Done, ciao Napoli

We have almost reached the end of our adventure. Maureen has been handed over to the people who will put her out to grass...

Goldie is being good waiting for his first trip on an aeroplane. Time for a beer I think..

Its been great.  

Maureen

She did us proud, over 2100 miles on just over £200 of fuel.

Now for the things that really could have caused issues but we went with it anyway.....

• Tracking was out causing wheel judder at 50+mph.
• Wheel judder loosened something behind the steering wheel which caused more steering wheel judder.
• Electric windows had a mind of their own and would do some random things.
• Shocker bump stops left the car somewhere on route so the back end clunked on bumps (so all of Italy).
• Something was loose on the back end and made some odd noises on sharp corners.
• Brakes squeeked.
• Turbo was none existent.
• Steering was occasionally a bit "interesting" the car wondered on the road.
• For the last day when locking the car the suspension decided what it's ride height would be, sometimes up at the front sometimes the back.... 

But that said she started, drove(ish) and got us to the finish and the airport.

I'd like to say she'll be sadly missed but the reality is it's time she got scrapped. A real banger for a banger challenge.

An early start

Not for any other reason than nature called after a night with a couple of beers...

Heading down to Pompei today for the official rally finish, via Rome and Mount Versuvious.

Rome was great went to the collosium on a park and ride

Then to Basilica s Paulo which was not on the places to visit but sounded interesting, the basilica was a great place off and the stop was nice. You can see where the churches money went over the years...

And Mike insisted we check out the world renouned McDonalds to sample the double cheeseburger which he can happily report to be just like the English one but with better tomato sauce.

Day 6 questions

Hope everyone's having some fun with these questions? Anyway here's day 6's quiz sheet.

Made it to Pisa

So we parked on the outskirts of Pisa and decided to have a walk into the walled area around the tower.

It's a fantastic sight and has a significant lean

The building behind the tower is equally magnificent.

Day 5 questions

Thanks for the support on the questions, it's very much appreciated. Here are today's brain teasers...

Day 5

A slower day today with only 235km to do to a place on the edge of the sea called Porto Stefano.

The day started early with a trip to a local go karting place which was fun.

The weather suggests there's a huge storm due to hit Florence so we are heading through it down to Pisa which should be better weather..

Mike's decided we are experiencing rural Italy by not using any toll roads or motorways, so we are mingling with the locals....

The thing sounded like it was flat out And struggling to get above 15kph... Maybe it's next year's banger???

Rural roads are a little more "rustic" so the suspension which is knocking more than it did before is getting a workout.

Oh and driving is fine, indicators and speed limits are seemingly unnecessary and people mingle on roadabouts, why have 2 lanes when you can just about fit 3...

Alps, Italy, motorway prices

Set off this morning at about 8, obligatory croissants from the first boulangerie we found.  Made our way round lake Geneva and into Switzerland. €40 for a road tax sticker and into the mountains.. 

Poor Maureen, 2200 metre climb to the top of the St Bernard pass, most of the climb in first or second gear, but she made it, a bit hot, a bit of a weep at the top, but cool enough in 20 minutes to top the radiator up. 

The view from the top is spectacular, the weather was perfect, warm sun, still and the air chilly and clear.  We stopped for a bit. Coffee and a moment to absorb the majestic beauty. Its truly fabulous. 

The procession of the ralliers down into Italy has been filmed for a documentary program that will be shown on Netflix, 40 or so of the cars made it to the top, some showing signs if the strain of getting to the top, some lost gears, some like us bolied, others were smoking badly, but the good humour and cheerfulness of our fellow rally goers was a testament to the enjoyment we had all has getting to the top. The road is worth travelling, I'm going to come back and do it again for sure.

The descent went on for a long time, when we made it to the motorway, the road still kept on down hill. 

Now, just past Milan, the motorways are busier than any we have encountered up to now, and the costs of using them is astronomic. €26 for 150k or thereabouts. 

Goldie made some friends, and enjoyed the scenery too. 

Fortunately we had brought our sofa with us so we could amire the view. 

Day 4 questions

Thanks for the assistance yesterday, we are getting into the swing of this bloggin malarkey, now we can post pictures it makes life a little easier.

Let's see if we can get these today :)

Thank you.

Day 3 questions

You may have seen we are now able to publish pictures via a different blogging app. So here are all of today's questions.

Thanks

Day 3 is well underway

Started out striking camp and getting on the road for 8am to get to the edge of Lake Geneva, we had a stop at sens to have a look around the fantastic cathedral 

and then on to Dijon with the guide dog for lunch...

Now we are heading down the A39 for Geneva.

Made it..

Day2, a long drive and didn't get to Paris.

Pizzas are good though. 

We dud get to Le Mans and drive along the public road section for a bit, at about 40mph.  

An accident an route (not us) delayed us sufficiently to miss our challenges in Paris, we arrived at the campsite in time to get the tent up in the dry and in the light. 

Pizza'd and beering up. 

Long day. Lovely bits of rural France, lots of motorway and infernal tolls.  

