Ti Motorsport

And So To Cape Town

All good things must come to an end & so it is with the 2012 World Cup Rally. The final day & still the outright winner was in doubt. It would all be decided on the days WRC sections.

For us, it was a case of packing the car for the final time, we would miss the stage & meet up with the other crews at the final control before the run into Cape Town. So, a leisurely breakfast with the Munne's & a couple of other walking wounded crews, before setting off.

The run to Swartland, the easy way, involved miles of dead straight road, unlike the proper route, which sorted out the eventual winner. By the time we arrived at the control, the early runners had already arrived.

The mods to some of the cars on full view, some intentional, some less so, this was the second broken screen on Guys Peugeot. A few others had  the odd battle scar.Rather surprisingly there wasn't a lot of accident damage & all bar one of the starters had made it to the finish

It was a very relaxed bunch & ice cream & lolly sales took a fairly big jump.

 

 

 

 

 

The winners, by 38 seconds, were Steve Blunt & Bob Duck. Their normally aspirated Subaru just getting the better of  the Toyota Hilux of Andy Actman & Andy Elcomb, but of course you know all that.  Had Andy not stopped to tow fellow competitors earlier in the event, who knows???? 

 

                                               

 

 As for the rest of us, we were just grateful to be there.

 

 

 

 

 

 

And

 

 

 

And courtesy of the Aalderings, a list of the places we visited.

 So on time we left for the final control at the Table Bay Hotel.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The welcome was great & the sense of achievement, in view of our numerous problems was something else.

The local Peugeot Owners Club had marked out a special area for all the Peugeot finishers.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Road to Clanwilliam

Before we finally went to sleep, Richard & I had talked about our plan for the next days journey to Clanwilliam 611 kms away.

We would do the first WRC section, "Gamchab River", with Richard driving, that would take us to the border with South Africa & the final country on our epic journey.

The Ai-Ais Hot Springs Resort was quite surprising & had we have had a little longer there, or had we have arrived earlier, we could have taken advantage of the hot spring treatments on offer.

Overnight Richard had had second thoughts about the stages & after some debate, it was decided not to do the stages, instead we would take the main road route to Clanwilliam.So a leisurely breakfast, before retracing our route down to the main road. This time, my turn at the 60 k of prime African gravel. In the company of the other walking wounded we headed for the border. Once again we had the company of the Reddingtons, who had kept an eye on us in some of our more troubled times. At the fuel station before the border, we got rid of the last of our Namibian dollars. 

The border crossing was the easiest of all. As Namibia & the RSA have a customs agreement, there was no carnet requirement & the passport control was a matter of moments. We then had a one & a half K drive over the Orange River Bridge to the RSA customs. We pulled up & were told to go to the offices in order 1,2 & 3. So we walked up to the office block & there was no 1, a couple of minutes, out & into next door, office 2 & so on, so easy.

The final 100k or so out of Namibia had been semi desert & the first 100 or so in South Africa was the same, but whereas the roads in Namibia had been dead straight for mile after mile, the RSA ones swept through rock formations,  we were only about 50 k from Clanwilliam before we saw any greenery. Then all of a sudden it was intensively cultivated, with massive irrigation chanels. After a very pleasant day we arrived at the Clanwilliam Bowling Club control. We were stopping at Rally HQ, the Clanwilliam Lodge & having booked in, I checked the car over for the final time, while Richard went & tested the hotel pool. Our Evening meal had been laid on by the members of the Bowls Club.  The food was excellent & everyone was in the mood to enjoy the informal final dinner.

Tomorrow all things being equal, we would all be at journeys end in Cape Town

On The Road Again

Both Richard & I woke early, no doubt a little anxious about the Namibian courier service. After a very nice breakfast, we said goodbye to some of the other inhabitants, to return to the van Dyk workshop. While Richard & I had been relaxing, the guys had made a new thrust washer, now while we waited for the couriers, we repacked the car, ready for our latest catch up drive. Our target now, just to get to Cape Town within our due time, in order to be classified as finishers.

