the long and short of it'- who'd abandoned their
Recovery truck somewhere in kazakhstan. Had a good catch up at a hotel last night over a few beers. Sad to be out of kazakhstan, but now preparing for our biggest challenge of the rally yet, even though olly keeps worrying that we've had our heads buried in the sand, our car is now fully laden with fuel and water, ready for the Gobi desert.@ |
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Day 24 Monday, 16 August 2010
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| at 08:34 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said after trawling round semey for help, came across a garage who couldn't get us new dampers, but he came up with the genius suggestion of replacing the rear coils with some super tough mercedes ones! Of course i said yes and now the problems with weight at the back of the car are gone, because it's sitting about 5 miles higher than before! That's right, our micra is now a hot rod! I cant tell you how awesome our car looks. The springs must be off some massive van- twice the thickness of our old ones! We don't even need to use a jack to get under the car anymore! |
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Day 23 Sunday, 15 August 2010
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| at 16:25 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said blasted through kazakhstan today, but now in semey with all sorts of problems. Roads were terrible, and a pothole took us clean out, wrecking the back left damper again, but there's knocking from all over the place and we're worried about the trailing arms too. so we won't be crossing the border tonight. Trying to get it fixed in the morning, and work out if the old work was a con or not. Also gotta get olly's eyes fixed because 1 driver will never last, doug has done 8 hours today. And now we need to find a hotel. Still loving it though. Lets get ready to mongol are staying with us purely to take the mick and get their own back i think.@ |
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| at 03:53 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said just in case you thought kazakhstan is an impoverished country- no it isn't. The big cities are really modern and wealthy. Everyone is very proud of kazakhstan as one of the newest and exciting countries in the world. The roads maybe rubbish, but the 'm' roads are all construction sites and where the road has been finished, it's really good. The poor places are villages in the plains, mostly filled with farmers- but it seems the current government are really getting about the country trying to change places. The club we went to on friday night had a car park full of brand new lamborghinis, porsches, mercedes etc owned by young kazakhs. I'd come here again, definitely. |
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Day 22 Saturday, 14 August 2010
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| at 16:03 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said we've decided between us 5 that olly has turned into an ACTUAL mong! Or maybe he's turning asian. Just stopped off at a petrol station with an armed guard... Wonder if it's dangerous round here? Dangerous doug to find out... |
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| at 15:57 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said last night, olly's eyes mutated into something monstrous, so for the time being, doug is the only driver and olly is taking eye drops. Big night out last night, but that's the end of pretty much a 3 day relaxing period of driving decent roads. Time to get dirty again, and find some long lost friends in an ambulance...@ |
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Day 21 Friday, 13 August 2010
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| at 07:14 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said just got pulled over by police again. Apparently our cars are too dirty, told us to clean them, and then they guided us to a hotel in the centre. Such helpful people! We're having an extended time out here. Almati's a pretty big modern city.@ |
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Day 20 Thursday, 12 August 2010
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| at 13:27 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said great to finally get off the m32 after 3 days. We were shown to a cheap hotel in taraz by an english speaking local who cycled up to us. He studied london, but prefers it here... Got caught speeding just after taraz- i'd say that's our first legitimate offence. Bit gutted since half of their roads are not driveable. |
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Day 19 Wednesday, 11 August 2010
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| at 13:42 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said After a very bouncy few days of driving we thought it best to stop giving Collin McRae a run for his money and have a quick look at the rear suspension. It turns out we had snapped both springs and blown both dampers. We got it all fixed for less than £70 and here we are on the road once again, wierdo with the beardo busy behind the steering wheel and I'm busy eating some cake. Still giving the Mongol boys a suitable amount of jip for driving into a ditch last night. Next stop: Almaty.