 

Marathon day 2 640km done

Well that was a monster day to start the rally, 640+km from Roscoff to the east side of Paris.

Tents up and food for the evening has been ordered. 9 hours on the road was a chore today with another tough day of similar distance tomorrow with passports required the destination has been set as Geneva...

Maureen is struggling on the inclines and has a rattle from behind the steering wheel (it's not effecting the ability to steer and it comes and goes so b'reet).

It will be interesting tomorrow and we've been told it's an easier time when we get to Italy, so an early start in the morning and another long day but with the view it gets easier if we can make it through tomorrow.

There has already been a couple of cars that have packed up, so let's see if we can make it to the end.

Fingers crossed.....

Day 2 questions

A bit late today on this but never mind only 2 questions we didn't get.

Which language has declined from more than a million speakers in the 1950's, to about 200,000 in the first decade of the 21st century?

What type of structure lies directly behind Camping Iris Parc Le Chene Gris?

If the boats a rockin.....

It's a choppy night on the channel crossing!

It started with a departure from Plymouth on-time at 10pm which was good.

After meeting in the main bar (obligatory pint or 4) we handed in our quiz sheet answers for day 1 to Mark (our toga wearing team controller) picked up our questions for day 2 mingled a little by greeting everyone who wandered past with an "ey-up".....

Then retired to a very dark cabin complete with bunk beds in rolling seas for a pitchy and rolly night waiting for Mike to fall out which he managed not to do thankfully.

Anyway it's early morning and unless the captain was pointing in the wrong direction we should be close to Roscoff to start towards our destination for day 2 of Paris.

So another 400 mile day today with questions which will be in a separate post.

Wish us luck...

Day 1 questions

So we have day 1's questions. Some of which only we would be able to find out. However there are some we could do with help with.

Answers in the comments please :)

Mevagissey was used as a film set in 2015 for which British film?

What is the altitude drop of Goliath falls (meters)?

Who granted Callington a market charter in 1267?

Which royal is the railway bridge across the Tamar named after?

Oh bloody hell!

We're off

Pompei or bust

One day to go!

Yesterday, Maureen was topped up with diesel, had new wiper blades fitted and the last few accessories, breathalyzers, red triangles etc. chucked into the boot. We're as ready as we can be, 3/4 of a nights sleep remaining.

A Whatsaspp group has been set up by the rally organisers for our team, cars 60 to 80 and we've started chatting to our fellow ralliers. It's getting rather exciting.

We set off at about 5am tomorrow morning, 28th Sept and we have a 300+ mile journey to St Austell where we will be registered and inspected.

The suspension leak hasn't got worse.

We can now see out of the windscreen when it rains.

Our Guide Dogs mascot is sitting on the parcel shelf looking out on a receding world.

Our bale of straw is in one piece on the back seat.

What can possibly go wrong?

#PompeiOrBust

Guide dogs came in to town....

They truly are a talented bunch of dogs the guide dogs, they came in to work to see us before we set off in just over a week (scary)....

The whole office really enjoyed the visit yesterday getting to talk to the fantastic team that support the charity, with dogs in all stages from the 10 month old pup to the 11 year old retiree.

Guess the weight of the cake

So with some fundraising done the next piece is a cake donated to us to do a guess the weight with.

This is a fantastic traditional Christmas cake that goes well with a cheese of choice.

I'll update this when the lucky winner is drawn with the total raised for this.

Fund Raising - Whippets fer t'blind

Phil and I aren't only doing the is for fun, oh no..

We are raising money for the fabulous Guide Dogs charity.

If you'd like to chip in you can donate at the following link - thanks.

https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/brc2019

A starting point....

So i'll start by saying.... a blog, what the bejesus do you write!!!

The view was to start to blog about our banger rally challenge to keep people who may or may not be interested in following where we are at the end of September, to keep a track on the things we get up to and to help to raise a few quid for the guide dogs if we can...

So myself and my work colleague Mike who is a very interesting guy (he used to work with the BBC as a sound engineer among other stuff) decided we wanted to try and compete in the rally this year and signed up in April with the team name "God's own c'ntry".

So what is the rally all about and why did we choose to do it?

The banger rally challenge is getting a relatively unsuitable car from Cornwall to a destination somewhere in a week. This year the organizers have chosen the sunny Italian destination of Pompei in the aptly named "Pompei or bust" www.bangerrallychallenge.co.uk

The cars value when purchased is to be less than £500 and have a valid MOT, thats about it for car rules...

So we found a few weeks ago now a Citroen C5 on autotrader from a private seller in Bradford. It looked clean and didn't squeak too much (yet) so we put up £440 and bought the blue chariot which Mike has named "Maureen".....

So as a boring blue armchair we didn't feel it had quite enough character to complete in the rally and so we set about with some Halfords paint rattle cans and a desire to produce a work of art Joseph would have been proud to wear...

The whole thing wouldn't have been complete without a huge Yorkshire rose (and a plethora of other stickers) complete with flat caps this is due to be our entry into this years challenge.