Preparation for 2015 PMF Motor Challenge

I’ll admit it hasn’t been easy preparing for the trip. Getting the cars ready was pretty straightforward, but arranging the itinerary (and government “guides” in some countries) and wading through the bureaucracy has been like trying to pull eels out of a bath of milk.

One reply I received was: “I saw your car, it will travel along to the Karaku Desert Darwaza? Is car kwandra? Rudder of the car left or right?”

What could I say but the car is kwandra, right rudder?

But even easy mechanical preparation can have its moments…

A few weeks before leaving, I fitted new brake pads and gave the Land Cruiser a final going-over. I drove out of the shed and there was a terrible clunking noise under brakes at low speed.

I stopped, looked under the car for 10 minutes and couldn’t see anything and finally had to take it to Haven Automotive at Kew. They have mechanics who are NRMA patrolmen and they’ve seen everything. Geoff, the boss, had a drive and said it could be the gearbox mountings! Back to their shed, on the hoist, and aha, a gearbox protect plate was quite close to the gearbox – that would be it then.

Back on the road and no, the noise is there. Geoff is still worried about the gearbox mounts.

Then, for me, a little light goes on. We stop, I go round to the back passenger door, open it, and, from under the new shelving and fittings around the fridge, I find a bottle of port…

I remembered I’d put it in for a time when it might come in handy! (along with a bottle of homemade Vodka). But some of the packing had gone, so now it was rolling around freely, banging every time I hit the brakes! Shows how strung up and nervous you are when getting close to departure time.