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Day 18 Tuesday, 10 August 2010
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| at 18:17 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said stopped off for dinner, then brilliantly, in the middle of town with everyone watching the 2 cars turn round, the kia accelerated straight into a ditch at the side of the road! Cue the mighty micra and a tow rope, holding up traffic to sort them out! And another massive issue- the air horn motor's burnt out. |
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| at 15:03 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said 2 hours of silence. So i wound down the window and hurled some obscene abuse at a bystanding cow. Probably the most offended cow in kazakhstan now. |
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| at 11:53 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said one local in Aral will probably have discovered a fortune when they find doug's lost wallet with over £200 of local currency... Since then, we've had another tyre blow out and been towed out of deep sand again. Considering whether to get new dampers. Springs need changing too. Camels everywhere. And some massive eagle/falcon/hawk keeps flying over us when we're driving through the plains. |
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Day 17 Monday, 9 August 2010
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| at 19:26 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said we were going to camp here in Aral, but were offered a room to stay by a local family. I've just had a shower in a shed. The house is quite pleasant... |
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| at 15:20 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said we're famous people by the way- had to sign some autographs in aqtobe town centre... |
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| at 15:13 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said finally, some phone signal! After spending the day in aqtobe with the boys in the kia rio, did some night driving and carried on today until we reached aral. A nice easy drive down the m32, where we got grounded 3 times, had a tyre blow out, had to get towed out of a hole twice and now the car feels like jelly because the rear dampers are shot to pieces. We've also had the car jacked up 6times in the last 2 days to smash dents out of the wheels. Also stopped at service stations to eat mutton and some other un-stomachable extras. The bonnet doesn't close properly because the car's bent up, and the back bumper's fallen off... Still not fully broken down though. Time for dinner on the aral sea- oh no wait, they accidently drained it.
@ |
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Day 16 Sunday, 8 August 2010
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Right, so we're in Aktobe, in a 4-star hotel- but when we turned up yesterday, we were the filthiest customers you'd ever seen, what an epic day. The Kia's CV joint had popped out and they need a new one, but for now it's popped back in and we need to grease it up. After that point, We hit the epic and vast salt flats and sand trails. There's actually a road- it's the A340, but if you drive on it you will definitely crash after about 5 minutes. It's rutted and potholed everywhere, and will rip any car to... Read more ... |
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Day 15 Saturday, 7 August 2010
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| at 06:53 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said disaster for the kia rio after only 1km- they've lost all power because the front right cv joint has gone. Trying to stop someone to tow them, but only 1 car every hour along this road... Me and olly are off to get help from the town, 60km away. |
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Day 14 Friday, 6 August 2010
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| at 11:07 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said Odometer: 150086 or 3801 miles since goodwood. Tried to camp last night but after getting sunburnt, losing travelling time by helping the mini, whilst not eating properly all day, the swarms of mosquitos were so intense that me and olly went for a hotel... We're so soft. At breakfast, i drank tomato juice drink. Yuk.
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Day 13 Thursday, 5 August 2010
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| at 15:50 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said just started thinking about food. We've been eating supermarket stuff mainly- just stopped off in cities when we've needed to top up. Both us and the ambulance have a small fridge so we can keep fresh meats and cheese for a couple of days, great when we went through germany, not so good now... Ukraine doughnuts are awesome! Eaten lots of sandwiches, drunk about 10-12 litres of water a day between us since we left poland,- BUT we've only got a bag of pasta left and we're in kazakhstan... A camel's just got in our way- wonder what that tastes like as roadkill?
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| at 12:16 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said had to give away a ration pack to get our passports returned at the border control, which was better than giving him $100! Plus it gives him and his wife an entire day of high quality military cuisine. So everyone's a winner. Lots of people came running up to the car as soon as we got through the gate, asking for money. I'm not sure, but i think kazakhstan's a little different from the countries we've been through so far... Time to cross europe again, this time with no tarmac, but more heat, and no road signs. |
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Day 12 Wednesday, 4 August 2010
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| at 22:44 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said went through astrakhan and out the other side to set up camp in another field. Will have to cross the border tomorrow, we're all pretty tired. It's just us, cornwall to mongolia and lets get ready to mongol. Everywhere we go, people beep horns and shout wellbeings. A lot of people between volgograd and here are aware of the mongol rally cars appearing once a year, it seems! |
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| at 12:50 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said things i forgot to mention in previous update- we saw about 10 other mongol teams here, 2 in our hotel, and the long and short of it rejoined us on our night out, after we left them in ukraine- though we haven't seen them today! Roads in russia are much nicer than ukraine, still not great though... On the road with just the ambulance this afternoon- the others will catch us later.
