Half way point – 12th July 2007

We were up this morning at 4.00 a.m. and finally off at 6.00 a.m.; only to break down fifteen minutes later and have to return to the garage. I was lucky, a piece to do with the back wheel broke and an Austin Healey had exactly the spare part that I needed. It took a while for repairs and then we were off again with the last group of cars. My understanding of car mechanics has improved by about 200%! Today we have driven for 9 hours and covered a total of 600 km and we just arrived in Kemerovo at 1.00 a.m.

Two days ago we arrived in Siberia. The scenery is incredible, driving through woods, miles and miles of Birch trees with their peeling bark and silver translucent leaves, it is really very beautiful. The driving is difficult and you have to concentrate the whole time as you are driving slalom; we are on an asphalt motorway, but still there are big holes in the road which you do not see until you are upon them. The greatest hazard is the Lorries that thunder down towards you and really believe that they are the king of the road; and believe me, they are! People are fascinated by all the old cars and they too become an obstacle because they drive up very close to take photographs with one hand, whilst steering with the other. We lost a Rolls Royce that way today; an amorous Russian driver came too close to the 1920’s Rolls Royce and the driver steered off the road to avoid an accident, only to overturn, thank goodness he was going very slowly and so neither he nor his passenger were injured. The car is now being put on a trailer and will be taken the next 3000 miles where it will get fixed.

In all, we have lost six cars out of the team of 30 – two have returned to Switzerland, 2 of the lovely old Alvis have been shipped and an Alfa Romeo is now out of order for 8 days and the Rolls Royce is on the back of a trailer.

The cars are made secure every night and as in medieval days, they are lavished with great care and attention. Whenever we arrive in a Russian town or city, we are given a police escort – which serves two purposes, one it gives us some sense of security and also ensures that we go directly to the place where we are spending the night. Some of these places are not easy to recognize as “hotels”.

The accommodation has been very variable, as indeed has the food! So far, the worst stop over was in a sanatorium, the building was crumbling; everything was threadbare and, although there was a shower, there was only an intermittent supply of water, but there was wine, albeit warm! As we are now in Russia there are a lot of borsches and a great variety of beef Stroganoff. When the morale gets low, I like to cook and get the other drivers to help, we had pasta the other night – penne with chili peppers and some local cheeses – there is a very limited choice of ingredients. We will be in Moscow on the 24th and we have promised ourselves chilled Champagne and caviar – I think by then we all will have deserved every drop of it!

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