Farewell Mongolia... Day 12 Khovd to Border

SEPTEMBER 21ST, 2010

Peking to Paris Motor Challenge update. More about the race here

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A stunning view for David and Sarah Rayner - BMW 321 Coupe - on the final day in Mongolia

Our final full day in Mongolia, and the scenery has been breathtaking, one of the finest days rallying since we left China. The punishment has been relentless, and the Volvo PV544 of Nicholas Pryor and Lesley Stockwell are limping into camp with axle failure.

Several crews are staggering on to the Russian border as “walking wounded”. We know that Car 6, the big La France, is on a truck, so it car 3, Daniel Ward’s 1919 Lancia Theta, The Shooter’s Ford, Car 29, lost its gears today and is on a truck but spares are lined up later down the route, the Renault 4CV, Car 89, had a temporary fix of its front suspension but it didn’t last long. The Vauxhall Viva GT has suffered electrical problems, diagnosed as a failed condenser.
Driving the Impossible

The handsome lead achieved by Gerry Crown in his Holden was maintained today, despite the fact that Gerry has finally decided that driving one-handed is just too much. He has his left wrist in a splint, and he is on doctor’s orders to give the arm maximum rest... he reckons its just an old war-wound of too much gearchanging in too many past rallies, so today, he handed the steering wheel over to young Matt Bryson, his navigator.

We suspect this meant that Matt had to work the GPS, on top of driving. Matt looked as if he was under pressure when we pulled our tent-pegs out of the frozen grassland first thing this morning. The son of John Bryson, top Australian navigator who sat alongside the likes of Andrew Cowan to win the Southern Cross Rally more than once, Matt was realising he had rather a lot on his shoulders.

Michael Thompson and Andrew Davies - Chrysler 75 Roadster - splash through another river crossing

However, he rose to challenge by setting the best times on all three tests, and delivering an extended lead in the Classics Category for the Holden over the second placed Anadol of Ongun and Tokcan. This unusual car was made in Turkey with the help of Reliant – it has an “over heavy” Reliant chassis, according to its driver, a fibreglass body, with a rear design similar to a Gilbern or Alfa GTV, and a Ford Mexico Kent engine of 1600cc.

Today’s final run to our camp site consisted of several glorious valleys with far reaching views, some horrendous roads, and five river crossings. The final Time Trial had a maze of roads wandering off at angles to the main track, and at times, looked totally confusing, as nothing was very clear which was the main track….the navigators for sure decided the best results on this one, as it took an agile ability to mix trip-meter with Tulip road book and GPS while trying to read the road to chose the best course.

Tomorrow, we are off to the Russian border. Another country, and another stack of adventures in store, now awaits. At 9.0pm, all are accounted for, except that the Rolls Royce of Richard Auchincloss is on a tow-rope with Simon Ayris in attendance, and the Volvo is awaiting a similar rescue. Their dinner is going cold…

Moon River... Day 11 Khovd - Rest Day

SEPTEMBER 20TH, 2010

Peking to Paris Motor Challenge update. More about the race here

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Rudi Freidrichs carries out rest day repairs to his Alvis

A “rest-day” today, camping here on a grass plain by a wide crystal-clear river, mountains in the far distance, with pasta on the bubble for lunch. However, for some, it’s anything but rest.

As Betty Banham said, it’s better described as frenzied activity as it’s a chance to get cars fixed for the final two days of Mongolia. Broken engine mountings, snapped shock-absorber mountings, radiator mountings, the job list for the sweep-mechanics has gone on and on, with some cars going off into town to visit a welding shop for repairs to cracked chassis, and more.

Car 59, the Alvis of Rudi Freidrichs and Lennox McNeeley, was looked like a dragon-fly without its wings once its wheels were off and various bits stripped out on the grass. This car had set second best times on the Time Trials coming into here, and the story is now emerging of the car achieving this after a make-shift repair to a broken king-pin. The Wilkinson’s supplied a spare they were carrying, but it was a size too small, so a sardine car was cut up to make a shim, and the whole lot put back together again, good enough to set a second-best time.

Mending and making-do out of bits and pieces has been going on all day. The Volvo PV544 of Nicholas Pryor and Linda Stockwell has had major surgery to its rear end, with shockabsorber mountings re-made, an engine mounting made, and the eyelet mounting of Bilstein shocks strengthened with added welding. Robert Kitchen in one of the sweeper-trucks has attended to various electrical problems. There are river crossings ahead, and good water-proofing will be vital.
Driving the Impossible

Rest Day entertainment - Nigel Gambier and Hugo Upton join in the local display of Mongolian wrestling

The 1954 Sunbeam Talbot Alpine of David and Joanna Roberts is in town having a cracked chassis welded up. They are not short of company. Car 28, the Lagonda with Dutch crew Maarten Hoeben and Jan Bruintjes, have put their open two seater on the back of a truck for a long haul to the Russian border, having suffered a broken axle half-shaft.

