Some how I managed to end up in the wrong country, nice to see Germany again but I was aiming for Austria. All good now and on my way to Vienna.
The Czech Republic is beautiful and the rain was good enough to stop for the Czechout party. As countries go the Czech Republic is almost perfect, it just requires a coastline.
Great party, great people. Feeling pretty bad now. No more to say apart from the inevitable never again, at least not right now.
So I’m now in the Czech Republic. Germany, west of Frankfurt you were damp, no you were bloody wet, however to the east you put on one of the best displays of clouds and cloud types I have ever seen, multi-hued and set in a blue sky and best of all you gave me sunshine. Good work Germany I hope the rest of Europe can equal your meteorology.
The Czech Republic is so far incredibly beautiful but also pretty wet. Let it metal your heart Blighty you are not alone in all this rain.
Saturday’s Mongol Rally launch went well, I got to meet several of the teams despite the wonderfully large amount of rain and picked up my carnet de passage which I need to allow me to drive through Iran.
Along the way some interesting facts came to light, it turns out Goodwood is the only race course in the world suited to racing fish. I also learned that the number one sport in Mongolia is mud wrestling, pretty girls like to sing about horses and mobility trolleys can do 70 mph in the rain.
At sone point in the proceedings it was decided that we were never going to have quite enough rain so we might as well launch with what we already had and be thankful for it. So of we all set off in a disorderly line heading east and into the sun. I believe one car burnt out it’s clutch and did not get off the Goodwood race track, at least not in a timely fashion.
Four hundred miles and several hours later, after sleeping under the clouds just outside Aachen, it is still raining and I could not even point in the general direction of the sun. Keeping dry has become a waste of time, so I’m trying for a less wet look. I should be in Klenova tonight for the European launch and the Czechout party.
So it starts, in a wet field in west Sussex.
I’ve been running around doing last minute shopping and packing preparing to set off tomorrow to start the Mongol Rally.
So excited I could not sleep last night, the last time I felt like this I was 13 on Christmas Eve. Time slowed down for me during the last few days which have really dragged by. No doubt it will speed up again and I’ll be back home before I’ve got used to the adventure. Such is life.
Wish me luck and please sponsor me using this….
During the Mongol rally I will have with me a spot tracker. This should allow friends and family or you to see my current location, more accurately, where I have been for the last seven days.
The tracker relies on batteries and a clear view of the appropriate GPS and messaging satellites, given these it should work. Click on the following link to see my location.
Alternatively you can look at The Adventurists team tracking site. This should also work well but relies on me sending SMS messages updating my position. This will only happen if I remember and will require a mobile network. These are both things that can not be wholly relied on but if the tracker is not working then this should serve as a fallback.
Note: These go live on the 14th of July.
A Folly?
Pointless folly? Not if you make a donation to charity. Please donate as much as you can at this……..
In the ancient heart of the Pamir there is an even more ancient secret, a hidden valley, the location of which was forgotten long before its recall, such is its mystery. Those who inhabit this valley are said to be blessed with eternal life and happiness, never have they known fear or want.
We have all heard stories of this secret place, the Greeks called it Atlantis, in the Bible it is Eden others have called it Utopia or Shangri-La. Kubla Khan who knew it as Xanadu may have been the last to give it a name and know its location.
After years of searching out and reading ancient manuscripts, many of which are but fragments written in ancient and forgotten tongues and many more years pawing over maps and satellite data I now know the location of this mysterious valley and its true name.
In August of this very year I intend to mount an expedition to this mythic place, this paradise, this Boogie Wonderland.
Here, built from the three most basic of elements Earth, Wind and Fire you can see for yourself this amazing place brought to life through the medium music.
Preparations for the rally are coming along well.
I came across this on the internet while researching the Pamir. It is a very common legend that I have heard several times and each time it has been about a different country. I have even used it myself to refer to my home county of Cumbria. All the same I like it and who knows it may have originated in the Pamir.
When God created the world, he asked all the people to form a line so that he could distribute the lands of the earth to them.
Now everyone knows that the Pamiri is not big, he is very polite and does not use his elbows. So the Pamiri representative found himself at the end of the line.
When it was his turn, God looked surprised: “It seems I miscalculated,” he said. “I don’t have any land left for you.”
The Pamiri began to cry – and everyone knows that when a Pamiri cries, even God cries too.
God put his arm around the Pamiri. “It was my fault,” he said. “Actually, I do have one little piece of land left that I was going to keep for myself as my garden. But since I made such a foolish mistake I will give it to you. It is called Badakhshan.”
I also very much like this one.
When God created man, he gave him a life of thirty years. Man was not happy with this and complained to God.
God replied that He had already allocated life to all living beings – to give man a longer life He would have to take years from the life of other animals. Man insisted.
So God gave man ten more years from the donkey, ten from the dog and ten from the monkey.
That is why man lives without care until thirty; then he begins to work like a donkey; after ten more years he starts to fight like a dog; and his last ten years are spent playing games with his grandchildren.
They just keep on coming.
When God created the world, he did not make a monkey. The monkey came about in this way:
In the first days of the world, a woman had baked a flat loaf of bread. Just then a poor man knocked at her door. She let him in but did not want to share her bread with him and so she sat on it. After a while the poor man left.
When the woman got up the flat bread stuck to her and she had been changed into a monkey because of her meanness. Since then the bottom of the monkey looks like a flat loaf.
And…
Luqman-i Hakim was a wise man who had a reputation as a healer. One day a man complained to him of a headache. Luqman-i Hakim told him it was the result of old age.
Another man complained of a pain in his legs. Luqman-i Hakim again answered, that it is caused by old age.
Yet another started to tell Luqman-i Hakim about a pain in his stomach. Again, the diagnosis was old age. The man became angry with Luqman-i Hakim and told him his advice was useless and he was a fool.
Luqman-i Hakim answered him: “If you were not an old man you would not speak these words.”
Credit to Robert Middleton http://www.pamirs.org