We were hoping to be able to leave by 12 o'clock, give or take a few minutes & really needed the bearings to arrive as scheduled at around 10 am. The package arrived on  time & it was then all systems go. The new bearings were checked & packed with heavy duty grease. As we needed to assemble everything before we could drill the stub axle to take a split pin, the drivers side was the first side to be done. The drilling took a lot longer than expected, largely due to the lack of decent drills. In the end, they had to go into town to buy some new ones.    

Our original plan was to drive to Mariental, 970 kilometres away & then catch up the following day. It was almost 12 o'clock when we finally finished & having said thanks to the guys, we headed out of Rundu.

It had been an unscheduled stop but what a great bunch of people.

We were making really good progress & at one point talked about trying to make the official overnight stop but decided to see how things were looking when we got to Mariental.

Our progress continued unabated, the road through Namibia was die straight for mile after mile after mile. We had maintained an average of 110kph, so decided to try to make the Ai Ais resort. We thought it would be a good idea to let the organisers know our new plan & as we were going to be very late, to make some arrangements about getting a room key. The text message, saying they finished serving dinner at 9.30, was a little meaningless, we had another 400k to do & it was now about 8 o'clock, so that was another meal we would miss. The road was generally excellent tarmac & only the final 60 k being gravel. Richard drew  the short straw, 60ks worth of superb African gravel, only drawback was that we were both absolutely knacked & the lights weren't quite up to picking up the crests properly.

We arrived at the security gate & as promised, our key was waiting, the guard even wanted to show us the way. I kept telling Richard to slow down, the poor guy was running alongside the car, he must have been as bushed as we were by the time we arrived at our accommodation block. It was 2.30am when we let ourselves into our room. We were due for a 9.20 start , so time for a cup of tea & a bit of shut eye.

A Night at the Kavango River Lodge

Having got as far as we could on the car, we were chauffeured to the 'in laws'. Neither Richard, nor I, had any idea what to expect & were amazed when we pitched up at the Lodge.

With lots of chalet type units, it was much bigger than I had expected. Ours had a patio, with table & chairs. From the restaurant balcony, we could look over into Angola on the right & out over the delta straight in front. We had, at some point on the trip, began drinking tea when we got in & today was  no exception.

While Richard made the tea, I started trying to spot wildlife. Perhaps a croc or maybe a hippo, possibly even the legendry Hippodile. Alas, they all kept out of sight, but we were treated to a sunset to match the brochure.

We had also been ordered to try the steaks & not wanting to upset the mechanics, we complied with orders. Without a doubt, it was the largest steak I have ever had put before me, but size, they say, isn't everything & while it was pretty good, the Zambeef  steak in Livingstone, still ranks highest. So, after a couple of beers, we turned in, fingers & toes crossed, that our bearings would turn up in the morning.

Repairs in Rundu

As promised, driver Peter & his mate from last night, turned up at 7.30 to take us back to the Mercedes compound. After some discussion about what needed doing & the best way to do it, I noticed one of the guys had started a job card. Now, I have no idea about how much a Mercedes truck dealer in Namibia charges, but I figured it would be more than Richard or I wanted to pay, so with thanks but not thanks, we got them to take us round to Jaco van Dyk's workshop, where the facilities would be free.

Having off loaded the car & got it into the workshop, it was time to try to remove the hub nut that had proved to be so much trouble yesterday. Even serious heat from the oxy/acetylene torch failed to help. Eventually, by using an air gun & levering the hub assembly from the back, we managed to get it off. As you can see, the nut & thrust washer are still together, fused in the initial failure. The thread on the stub axle, completely wrecked. That was something that we would definitely have to deal with. The inner section of the bearing had to be cut off before we could try to salvage the strut. Lots of little bits of bearing everywhere. Having left our original hubs in Nairobi [how stupid was that] we needed to source new bearings, if we couldn't salvage the thread on the stub axle, we would be into a new strut as well.

While Richard went off with the number 1 mechanic, to try to get some bearings, the other two started trying to reintroduce the concept of thread to the stub axle.

Dealing with trucks had it's advantages & when it came to salvaging our strut, their tap & die kit, which went up to some seriously large sizes, proved invaluable. We eventually settled on 18mm as being a suitable size to go for. It took a while but we managed to get a satisfactory thread. So far so good, now we just want Richard to bring home the bearing. That however wasn't about to happen. Bearings were available in Windhoek but would need to be couriered in & that would mean that we would have another unscheduled overnight stop. In view of the carnage on the drivers side, I took the other side apart in case we needed a second set of bearings. Although the other side had been correctly assembled, the bearings showed signs of damage, so two sets ordered.

