Helping the Foundation

Meeting remote farmers.

Although a little bit out of our normal operating area The Up and Under rally team assisted the Foundation by delivering a box full of sports kit to younsters in the Missor area of Morocco. The kit was passed on to Mr Baroudi a prominent figure in the area for distribution to those youngsters most likely to benefit. Kit was donated by the South Cheshire Harriers, Crewe Alex, Up and Under Staff and supporters of the Foundation.

Kids always like new stuff.

Handing over kit in Missor

Mr Baroudi, Andy and Rainer (rally organiser)

The finish - at last!

Shrek

Link to a vid of shrek doing what he is designed to do ;o)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xyZvW5m0RRU&feature=related
Fruit

Tuareg Rally 1st 5 days

After the usual chaos of the boat crossing we were in Africa. Nador is really very similar to a scruffy southern European town gone to seed.


We got our time cards and set off The stage added up to about 400km ending in Missor. It was a mix of navigation stages, where you have a time limit to get to the end, a special, where you are timed, and road sections. The terrain in N morocco is rough and it is an opportunity to find out what is loose on your car, fortunately we went through ok. The final special was cancelled due to a flodded river.


In the evening we handed over a rally box full of trainers to the locals along with a couple of footballs and some sport kit. This will no doubt find good homes amongst the local younsters. If you are passing through look out for the kids in Crewe Alex and Nantwich Town kit

During the night, as we slept in our tent with 20 bikers, the river did its stuff on the local bridge leaving us with the choice of a swim across or a long diversion to reach the days first special stage.

The bridge problems meant that we were 3 hours delayed, the end cut off time to start the final special was moved back by 5 minutes so it was 'get your skates on' time. The first special went well with no dramas. The following nav stage was really rough 50km of tracks that made Cheshire roads look like silk. at the end of the Nav stage we had 1 hour to cover 100km, on road, but with many villages where we had to slow down to 60 or less. If we missed the start of  the special we would get a 2 hour penalty, It was a bit of a rush but we made it with 3 minutes to spare thus being one of only 2 cars to get through. This put us nicely in 1st place as we reached Merzouga.

Stage 3 "Three Ergs", all special for 170km. This was a mixed stage that required raising and lowering of tyre pressures at regular intervals. By now the temperature was feeling more desert than at the much higher Missor and running about in race suits soon got the sweat going.


Another straight forword stage, but wierdly we found a mobile phone lying on a dune in the middle of nowhere. Still in first place and cruising.

The King Stage and for us a day of drama. On this stage we went into the big dunes of Erg Chebbi and they are massive. 2km from the start we crested a dune to find a motorcyclist who had obviously had a big one. We stopped with a couple of others and did all the emergency stuff, marking the location on GPS, calling assistance and rendering first aid. We later found out he was Italian had hurt his back and wouldn't lie still. They don't teach you restraint techniques on any first aid course I haver ever been on. He wanted to move about and we had quite a job keeping him still meanwhile Lorna directed traffic at the top of the dune.

Eventually doctors arrived and we assisted them, the final diagnosis being broken ribs anbd a splattered nose. After pushing the doctor's car we set off again, dead last.

After about 10km we crested a dune and missed a camel by about a metre, lucky break for both of us!


After about 30km, of what is undoubtable buttock clenching driving, I took a left or right decision at the top of a dune, one of thousands, but this one was to end with a bump.


Directly in front of me was a 10 foot wide clump of camel grass, believe me you would rather hit a camel than this stuff, I avoided it to the left before seing, emerging behind it, some rocks so further right I traversed. Traversing is fun on a crag, but in dunes it is one step away from a crash. The downhill wheels dig in and it is easy to roll, As we reached the foot of the dune the car did just that. Slowly and gently, lay down on its right side.

So began a long day in the desert. It was mid day and too hot to dig, so we built a tent and waited. We got word to the Orga but knew they would be busy and we weren't a medical emergency. It was very calm at the bottom of our dune and we napped between waving OK to passing vehicles.

At about 4.30 it was cool enough to dig and dig we did until about 7pm. A collection of bikers from the orga arrive armed with shovels and lashings of good cheer. We did lots of things with jacks that went against HSE guidance, but after 3 hours of graft the car was righted with startlingly little dammage. A quick check over and a fantastic sunset drive out of the dunes flat out to avoid being stuck in the dark. We slept well that night. Overall it was a disappointment to loose 1st place but we had come out of it pretty well.

Friday brought us to the dune race. A mad flat out race around the Big dune at Erg Chebbi. 18km laps, 2 for us 4 for the pros as fast as you dare. This was where we had our now infamous flip and we didn't want any disaters this time. Except for shedding a tyre half way through and having a tough landing or two it was pretty starightforward. Oh and the wing fell off partly caused by yesterdays events and added to by today's.

We have been kept running by a great crew from Rally Raid, headed by Chris who trys to keep Pally and Ian under control. What these guys achieve is incredible. Another Warrior, driven by Izhar, had a big roll and looked quite a wreck on the King Stage, 24 hours later it is ready to race again.

After all these events we were placed third in class. Hopefully we can hold onto this until Spain but time will tell.
Fruit

The mists of time?

It was back in summer 2006 when Fruit first started talking about doing the Tuareg rally. I wasn't against the idea, but was rather more cautious and wanted to 'try things out' first. So, it was agreed that we would do a trip to Morocco over Xmas and New Year. Plan A was to join a group, plan B was to go it alone. Plan B won out.

At this point we had never driven a 4x4, let alone owned one, so the first job was to go shopping. We plumped for a Land Rover Defender 90 - one, because it looked the part and two, because there was one for sale just up the road. Enter the Rat stage left.

A short wheel base probably wasn't the brightest choice as we planned to turn it into a camper and Fruit is 6 foot 3, fortunately I am only 5 foot 4. So with the seats folded forward, the creation of a cunning sleeping platform, Fruit sleeping diagonally and me filling in the gap at the side it kinda worked.

We bought the Rat in October and after a few off-road lessons courtesy of Jim at Explore Off-Road (http://www.exploreoffroad.co.uk/) and some camper van conversion work we set off to Morocco via Spain.

26 days and counting

26 days until the start of the race - unfortunately its more like 23 days until Fruit leaves to drive to Spain ....

We started the new car, for now lovingly termed the 'Duck' (for reasons which may become apparent) in September 2008, when we got a Land Rover Discovery to act as the base vehicle. We then went away for a month to Libya in the Rat, which we had rapidly converted from desert racer to desert camper, on the Libya Rally Raid pre-tour (http://www.libya-rally-raid.org/-raid.org/). So nothing much happened until November.





After a bit of a incident in our last Tuareg, when we unexpectedly ended up upside down, we decided that an integral roll cage would be a really good idea and so with some egging on from BD and Paul Round at Rally Raid International 'the Duck' was born.

Fruit, while undetered by most things, doesn't actually know a great deal about cars (other than how to drive one) so he is on a steep learning curve. The Duck is currently being wired and the lights were switched on for the first time yesterday.

We have taken the rally seats from the Rat, but Fruit may be looking at a new one as it is a bit of a squeeze in the cab and, lets face it, any excuse for shopping (it's not a female preserve you know - its just that blokes buy different things).