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Day 10 Monday, 2 August 2010
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| at 19:23 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said with 500 metres till the russian border, got stopped by one final ukraine policeman. He wanted $100, i gave him $26. Quite pleased with that one. Seems that even the power of arrest is actually a load of rubbish... Also haggled the price of russian insurance and saved us all €41. (Us, let's get ready to mongol and cornwall to mongolia. The long and short of it left us to get their rear axle fixed). Anyway, i'm haggling everything that doesn't require visa card. Such a corrupt part of the world. Watermelons are great round here though. |
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| at 06:28 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said currently sitting on top of a cliff drinking a cup of tea watching the sun rise over the black sea. Went down to the beach earlier for a swim too. Best place we've camped so far.@ |
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Day 9 Sunday, 1 August 2010
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| at 19:11 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said "olly! OLLY! GET OFF THE STEERING WHEEL!! What? Oh yeah, right side of the road..." |
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| at 16:38 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said Seriously, if kazakhstan is supposed to be worse than ukraine, we've got some serious mechanical issues to contend with. The only smooth road has been the motorway which joins kiev and odessa. We are literally rattling along at 60, sometimes down to 20 or a crawl in bad patches. The truck's had yet more trouble and they're gonna have to see a garage in the morning. Me and olly can't bail them out on this one! It's roasting hot now by the way, and i'm blowing the horn at amused pedestrians in all the small towns. They love it!
Currently listening to ukraine's smash hits 2010.@ |
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| at 11:07 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said woke up this morning to find 2 tyres stolen from the roof of let's get ready to mongol's kia rio, and a few things stolen from the recovery truck too. Nothing too major. The truck and the ambulance took off early, and we went with the rio to get some new tyres and also do a custom spray paint job. The car now has an extra 10bhp, so time to catch the others...!
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Day 8 Saturday, 31 July 2010
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| at 23:09 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said spending the evening in a blues bar listening to a rock band, having booked into a cheap hotel and also re-met 'lets get ready to mongol' who we travelled to czech republic with. They've been in hungary and romania. We also noticed a couple of other mongol team cars about the city... Laundry is at last being done by a lady overnight while we sleep, at last! Time to bust some grooves on the dancefloor...@ |
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| at 15:26 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said went into vinnytsia this morning, found a shop called 'ford transit autoparts' and managed, unbelievably, to find a brand new universal joint complete with spline sleeve and everything we needed to simply bolt the old prop shaft back on. So now we've recovered the recovery truck, we're all back on the road, desperately looking for a laundrette and somewhere to shower. (We don't really want to use our portable shower yet...)-just left uman. |
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Day 7 Friday, 30 July 2010
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| at 22:17 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said we've run into trouble. Team 'the long and short of it' are driving a transit tow truck, and it's wrecked it's knuckle joint on the prop shaft. Me and olly removed the shaft but tomorrow morning we need to go and find a replacement at a scrapyard, or it might be back down to us and the ambulance. We were also with team nw4 badgers, but had to leave them at the border- they couldn't get in because they didn't have taken their full car reg documents. Still, bribed 2 policemen today and the Gobi car is without a single mechanical problem! Tough day tomorrow...
Sleeping in a layby tonight... |
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| at 16:50 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said First run in with a fat Ukraine policeman came today, result; Mrs fat Ukraine policeman gets a slap up meal tonight. Doug and I wont be havin a slap up meal after 'dropping' 17euros in a police car.