Lunch was taken in the next door Wimpy Bar, not a place we see anymore in the uk but they seem to be tied in with a fuel chain in parts of Africa. It was like stepping back 20 years, same menu's etc etc

As we had had some time to spare, the air filter came in for a bit of attention as well. Gone, the coke cans & bottles in favour of ducting hose. We still needed the tank tape to seal the carburettor end. During the course of the afternoon, the boys had made arrangements for us to stay at one of their in-laws Lodge. 'You will like it' we were told '& the food is excellent.' So with nothing left to do until the new bearings arrived, we took up their offer of an early halt to work & a lift to the Lodge.

The Road to Rundu

While we were waiting for the tow truck, Richard & I continued a little list that had started a few days earlier, when mile after mile of die straight road, had led to a touch of boredom. What would we do different, if we were to do the event again. What changes would we make to the car. What different equipment would we take etc, etc, what had we forgot. The final list was surprisingly short.

Just as it started to get dark, a Toyota LandCruiser & heavy duty trailer turned up. We managed to get the car loaded before it got totally dark & before the rain, thunder & lightening, which we had seen in the distance, arrived on our doorstep.As we were about to get underway, the driver asked if we happened to have a 13mm spanner. Curious! Of course ,we had the very item. I must say my curiosity was aroused, so I dug around in the back of the car, found the spanner & handed it over. He fastened the drivers wiper blade. This boded well for the journey. Richard got to sit up front, I made my self at home in the back with the drivers mate, who had insisted that 1 of us should ride up front. With a 3+ hour journey ahead of us & not knowing what might happen when we got to journeys end, I opted for a bit more sleep.

At some point, I was woken by thunder, we had obviously met the storm that we had seen coming. Looking out of the windscreen, no, hang on, I couldn't see out of the windscreen, it was almost totally misted up. There was just a tiny little bit that the driver was looking through. No bigger than a large post card, absolutely no exaggeration. It was very scary. At that point matey got hold of a bit of rag & gave his bit of the screen a wipe before handing the rag over to Richard. Realising I was conscious, Richard explained that the demisting didn't work. Definitely time to get back to sleep & that's the way the journey continued. Rude awakening by forces unknown, amazement that we were still alive because half the time, I could see nothing through the screen. Not only because of the misting up but the rain was lashing down. You might say it was like a bit of a tropical storm. I did notice that Richard kept his side of the screen well cleared, he even handed the rag to the driver who waved it away & gave his clearing a wipe with the back of his hand. Finally we made it into Rundu & dropped the car at the company compound. The guys then took us to a local motel, which was surprisingly good & promised to pick us up in the morning & take us back to the car.

The Longest Day

Today has the longest, single day, mileage of the whole event. The journey to Tsumeb in Namibia,would not only involve a border crossing but 1042 kilometres & just 13.30 hours to complete it all.

In trouble, before we even got away, were the Sommers, the VW on the end of a tow rope, heading into Livingstone for repairs.

Having topped up with fuel & collected a couple of spare cans of brake fluid, we headed off, Richard taking the first stint. Our plan was to do 200ish K stints, so we would do our first driver change before the Zambia / Namibia border.

The border formalities, exiting Zambia, were without drama & entry into Namibia was probably one of the easiest on the whole trip.

Our brake fluid leak had gradually got worse[well it was never going to get better was it] With mile after mile of die straight road, it was not too much of an issue. Being a dual circuit system, we were relatively safe, just a little more travel when the fluid dropped & I was planning to blank the rears off altogether at the evening stop. I had resisted doing it before as the pedal feel had been almost solid when I had tried it earlier.

By now, we had covered about 500 of our 1000+kilometres.  Having left Zambia, we started to spot animals again. It was very strange, coincidence no doubt. Perhaps the Elephants knew something we didn't. At the next fuel stop, I noticed a tyre bay & we decided to change the drivers side front tyre around on the rim before the wear got too bad. As Richard wasn't happy about the brakes I took another stint.