For those not attending to repairs, the locals have put on an afternoon display of archery, wrestling, and horse-riding, culminating in archery on the back of horses at full gallop.

The sun dropped quickly over the far mountains, to be replaced by a full moon tonight… it’s been a bright blue sky all day which suggests tonight could be a cold one.

The High Plains Drifter... Day 10 Teel River to Khovd

SEPTEMBER 19TH, 2010

Peking to Paris Motor Challenge update. More about the race here

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William and Victoria Medcalf currently hold Vintageant Category third place in the 1925 Bentley Super Sports

Gerry Crown retained the lead in the Classics division today. He started the day with a comfortable lead over young Garry Staples Jnr. and Gernold Nisius in the VW Beetle Cabrio. While the sun was making up its mind what sort of day we would get as we broke camp at Teel River, these two were already turning on the heat.

Alas, too much red-mist in the drive west saw the VW sidelined with rear suspension bothers, something the Banhams were unable to fix in the middle of the desert, so it was destined to end the day on a truck.

Gerry Crown with Matt Bryson is a veteran of the first Peking Paris Retrospective of ’97, and Gerry is the only drive on the event to have tackled all three Peking Paris Challenges. He is listed on the entry list as a navigator. The reason for this perhaps needs some explanation. Aged 78, Gerry was considered too incapable, too incompetent, to qualify for a Chinese driving licence, so, he is listed as a navigator with Matt Bryson as driver. That gets round Chinese red-tape and since getting behind the wheel Gerry has clearly enjoyed proving to those in authority that they have got him wrong. He has been rallying since 1963, his first event being Australia’s prestigious BP Rally, driving an 850cc Mini, which ended in something of a disaster as he rolled it down a hillside. A minor diversion: Gerry was rescued by the legendary Gelignite Jack Murray, who towed the Mini for over a hundred miles through a forest, forgetting the Mini was there, and Gerry Crown reckons he is the first person to ever see 100 mph on the clock of a rallying 850cc Mini…certainly at the end of a tow-rope.

Long in the tooth he may be, but he seems to have the measure of the Peking Paris, although he fails to get the measure of this camping lark and reckons he is past playing Swallows and Amazons, so chooses to sleep in his car. He will no doubt sleep soundly tonight in the knowledge that he now has a 13 minute gap over the Turkish Team’s Anadol, now in second spot. Adrian Gosden and Andrew Honeychurch have no rear shocks on their Aston Martin DB5, but they are up to third in the Classics Category now. Greg and Liz Newton in a Holden are fourth, and the Sunbeam Talbot Alpine of David and Jo Roberts are fifth, despite a lot of sand somehow entering the sump.

We have driven another glorious day across tremendous landscapes, with two Time Trials for good measure. It suited William and Victoria Medcalf in their Bentley as they set fourth best time on the first Time Trial and second best on the second timed-to-the-second blast of the day. Top Vintageant on both tests was Steve Hyde and Janet Lyne in their yellow Chevy Fangio Coupe. Rudi Friedrichs and Lennox McNeely also had a good day and the Alvis is now 5th in the Vintageant Category, behind the Wilkinson’s Alvis.

The repair shop in the nearby town of Khovd is going to be busy on our day off tomorrow, David and Sarah Rayner had the subframe off the BMW Coupe this afternoon and trucked into town for welding up, in order to be first in the queue.

The Vauxhall Viva GT is on the back of a truck today, but is not alone, the Peugeot 203 broke its front spring for the third time today. There is welding equipment here at our riverside campsite – everyone is in good spirits.

Tranquillity Base... Day 9 Uliastay to Teel River

SEPTEMBER 18TH, 2010

Peking to Paris Motor Challenge update. More about the race here

Maarten Hoeben and Jan Bruintjes - Lagonda - need a helping hand to escape a patch of soft sand

“Mongolia has the best scenery in the world.” That’s the summing up of Catriona Rings, navigator in the pretty red Alfa alongside Alastair Caldwell, who has probably rallied in every country with a road worth rallying. And it sums up the mood of the event as we struggle with hammer and tent-pegs yet again, beside another fast-flowing river.

We have just driven 300 kilometres and just as we had all thought “the scenery surely can’t get any better” today has proved to be absolute stunner, and the best so far. Many are saying it’s been the finest driving-day of their lives, even your Syd Stelvio reckons today makes it onto a short-list of three of the world’s greatest roads.

We have crossed a vast open plain, beneath big skies, with a line of mountains on either side, and not seen a soul. Not another car. Not another shepherd, most of us have not ever seen an animal, although a few claim to have seen a herd of camels.

