The launch was pretty good with lots of cars to see and people wandering around. There were also some Mongolian wrestlers and a few acrobats and the like.

This is also where we came across "Mishka". A barbie doll dressed up as a Russian princess who was being carried around by a full-sized Russian princess in very similar clothes.

The full-sized version was so impressed with our bantering skills that just as we rolled out toward the parade lap she presented us with Mini-Mishka. Who, along with Golden Barney, became our Rally mascot.

We did a painfully slow parade lap of Goodwood and then hit the open road.

We took the 17:20 train through the channel tunnel and half-an-hour later we were in Europe.

Conveniently my parents live in Germany so we drove straight there arriving just after midnight.

Total so far - 445 miles

We made short work of all that and then sat down for some lunch and to watch MotoGP.

We left at 15:20 for the Nurburgring where we knew a lot of teams were going to attempt some laps. On arriving unfortunately we were told our Roof-rack would have to come off. Seeing as how it was bolted through the roof of the car this was simply too much effort for the track time remaining so we decided to just spectate for a while instead.

17:45 and we're heading away from the 'ring and toward the Czech Republic for the party on the 20th.

23:00 We camped at some services 20km before Amberg. By the end of the night there were 15 teams there and the place looked like a mini-Glastonbury.

We also managed to blag a box of food from Team "The Unprofessionals" who were trying to lighten their load as their car was only 4 inches from the ground!

Total so far - 758 miles

We arrived at 13:00 and the field was pretty empty so we got a good pitch and spent the afternoon drinking cheap Czech beer and playing bizarre games (Binocular croquet for example) with a trio of spandex clad girls hired by the Adventurists as entertainers.

Other teams rolled in during the day including Team The Jersey Boys who had run into the back of a car just outside the Goodwood campsite the night before the launch and instantly made themselves Rally legends.

As the day wore on we put together a game of cricket and the far more amusing Car-Tug-of-War. Which saw our Skoda up again the Corsa of Team I Mongl'd Ya Mum. They had the advantage of going downhill and so technically won the event. However their car went on to break down repeatedly and although they made it to Mongolia they only got to the first drop-off point and had to hitch a lift in another Rally car to the finish line. Ergo, we win by default.

The party in the castle kicked off around 19:00 and Tom and I went dressed as British soldiers from the Rourke's Drift era.

To be honest the party was pretty lame and a complete sausage-fest. It would have been a better idea to just skip it and have had a night out in Prague instead.

Total so far - 878 miles

Prague was the usual good night out that saw us get back to the Hostel at 5am.

Total so far - 967 miles

Total so far - 1,305 miles

We left in the early evening hoping to see Monument Park on the way out. Monument Park is where they put all the old soviet statues etc.

However we didn't manage to find it so just headed on our way to Romania.

Not a great introduction to Romania as I was accosted by windscreen "cleaning" gypsies while Tom's was away trying to buy road tax.

Having decided we didn't like Romania we set about trying to drive across it as fast as possible. But not as fast as the psychotic Romanian drivers who think nothing of overtaking uphill, round a blind corner.

We ended up camping in a random field just off the road at 3:45am.

In other news, the marshmallows that I'd bought in Germany for toasting at a much later date had melted due to sitting on the car's parcel-shelf and had turned into a single giant block of marshmallow.

Total so far - 1,620 miles

After a nice mountain road we found our way to a lake near Kazanluk and setup camp for the night.

The candles we had for camping had begun to melt in the car so from then on we kept them in the cool-box. I also modified my tent by cutting off the porch which meant I only needed two poles instead of three and less pegs. Thus speeding up my tent pitching a good deal.

Total so far - 2,032 miles

Thanks to Team "The Unprofessionals" we had the name and phone number of a Hostel in the SultanAhmet area of Istanbul. We got ourselves within striking range and then Tom got in a cab and I followed behind in the car. Even after two phone calls (on my phone I should add) the Taxi driver couldn't find the place but assured us it was "around here somewhere".

Another phone call to the Hostel and we found it and got parked up on the street outside.

We set about looking for a barbers to have a haircut and shave. One restaurant maître-de didn't take too kindly to me not wanting his "boy" to show us where a barbers was (and thereby bump up the cost for us so he could be given his cut) and promptly told me to go F... myself.

We founds a barber a few minutes later and had a very good cut and shave complete with ear-hairs burnt off with a cigarette lighter. Wasn't expecting that!

A night out ensued which saw us getting back to the hostel around 3am.

Total so far - 2,313 miles

For a while there we were thinking we would have to somehow cross 8 lanes of incoming traffic before filtering the traffic going back across the bridge. Probably a good job we didn't have to do that.

After that we managed to miss our turning (due to the fact that we didn't have a map of this part of Turkey) and ended up doing a loop of Ankara before a couple of Dutch cyclists we met in a petrol station put us on the right track.

We began to head for the town of Samsun and the black sea coast. We also had to sacrifice one of the car's under-lights in order to use it's cigarette socket plug to graft onto the power cord of the cool-box as I'd run over the cool-box plug with the passenger seat.