About 4 kilometres down the road, we started to hear a squealing noise coming from the front of the car. Owain Lloyd &  Peter Scott came blasting past in the Merc, as we pulled in to investigate the noise. Our drivers side front wheel was obviously in a spot of bother. The camber was mega. Thinking that the guy hadn't fastened the wheel nuts, we got the jack out & lifted the car. Not the case. The wheel was tight on the hub, the hub however was almost fully floating.  The wheel bearing had collapsed.

 I had just started to try to strip the hub, when the Sommers pulled up, repairs to the Karmann Ghia having not taken very long. There was nothing they could do to help but they thoughtfully left us some of their water. Next to stop, Charles & Marc in the Jeep. More drinks offered & as I now knew we had major problems, the offer of their tent, was something which we took up. Somehow instead of staking the nut, whichever 'mechanic' in Nairobi had fitted the drivers side, had bent the thrust washer back to act as a tab washer. Look carefully & you can see where it is bent back to lock the nut.[1 o'clockish]

All of my attempts to free it, were to no avail.

While I had been hammering away, Richard had been on the phone & had managed to get hold of the Namibian fixer.The good news was that we had the offer of workshop facilities in Rundu.[meant nothing to me at the time, where the hell is Rundu] While I continued my vain attempts to vent my anger at what had happened, I noticed that a pick up had pulled up, nothing to do with the rally at all & Richard was talking to the driver. By now the skies had started to darken, fairly foreboding clouds, not to mention that by now, it was very late afternoon.

I had continued my banging, by now my hand was starting to throb, from the constant jarring, as was my head, a combination of noise & heat most likely. But good news. The guy that Richard was talking to had been able to arrange for a trailered tow. Absolute magic. Might be a while though, Rundu as I now learnt was a long way away. 3 + hours drive in fact. Time to give up on my futile efforts & await rescue.

It was now almost dark & although fairly certain that the tow had been arranged, there was a tiny bit of doubt, so Richard, who had been speaking to his better half, Catherine, decided that a trial erection of the tent would be a sensible move. So out of it's bag & low & behold, lots of bits BUT with instructions. It took Richard all of about half a paragraph & a look at the bits, to decide we definitely had a tow arranged & even if they didn't turn up, we would sleep in the car.

With nothing better to do, I got my head down.

 

An Evening Meal

Having 'done' the Falls, as our transatlantic cousins might say, it was time to lower the tone of the hotel grounds. Lots of the crews took the opportunity to do  washing & the trees outside our room were ideal for hanging  things out to dry.

Our pre dinner drink, by the pool was accompanied by the local band. With a couple of restaurants to choose from we were thinking about a second beer. In the end we opted to give the main one a miss, in  favour of the steak house. Charles & Marc, being American, like their steak.

The menu made a feature of their Zambeef

We had seen loads of big trucks with the Zambeef markings on their sides, so seemed like we ought to try it. The choice of sauces were the normal run of the mill, pepper [get it pepper mill] blue cheese, chilli & the intriguing "Monkey Gland" sauce. Strangely enough, we all gave that one a miss. Later on, i googled it & while containing no bits of monkey, I was glad I stuck with the chilli.

Our walk through the grounds back to our room was uneventful, just like the rest of the country, no wildlife. The main decision left before bed, clothes out of the trees, tonight or awake to find some monkey wearing them in the morning.

With a morning start time of 7.10 we all took to our beds,respectably early.

Day 24 Lusaka to Livingstone

During a very pleasant evening meal in the company of David Spurling, Nigel Gray, the Reddingtons, Max & John Bayliss with the Volvo, we learnt that Alistair Caldwell & Hayden had had their Yellowbrick stolen. They had been driving along in the traffic to get to the hotel, with the window open & someone had just reached in & taken it. I was quite surprised that someone with Alistair's experience would put himself in that position. Good job the organisers had some spares.

The trip to Livingstone & Victoria Falls was 484 kilometres & was just marked by a start & finish passage checks [Yellowbrick]. We had arrived in Lusaka with empty tanks, so first priority would be filling up at the Total station about 5k down the road. It became quite a lot more pressing, when we wrong slotted at one of the first roundabouts. Lusaka has been the cleanest major city visited so far but you only have to go a couple of streets back from the main roads, for the poorer side of life to appear. How do I know, easy, we visited quite a lot of it, trying to get back en route.