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| at 07:55 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said absolutely ridiculous traffic jam last night, means we pitched our tent some way short of the ukraine border, at a service station. 'The long and short of it' team that are with us have taken their truck to a local garage with a polish man to get some new wheel bolts, then hopefully we'll be on our way. Losing some time here... Also camped on an ants nest. Feeling a bit itchy! |
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Day 6 Thursday, 29 July 2010
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| at 18:29 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said horrifying tour, but very interesting. Certainly somewhere I'll remember my whole life. Off to somewhere happier now. Randomly met 2 more teams in auschwitz- so now we are all heading east with the aim of reaching the russian border on monday morning when they reopen after the weekend. |
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Day 5 Wednesday, 28 July 2010
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| at 21:29 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said slow 12 hours with cornwall to mongolia. Set up camp just outside krakow and are planning a quick trip to auschwitz before continuing. The guys we are with are really accommodating and going a bit slower will do the car a world of good prior to kazakhstan... |
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| at 16:22 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said the czechs have this weird rule where you have to have headlights on if you're driving, no matter what time of day it is. Country roads are amazing. We're with 'cornwall to mongolia' who have an ambulance that cannot do uphill driving. We'll see how long this lasts though. Saw some bloke cutting his lawn with a remote control mower... What's the point? |
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Day 4 Tuesday, 27 July 2010
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| at 23:03 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said why on earth do some teams choose to stay here for longer than a day? We've got kazakhstan to explore, so we'll be finding a more determined convoy tomorrow... We won the engine-cooked croissant competition by the way. The second challenge the Gobi car has won...@ |
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| at 20:54 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said ok so the teams we are with are- mad hatters, catch us if you khan, great canadian beavers, team fudge, and team cake or death. We're all out having an italian, and discussing where to go next... |
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| at 19:37 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said we got to prague losing track of the mongol convoy we joined, spent a few hours wandering around and getting irritated by tacky souvenir shops, and then after a few more hours driving round lost and looking for friends, spotted a new convoy heading out to a campsite on the outskirts, so we're now with a transit, a vauxhall agila, suzuki swift, a fiat brava, and another micra, who we met back at goodwood. We've also added 5bhp to the car by making a wide bore exhaust out of an old pringle tube! |
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| at 07:59 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said the czechout party last night was absolutely awesome. Based in a castle, with a couple of stages and a dance tent, we ate free hog roast, bratwurst and pork and stuff, and drank gin and ginger. Just waking up in the world's noisiest campsite, with over 300 other teams here... No idea what the plan is today, but we're looking for a new convoy. We've overcome the problem of our boot not shutting properly, by smashing it with a hammer. That repair is dedicated to hoddy and buster, summer duties on hms gloucester, who would be proud of our repair work! |
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Day 3 Monday, 26 July 2010
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| at 16:20 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said FIRST CRASH! But don't worry, we're all good. Involved us just stopping in time to avoid crashing into let's get ready to mongol, only to get shunted by team 55! Their corsa took most of the damage and were lucky not to lose their windscreen with their roofrack sliding all the way forwards- we now have to kick the boot to make it shut properly! Not far to travel for the czechout party now! |
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| at 11:18 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said just left after a casual morning of getting stuff cleaned at the campsite, quick bit of shopping too. It's raining but we're going to see who's engine cooks the best croissant from here to klatovy in czech republic. Made an adjustment on the clutch this morning- think olly's lap yest ** some text is missing ** |
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Day 2 Sunday, 25 July 2010
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| at 19:36 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said pitched up close to wurzberg, at a campsite next to the river main. Very idyllic. A restaurant and a bar too?
The Gobi car has been fantastic despite only averaging 230 miles per tank. Still suffering from my experience in a micra on nurburgring... |
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| at 13:34 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said our team, team 55 and team let's get ready to mongel (we lost the other team somewhere in belgium) have been at the race track most of the day, and taken on some of the finest supercars money can by. The Gobi car was awesome and even gained a position on team 55 despite starting 30 seconds behind! We weren't so good against the ferraris and corvettes, but the porches couldn't handle us, probably distracted by the tennis racket strapped to our roof rack! Olly is about to take his lap after applying plenty of gaffa tape on bodywork defects, and a crash needs to be cleared from the track... Major repair work maybe required tonight... But I've never seen spectators laugh so much!