We also saw our first wedding parade. This is where a load of cars driven by boy racers deck themselves out with bows etc and drive around with hazard-lights on, horns blaring and generally making a nuisance of themselves.

We camped at 10pm a hundred metres off the road. We had some concerns over a "mob" that seemed to be gathering on the opposite side of the road from us but were relieved when a bus stopped and they all got on :-)

Total so far - 2,719 miles

At 4pm we found the Anka Otel on the black sea coast. It seemed to be in the process of being renovated but we managed to get a room and then go for a swim in the sea. I guess the black sand has something to do with the black sea being called the black sea?

The evening got a little weird when the owner invited us to join him inside where there was some sort of party going on. We still haven't figured out what it was all about. There was a singer, a couple of girls who's birthday it might have been, an older couple who may have been celebrating their wedding anniversary and a table of girls who may have been hookers.

Like I said, Weird.

Total so far - 3,107 miles

Fiona and Karl of Team Khangas Khan were waiting for us in the Otel car-park when we got up and after a bit of England/Aussie banter we headed for the Georgian border.

The border crossing was uneventful and only took a couple of hours.

We stopped at a cafe just after the border where the old woman working there pointed out that I was wearing a Hammer & Sickle T-shirt. Oops! Cue me nipping out to the car for a quick change.

Early evening and we were all in a hotel in Kutaisi. A place I remember nothing about.

Total so far - 3,352

The border was a breeze and only cost us $25. (People at the southern border were getting charged $70). The only hold up at the border was a power cut that meant the computers weren't working so we had to wait for the power to come back on to get us registered and be on our way.

We were in a hotel by 8pm but I forget the name of the town.

Total so far - 3,637 miles

We had been in touch with Fiona/Karl who were on the ferry and informed us it would be leaving at 5pm, 6pm, 9pm or tomorrow. The race was on.

At this point we were making our way through about 200kms of roadworks. This essentially meant driving offroad next to the road under construction and then having the odd brief dash on a new bit of road before heading off the side again.

Using Fiona/Karl's directions we flew through Baku and into the ferry office. There were a few teams already outside the office, but they were having to sort out letters of introduction to Turkmenistan that we already had, so we went straight to the ticket buying process. And this is where things started going wrong and didn't get any better until two and half days later.

The car was $50 per metre, each person was around $100 and then there was a $40 stamping a-bit-of-paper fee. $440 to get on the ferry!

After a few customs checks and a variety of paperwork we physically made it onto the ferry. Relieved as we had no idea when the next one would be. (There had been rumours of 4 days to a week between ferries).

We had a cabin on the ferry. It looked like someone had died in there and then been left to decompose as well.

We met up with Fiona/Karl and cooked up a meal together on the top deck along with about another 10 Rally teams.

The ferry left port at 9.30pm and then stayed at anchorage until 1am when it started to sail.

Total so far - 3,883 miles

We were parked up just outside of the Turkmenbashi port waiting on a pilot. The ferry ran out of water, soft drinks, beer and ultimately food.

Total so far - 3,883 miles

The crux of the problem seemed to be that a few pages of the list of names supplied by the Adventurists to the Turkmen authorities, detailing who was coming into their country, were missing.

Around 6pm (we got off the ferry at midday) things started to happen and the Authorities relieved us of $144 for the car, $95 per person and $12 to open the gate out of the place. (So far this ferry escapade has cost us $786 stat fans).

After bouncing around the customs office from post to post we had our paperwork done and were allowing into the country.

After about a minute of driving freely in Turkmenistan a car overtook us and pulled over forcing us to stop. It turned out to be a couple of guys from customs control at the port. They asked for our paperwork and took a copy-sheet off one of the many pieces. They must have forgotten about while we were in their office. Then they wheel-span their way off into the night to track down everyone else who had just gone through.

We did a bit of shopping in Turkmenbashi and managed to mistakenly buy a 6 pack of fizzy water. This was a mistake that would be made repeatedly by ourselves and every other Rally team.

Just after midnight we met up with Fiona/Karl and camped by the side of the road.

Fiona/Karl gave us a map to stick on the car. This proved very useful indeed as an aid to explain to people what exactly we were doing. Border guards for example.

Total so far - 3,989 miles

A pretty straight forward drive to Ashgabat stopping for fuel and to put some spare fuel into the Jerry can on the roof. Petrol is cheap in Turkmenistan. We got 50 litres for around $12.

The whole of Turkmenistan is a pretty weird place but Ashgabat is the icing on the cake. That icing takes the form of a 20m gold statue of the leader that rotates to follow the sun.

Add to this a city centre where every building is made of marble (or at least marble tiles) and Ashgabat is certainly a city that you remember. Bizarrely enough I don't have any photos of any of it. You'll just have to use your imagination.

After a lunch of the every present Shashlik (Kebab) we set about trying to find a hotel. We followed our standard procedure of driving randomly around the city looking for inspiration. After coming across a couple of full hotels we saw the pink truck of Team "The Rolling Cones". We pulled up next to them (as did another 3 rally teams incredibly) and swapped notes.

A nearby 5-star hotel suggested a hotel the other side of town and leaving the Cones behind (they had other plans) we drove to the hotel and got a room.