Where else can you begin the day on a sandy, gravel road, so unused there is grass growing up the middle, and run up and down valley after valley, and every time you crest a hill, have your breath knocked away from you by yet another vast prairie. You discover just how it must feel to be a single-handed oarsman rowing the Atlantic when you realise you are looking at horizon that displays the curvature of the earth… and when you get there, you crest a hill for another far horizon. On, and on, and on…and finish up beside a river without one kilometre of tarmac, and, joy oh joy, not a single pot-hole.

In case you are wondering where this treasured spot of utter tranquillity exists on the map and plan a parachuting holiday, check it out on Google Earth at 48.29137°N 93.48999°E only don’t bother with the bathing costume as Andy Inskip says the water in these parts is icy-cold.

So, it’s been a great day. Not easy for the navigators, as some found themselves going off route and skirting round the back of a mountain before realising they now had some real navigating to do to plot a course across country to get back on route.

Confronted with a Y-junction, a lot of cars swung left as it seems the main track to take, as Rupert Marks and Simon Mackenzie-Smith said at on arrival in their Ford Model-A at the campsite: “We got lost with the lads in the Lagonda, Car 25, we went 7km off track, Nigel Gambier said “it's just the other side of that mountain”, got a puncture driving over the grassland looking for the correct track, our first one, cracked front cross-member, but what stunning scenery – this is the day we entered this rally for!”

The beer tent is doing a roaring trade, the sun is setting, so a Sundowner has obvious appeal, and the chefs are chopping up a small mountain of raw cabbage for a coleslaw salad, there is distinctive smell of barbecued chicken coming out of one kitchen tent… and there are log fires under several large rusty drums of water for hot showers. The team of campsite workers are hard at work… and so are the roving mechanics.

Chris Elkins and Ed Rutherford have gone off in their Vauxhall Fronterra to rescue some ten cars that are reported bogged on the side of a very sandy hillside about 12 kilometres away, so while today was planned as a short day, and with no timing – a chance for everyone to recover from the rigours and hardship of the appalling roads of the last two days – it looks like some will still be in late tonight.

Alastair Caldwell broke a gear-lever today, as well as a shock absorber mounting, and is under the car. Catriona is passing him paper cups of what looks like either brake fluid, or, a slurp of red wine. But given she is sipping her own, it’s surely just another bottle of Australian Cabernet. Not that this matters a jot – the Alfa has been without brakes for days.

The Struggle for Survival… Day 8 Tariat to Uliastay

SEPTEMBER 17TH, 2010

Peking to Paris Motor Challenge update. More about the race here

Among many with problems on Day 8, Daniel Schlatter & Rabia Tarzi have a broken differntail on their Bentley

What’s the best way to end a terrible day? A row of square cubicles has been set up on a river bank, overlooking another vast open plain, and it’s here that you can snatch a hot shower. Burning logs under a large round drum heat the water and it comes out the shower head at just the right temperature. After a day of grinding over back-jarring pot-holes, deep ruts, and washaways, this has been the hardest day so far.

Max Stephenson in a Vauxhall, competing in the Pioneer Category, started his day with two broken front springs. These were fixed in the morning, Charles Bishop lending one, and the car was soon on its way. It’s been so punishing today even the La France has been in trouble – a cracked chassis and a holed radiator, but it made the camp site under its own steam.

Rachel Vestey and Susie Harvey in a Plymouth had made a good start, up to 15th in the Vintageants, but today were sticken with sheared shackle pin in their rear suspension, it was bodged up enough for them to limp on for a bit and they have yet to make camp as dinner was served… it sounds as if they are in for a long night.

Bill Bolsover in a Chevy had been up with the leaders but today hit mechanical maladies. David Rayner was performing brilliantly in the little BMW Coupe but suffered steering failure due to the rough roads this afternoon. Hugo Upton and Nigel Gambier in the Lagonda have changed the clutch thrust bearing, and there was sad news for Garry Staples Senior in the white VW Beetle who collected a 12 hour lateness penalty after mechanical problems, which dumps him right out of contention for the time being in the Classics Category – his son, however, had a great day, arriving at the final time control bang on his minute, and beaming that it had been a wonderful day, driving his VW Cabrio.

The two MG SAs from Australia took it steady today, the crews arriving totally exhausted but both cars sounded far healthier than most.

Marco Rollinger in a Bentley suffered gearbox failure, and was being towed in. Ralph Auchinshloss has had a torrid time with electrical bothers with his Rolls Royce, they came in last night with no lights. The pretty silver Tatra Coupe air-cooled V8 disappeared off the radar after a timing chain came loose, causing enough chaff to damage a big-end, but this was repaired in Ulaan Baatar and re-joined us this morning, having got to the camp at around 3.0am…. we hear however they have been in trouble again during the day.

