Sunday, July 14- Launch Day:
Not long after waking up in
what was soon to become an oven at around 8am, the crowd also began to stir and
soon a fellow with a megaphone was out to get us moving. Lisa and I walked down to get breakfast and
allow the morning dew to dry before packing up our tent in preparation for
departure. Breakfast was a simple bacon
sandwich and we were a little miffed about having to pay for coffee, but at
this point half of our mild complaining stemmed from simply waking up hung
over. We headed back up the hill and got
the tent together, then packed up the car and waited with everyone else for
what came next; the awards ceremony.
There were some rather modest goodies given to teams that had raised the
most for charity (The Old Blues Brothers- two very nice gentlemen named Paul and Ian driving a Smart ForFour), came far too overprepared (can't remember the team name, but they
were given a large television set that had been painted gold and instructed to
produce it at the finish line), broken down numerous times already (Team
Serpico) and so on. Throughout the morning young men dressed in period chain mail and armed with swords staged duels and wrestled around on the ground to get the crowd worked up, and Lisa jumped at a photo op. This was followed by
a little jousting, first by two guys on horseback and then a round of horse
versus rally car just to get the crowd in high spirits. Soon after we took some group photos in front
of the stage, filed off to our cars and slowly began moving towards the stage
in our cars for our official sendoff.
Our little Alto struggled just a bit getting up the ramp but I managed
to get us up and over without stalling it or getting hung up on the boards, which
I’d really been worried about. That’s exactly
what had happened to Team Serpico as they were driving up to receive their “least
likely to make it” award, which drew a roar of laughter and applause from the
crowd. I really hope those guys make it,
we’re all rooting for them. After
passing over the stage and making a short drive back around the grounds and we were
on the road, heading to the ferry landing at Dover and our short trip across
the channel to France. Loading at the
ferry docks went smoothly, and the sheer size and scale of the facilities used
by these ships came as a surprise. We
boarded the French-flagged vessel Rodin and arrived in Calais perhaps an hour
later. After getting back on the road,
this time driving on the right-hand side, we somewhat cautiously maneuvered our
car down the less traveled country roads and avoided the larger highways on our
way to Belgium and Luxembourg. Being a
Sunday we noted that the entire nation of France, aside from the docks at
Calais, seemed to have closed up shop for the day. I’m not exaggerating, the streets were
deserted in every town we drove through (I am somewhat embarrassed to admit this but a few days later I was politely informed by my own mother that on Sunday, July 14 it was, in fact, Bastille Day- practically the French equivalent to the 4th of July). As evening hours approached and we passed through more and more of these
picturesque French villages we did notice the occasional pub open to small
groups of patrons, but this was relatively rare and otherwise all was
quiet. The towns themselves were
enviable in their beauty, almost as if they had been constructed solely for the
benefit of passing tourists. You could always
spot them from miles off simply by looking for a large Romanesque church
steeple or bell tower marking their location on the horizon. Most of any appreciable size also had a soldiers’
memorial somewhere in the town center, often painted, rifle in hand complete
with bayonet and usually sporting a uniform dating back to World War I. The
countryside was beautiful; rolling farmland and tree-lined highways stretched
on for miles. It was also dotted with
British and Canadian WWI cemeteries, so I presumed we were passing through what
had once been the front lines of a massive battlefield. As daylight hours dwindled we made an attempt
to locate camp sites using our satellite navigation. Though we passed a number of good spots to
pull over in the Ardennes forest, facilities were of particular interest. After a few dead ends we turned for the town
of Chimay, entered Belgium with little more than a small sign to let us know we
were in it and found a hotel at the last minute. Tomorrow we set off for the Czech Republic
and our last official meeting point with other teams before we all head further
east.
Saturday, July 13:
Waking around 8am with plenty of time to spare the four of
us shared a pot of fresh coffee courtesy of the now fully operations gasoline
powered cooking stove. We had a few
stops to make that morning and some very important errands to run. We needed an ample supply of dry goods for
our food pantry and a laundry list of important items for the car, including
two new rear tires. The plan was to
mount the old ones on some cheap spare rims and throw them in the car as cheap
back-ups, but sadly the tire store didn’t have any. At any rate they did have the new tires we
needed in stock and were kind enough to leave us the old ones. We made a few stops for additional tools; a
mallet, large flathead screwdriver, jumper cables, fire extinguisher, tow rope
and a spare quart of oil should the car start burning more than it should. Despite those essentials we still lacked a
spare drive belt and those rims, so we’d have to try again once we got to
mainland Europe. At Morrison’s, a very
large chain grocery, we stocked up on foodstuffs and even grabbed two large
plastic bins to keep everything in. We
cheerfully filled them up in the parking lot with all of our food in one and
sleeping bags, pillows and inflatable mats in the other, very glad to have our
car a little more organized prior to our departure. At that point it was time to head off to
Bodiam and to the startline festivities that were waiting for us there. The drive was gorgeous, if not a bit nerve racking
on some very narrow hedge-lined country roads.