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| at 06:11 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said Slept in a roadside services car park just outside of klon for the last few hours, but now we've been rudely awaken by the polizei who have taken our passports for the moment... We didn't really expect this so early on... |
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| at 01:40 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said Odometer reading 146517. First fuel stop since goodwood. Not the best economy! Olly's powering through, may need to look at our aerodynamics in the morning, try and improve our economy. Anyway, belgium's boring, lets go to holland. |
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Day 1 Saturday, 24 July 2010
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| at 23:27 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said met up with teamfiftyfive and team backflips and flipflops, and team lets get ready to mongol. The aim is to get to the nurburgring in germany. First of the night shifts and i'm getting my head down, olly driving. 100 miles left in the tank before a refill. Cars in this convoy- corsa, micra, kia rio and ancient fiesta. Let's do it! |
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| at 20:19 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said missed the ferry, re-booked for 9.30, time now for some dinner? Oh look there's a burger king! |
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| at 16:56 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said on our way to brighton to see what sort of european maps might be available. I know this may seem controversial to some people, but we found out just after chichester that we have the potential to get lost quite easily... |
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| at 15:36 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said Odometer-146285. And it's go, go, go. Spectacular driving on the opening lap from olly almost killed me as i climbed out of the window and onto the roof. But everything is working and heading east. Olly's geography, I've realised is not up to scratch. Tried to go west to dover and couldn't think for the life of him why would need to go east to brightn?! 4.5 hours till our ferry. It has just occured to me that the seats are not very comfy...@ |
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| at 12:00 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said oh dear, not even on the grid and the radiator's leakin. Cue emergency radiator change- yes we were carrying a spare- and it looks like all's good. What else could go wrong now?! No more coolant leaks please... |
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| at 10:04 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said we've just realised there is no clearance under the rear arches. Infact the wheels have gone through the rear arches. Well, hopefully we'll get to goodwood... |
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| at 06:38 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said suddenly remembered we hadn't booked the ferry last night, but we just managed to book ourselves onto the 8pm to dover. Mum says i can't go to goodwood until i tidy my bedroom. So it's an early start today... Olly's still asleep. So lazy... |
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1 day before launch Friday, 23 July 2010
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| at 12:04 on Gobi Car Get Baatard said work has finally finished, the car will be fully packed this afternoon, and then it's time for curry and beer! |
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102 days before launch Tuesday, 13 April 2010
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So a lot has happened. Olly went mad with his mods, so there is now a trucker's air horn on the roof, a full-beam reversing light (might come in handy during the night), some snazzy but currently redundant switches in the dashboard, lots of rally-style holes in the bumper, and we've also fitted a pretty strong sump-guard. A few pieces of maintenance too, and we're nearly there. A brand new ipod stereo came in the post over the weekend (I'm sorry, but that is DEFINITELY needed!), and we also deadened the sound in the car by putting some lovely felt... Read more ... |
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141 days before launch Friday, 5 March 2010
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The Gobi Car returned to the south last week, and is now a 2-seater! Many mods have been made, spare parts acquired- and you may notice we have a flyer designed that will be er... flying around with all our info on it! The car will be heading down to Havant in the next week or so to have some of the main sponsors' logos printed on it. Time is of the essence now- with just 2 of us, there is much work to be done! ... Read more ... |
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174 days before launch Sunday, 31 January 2010
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Today the Gobi car (a lovely red Nissan Micra, donated by Hutfields Garage, Botley) has been driven to Shropshire, where it will undergo major surgery. Namely, bull bars, guards, extra fans, roof rack and a full re-stock of extra engine hoses, filters, fluids, wheels & tyres... and then the interior will be re-designed to accomodate 2 men and 40 days supplies... In the next 2 weeks the car will look very different from the day we picked it up! ... Read more ... |
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205 days before launch Thursday, 31 December 2009
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We are finally back from our six and a half month deployment in and around the South Atlantic. Mongol Rally plans are now in full swing... We have aquired two more sponsors... (That makes three then!) We have found a car, even more letters being sent out to potential sponsors, charity money coming in, and we've been so busy with it all Doug hasn't even had time to trim his beard. Top stuff top stuff top stuff, nice.
... Read more ... |
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276 days before launch Wednesday, 21 October 2009
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WE HAVE OUR FIRST SPONSOR! Who have very kindly agreed to buy our car!!!
Massive thank you to John and Cathy at 'Creamore Mill Wood Turnery' – which, by the way, is possibly the best wood turnery and interior & garden design company in the world!
Also, website's taking shape, new team logo, more letters being sent out to potential sponsors and we’re both feeling very positive about the whole thing, Doug’s even trimmed his beard...
...Time for a cup of tea
... Read more ... |
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293 days before launch Sunday, 4 October 2009
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Since we are doing this rally un-supported, with no back-up team, and well, no-one to help us should we injure ourselves or get shot at, we've just managed to book ourselves on a first aid course in January! Great stuff!
... Read more ... |
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301 days before launch Saturday, 26 September 2009
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Hey hey! So what's happened? Well, if you look on the left hand side of the page, there is a 'sponsor me' button, which takes you directly to our 'justgiving' page, and that's where you donate all the money you want to sponsor us with!
There is an incentive to donate more though- Both of us have agreed that if 100 people donate £10 or more, we will undergo a "surgery-free sex change" for the launch at The Festival of Slow at Goodwood! Please make this happen! This will include a full body wax (except for those very private areas),... Read more ... |
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