Saddest sight of the day was the pretty little blue Renault 4CV, which was parked forlornly on a truck with the front nearside wheel missing, having suffered suspension failure again.

We have driven through some truly fantastic scenery, the sort of stuff you only see on a film set for epics such as Lord of the Rings, but for most of us, we have bigger things on our minds. Such as our quest for reaching the far side of the Moon.

The Land That Time Forgot… Day 7 Kharakorin to Tariat

SEPTEMBER 16TH, 2010

Peking to Paris Motor Challenge update. More about the race here

Chevrolet Fangio Coupe bow wave - Steve Hyde and Janet Lyne leading the Vintageant category

The landscape had regained its clear sharp colours by the time the final crews tumbled down the wooden steps of the old village hall where breakfast had been hastily served. The line up for a cauldron of hot porridge, with salads in the centre, and fried eggs and omelettes coming out of two frying-pans at the far end of the queue had started at 5.30 am.

At this time of the morning, the horizon was nothing more than a brown smudge where the far mountains join the sky, changing gradually to a purple streak as the rising sun climbs over the dark summits, presenting yet another big sky across a vast plain. Like a shoal of iron filings being pulled by a mysterious magnet, we seem compulsively drawn further and further down into Middle Earth. By the time the first car fires into life, the dusting of frost across 500 miles of grass begins to thaw.

Robert Kitchen and Alan Page in one of the mobile-workshops were bracing themselves for another hectic day. Their final job before finding their bed before midnight had been to fix two punctures. Earlier they had sorted out a small electrical fire in Car 81, Jean and Anne Stenhauser’s monster La Salle Cadillac, and rebuilt the valve-gear of the pink Chevrolet Coupe of Toby Kilner, who happened to have a spare rocker arm…just what you need when you’ve just broken one.

Highlight of today has been three river crossings. The first was a real sort-out, as it was wider, and deeper, than anything found on the original route survey due to recent freak rains. The day was shorter than the last two days at a mere 320 kilometres, and contained two Time Trials – sections timed to the second, otherwise known as Selectifs, on dirt tracks.

We continued our way down a vast wide valley fringed with mountains on either side, and ended up pitching our tents beside a large tranquil lake. The final run into camp was an appallingly rough road and it was enough for Daniel Ward’s Lancia Theta to again break a front stub-axle. We hear he has managed to find a local blacksmith to weld the two halves back together again.
Driving the Impossible

Chevrolet Fangio Coupe bow wave - Steve Hyde and Janet Lyne leading the Vintageant category

Others, however, have bigger problems. Car 101, Frank Bird from Australian in a Holden is back in Ulaan Bataar, engine parts have arrived and they hope to catch us up by Sunday. Tim Scott on the motorcycle is on a truck and hopes to meet us at the Russian border. Bruce Washington from New Zealand in a 1929 Chrysler has failed to sort the big-end problems so they hope to buy a local car and catch us up to tour the route, and Roger Allen and Maggie Gray have bought a local car through a local mining company, and also plan to play catch-up having given up on their La Salle. The Stutz of Andrew Bailey and Micky Gabbett ran out of petrol at the end of the day today, succeeded in getting a tow to the petrol station they had missed, only to find that all supplies of petrol had run out. The second Stutz of David Berks and Bob Bradfield hit one of the river crossings with just too much gusto, causing the fan to be pushed through the radiator. This becomes the second incident of a stuffed radiator caused by a fan. The Rolls Royce Phantom of George Howitt arrived at the camp site with a broken front spring and an exhaust downpipe squashed flat – Andy Actman and Ian Langford of Lenham Sportscars are grafting in a section of fresh pipe. The spring can wait, says George, until he finds a village. Leaf-spring repairs by local “trucksmith” are everywhere.

The last half of today has been down appallingly rough roads. It seems to have suited the big La France with its tractor-like tyres on big wooden wheels as it was the 10th car into the camp tonight, arriving ahead of the Porsche 356 of American Steve Harris.

Steve Hyde in the yellow Chevy needed a tow out of a river and dropped a lot of time, but made up for it by setting good times of the two Time Trials to retain his lead in the Vintageants. Michael and Anne Wilkinson in their Alvis SA are second with the Chrysler 75 of Michael Thompson and Andrew Davies in third.

Gerry Crown leads the Classic Category but Garry Staples Junior in the red VW Beetle Cabrio took some time off the Holden, and was ten minutes quicker than his dad – the white VW however arrived at the camp looking immaculate, their only problem being a missing hubcap.

Frederique Constant on the cover of WatchWorld

Frederique Constant on the cover of WatchWorld, one of the UK's leading watch magazines! Check out the article about 'The Rise of Frederique Constant'.