Having finally got back on track & with full tanks, we headed south. Zambia was amazingly green, the country looked really fertile, whether it is or not I don't know.

We eventually made it to Livingstone & the Zambezi Sun Hotel. First time round we were greeted with a welcome dance, by the time I made it back from the car park, the novelty seemed to have worn off.

It had however been a really nice gesture. By now Richard was getting instructions from one of the staff & having been fully briefed took us across the very nicely laid out grounds, complete with assorted metal animals, to our room. We were told that the wild varieties also roamed the grounds & to be aware. Be very aware. The room, was quite lavish, as one would expect from a very up market hotel, backing onto one of the most famous waterfalls on Earth. You could hear the Falls in the background.

The organisers had given us a schedule which allowed us plenty of time to explore & experience something truly awe inspiring.

Being residents of the hotel gave us free entry to the famous Victoria Falls, watched over by David Livingstone himself. We had passed lots of other crews, all of whom were drenched & offering advice as what was best to wear. Some said just shorts & get wet, others saying waterproof but were still soaked anyway. At least the sun was out & we would soon dry out. There is a quite narrow path which takes you towards the Falls & you are very aware of the increasing noise of the water & of the fine mist which is in the air, the closer you get the greater the noise & the wetter you start to get. Through the trees, you get your first glimpses, by now it's quite difficult to hear what your neighbouring traveller is saying, there is just such a roar from the Falls. As you walk on, by now pretty soaked you get to see their full scale.

The walk across is very wet indeed & the water stings your eyes.The picture does give some idea of the sartorial elegance of some members of our party. The rainbows came & went every few minutes & when you looked down towards the bottom of the falls  the river below was almost lost to sight in the mist & spray.

One more,'thank you' to the organisers for giving me a once in a life time chance to see something truly spectacular.

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Disturbed Night

The lack of hot water from the shower was a bit of a draw back in the 'cleanliness is next to godliness' stakes, but it did mean that I didn't feel guilty about the state of the towel when I had finished.

Our suite was about as far from reception as it was possible to get but being a nice evening, the stroll was quite pleasant. The food was good, as was the company, what wasn't so good was the arrival of very heavy rain. Perhaps, if we have another beer, the rain will have stopped. Good idea. Shame it didn't work, if anything the rain was even heavier. Needless to say, we were soaked by the time we got back to our chalet.

The light bulb, about 10 watts didn't give us enough light to fill in our diaries, head torches were the order of the night. The appearance, on my pillow, of an earwig freaked me out. Ever since I was a child, I have had a thing about them. Paranoid even. The result was a seek & destroy mission on all earwigs. Next it was a monster spider. Spiders I don't have too big a problem with but I popped the 10 watt light back on. While I was playing big game hunter, the rain had continued  to tip down & we had a terrific thunder & lightening storm. I eventually dropped off into a disturbed sleep, only to be woken minutes later by the alarm & to find a new sleeping companion.

Our rooms wildlife made up for the almost total lack of any form of animal life since we entered the country. Not just wild animals but domestic as well.

The start was predictably very wet & following last nights torrential down pour the road conditions were not good, the road itself however was very good, lacking yesterdays car swallowing potholes. Our cable tie mod to the wiper blades has worked well, we haven't lost a blade since & shortening the throw has cured the problem with the co driver blade getting stuck going beyond the screen. The road side was all small trees & bushes & very green. It was also noticeable, that we had gone back to mud huts unlike southern Tanzania where they seemed to have been using locally made clay bricks. One of the local trucks had a day to forget, luckily it didn't impede our progress.

At one of our fuel stops, we had a strange encounter. Charles Green, co driver in the Jeep, had had to remain at the fuel station, while driver Marc Buchanan went to try to find some local currency to pay for the fuel. None of the garages take credit or debit cards, some would take $US but it was generally local currency only.

 

It was Richards turn to drive to-days WRC 'Chiwala' stage. The stage was really nice, but there were some quite nasty dips for a couple of kilometres near the end. We managed to drop 12 minutes.

With todays action under our belts,there was a 140k drive to the overnight stop at the Intercontinental Hotel in Lusaka.