The car navigation system (yes, we cheated) took us on what seemed to be
a very roundabout and haphazard way, but eventually we saw signs for the castle
followed by a large grouping of very tiny cars in the distance. That was our destination. We pulled into a spot and immediately ran
into Sam Moore and Thunder from Down Under.
We’d heard they also ran into some problems with their D&K sourced
car and were glad to see they were in good spirits and their vehicle seemed
fully operational. We met a nice couple
traveling as “the B-team” and all stretched out for some wine and to exchange stories
up to that point. Before long word got
around that we’d be able to set up our tents.
Ever mindful of just how precious a nice, flat place for your tent can
be and how essential it is to a good night’s sleep we jumped at the opportunity
to get moving. Our placement was a good
ways up a hillside adjacent to the castle, but certainly level enough to
prevent us from ending up in a heap at the far side of the tent. With everything set up, sleeping bags zipped
together and mats properly inflated we walked back down the hill to rejoin the
festivities and eventually claim our much anticipated portion of what had been
billed as a feast. This turned out to be
a disappointing hamburger with sautéed onions which we wolfed down anyway, and
not a half bad one either. A short time
later we were all herded off to the castle and Lisa pounced on a rare photo-op
with some chain mail clad period actors.
They would be a source of entertainment throughout our walk to Bodiam a
few hundred yards away, occasionally stopping to challenge each other to
swordplay or some wrestling for our amusement.
At Bodiam we wandered the parapets, enjoyed the free mead while it
lasted and had a brief chat with Tim the Disco Wizard. He was an unusual fellow that bore a sort of
medieval resemblance to Jack Sparrow and pointedly refused to break character. He may well have been under the influence of
some very strong drugs, but was harmless enough as he wandered around the
crowd. Enter the team clad in speedos,
prompting about a half hour of staring, photo ops and a quick chat with a
security guard. I assured him those
gentlemen hadn’t smuggled in anything of concern based on our
observations.
Friday, July 12:
After a morning check-in with the mechanic, it turned out
the work on our rally car was soon to be completed. We packed up our belongings and bid London a
fond but much needed farewell, as we’d dallied there much longer than
anticipated. Dave Leach advised us to
catch the 2:10pm train out to Thames Ditton and was waiting for us at the
station in Vauxhall, all smiles as usual.
He had very generously and enthusiastically taken off early from work to
accompany us. Once back at Dave’s house
we hopped into his red ’89 BMW (aka The Rockabilly Cruise Machine) and headed
down to the mechanic’s shop, The Weybridge Garage on 34 Walton Road, to survey
the damage and collect our wounded car.
The shop keeper was very optimistic, stating that our Alto “had plenty
of heart, and with a little care, vigilance and no small degree of luck it
would get us to Mongolia”. The butcher’s
bill was a staggering 712GBP, but at that point we were prepared for the shock
and honestly just grateful to have a fully operational vehicle. Having successfully retrieved our pitiful car
we said our goodbyes to Dave Leach, our savior for the last week along with
Candace Blair who provided accommodations in London. I’d been provided a useful tip for a good
campsite and we headed south towards the coast and the town of
Herstmonceaux. Once there we set up camp
for the night at a pub called the Bull’s Head, which had a field in the back
for people to set up tents and some surprisingly nice bathroom facilities at
15GBP. As we surveyed a plot a cheerful
young couple walked up and said “you look like you’re about to drive to
Mongolia!”. That was Chase and his
girlfriend, and we opted to join them across the field to socialize a bit and
enjoy a flatter, thistle-free location. After
setting up our ridiculously palatial tent next to their baby blue Fiat Panda,
we walked back to the pub for a nice dinner.
Bangers and mash for myself and steak pie for Lisa, and the food was
excellent. The next day was our big trip
to the start line at Bodiam Castle, about 18 miles away.
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