We did some laundry and had a swim in the pool. At least Tom did. When he emerged covered in some kind of slime I passed on the whole swimming thing.

We went to a cafe over the road for dinner with CraigDavid of Team "Knight Micra" (We were to meet them at various points as the Rally unfolded).

Shashlik again, that had to be ordered by miming the animal you were wanting to eat and then we went to the hotel disco until the small hours.

Total so far - 4,270 miles

"You on Mongol Rally?"
"Yes."
"Interview. Tomorrow. 10am."
"Err...Ok."

So at 10am, duly hungover, we went down to reception for our interview. The aforementioned Russian-looking chap and his incredibly hot translator appeared and we sat down on a couch in reception for an hour long interview.

I should explain that Turkmenistan is basically a police state and all top-end hotel rooms are bugged etc. Because of this we can't be entirely sure if we were interviewed by the press after a human interest story or the secret police wanting to find out more information about the aims of this "Rally" that comes through their country each year.

Interview finished we had some lunch and then hit the road around 1pm. The previous days washing hadn't dried by the time we left so we drove a couple of hours and then pulled over by a bus stop to begin "Operation Drying". 45 minutes later everything was dry and we were on our way again.

Around 10pm we stared looking for a place to camp. Whilst cruising along a road still under construction we hit a mini sand dune and the car promptly got stuck.

We broke out the shovel and the sand mats (door mats) and spent about 30 minutes digging the car out. In the process we managed to split the exhaust in half. Seeing as it was late and pitch black we decided to camp right there. I was sleeping in the car and it soon became apparent that I had a choice between having the windows open and being eaten alive by mosquitoes or have the windows shut and be cooked alive in the 36c car.

I started with the windows down but with the constant mozzies I had to roll them up and then spend the rest of the night hunting down the flying nightmares that were now trapped in the car with me. I got five out of six.

Total so far - 4,553 miles

We stopped at Lebap market for a look around. In the end we bought a pasta sieve, a foot pump, a long-sleeved (anti-mosquito) shirt and a coat hanger (to replace some of the hangers on the exhaust).

We had lunch near what we thought was the border with Uzbekistan and upon leaving the cafe we somehow now had a taxi leading to where we needed to go. We followed expecting to have to pay something to the taxi driver (still not entirely sure where he appeared from) but he then pulled over and waved us on and told us to take the next left.

We turned left and now there was some random lada in front of us gesturing to follow him (secret police again no doubt). We followed the lada through the backstreets until we came to a checkpoint and a floating bridge.

He waved us on and we stopped at the checkpoint, did the paperwork thing, paid about $20 for something or other and then crossed the floating bridge.

And when we got to the other side we were in....Turkmenistan still. Hmmm. Turns out it took us another hour to find the border. Everyone in Turkmenistan seemed to know where we needed to go. It's like they all got a letter form the leader saying "The rally is coming through again. If you see any crazy looking cars point them towards the nearest border."

Getting out of Turkmenistan was a lot easier than getting in and entry to Uzbekistan was totally free for us (except for the visa we already had) and the car.

We drove on to Samarkand, unfortunately arriving there at night and on independence day so a lot of the roads were closed. Our standard practice of random driving looking for a hotel wasn't paying off and we were about to head out of town and look for somewhere to camp when a car pulled us over and offered to take us to his fathers hotel. We followed and ended up in a very the nice B&B Bahodir with the car actually parked inside the building.

Turns out this place was actually in "The Lonely Planet" guidebook (that we didn't have) and had hosted a variety of Rally teams this year and in previous years.

Total so far - 4,937 miles

With the help of the son of the B&B owner we took the car to a local mechanic where we left it for about 5 hours while we had a walk around town.

When we got the car back it was looking a lot better and all for 130,000 Sums. About $73.

A couple of danish teams arrived at the B&B. Much hilarity ensued.

Total so far - 4,944 miles

The exhaust fell apart again so we took the decision to go visit a mechanic. We found one in some backwater town and within 10 minutes the exhaust was welded up. As a bonus the guy didn't want any money he just wanted some photos taken with us. As is usual in these situations when you arrive there are only a couple of people there but when you leave the place is packed with yokels.

The idea today was to take the southern road through Uzbekistan to the border with Kyrgyzstan. We tried as best we could but kept running into Police blockades. We got through them all but eventually reached a gate we weren't allowed through. Turned out we were right on the border with Tajikistan and travel around there was restricted.

So we headed back the way we had come and after what was essentially a two hour sightseeing tour we were back on the main road to Tashkent.

More driving ensued until about 8pm when we stopped at a roadside market. This is where we met "Jonny" and this is where things started getting weird again.

Jonny speaks no English. We speak no Uzbeki. Somehow we came to the conclusion that he lived just down the road and we could stay for the night.

We start following Jonny and family's car. We look at the map. We realise his place is actually about 3 hours drive away. Hmmmm.

After a couple of hours Jonny pulls over by a gas station and has a conflab with the attendant, who it turns out speaks some English. The decision is made that we will stay at the gas station for the night while Jonny and family head home. Then, the next day, drive the final hour or so to Jonny's town and call him. (Remember, he speaks no English).

So we end up spending the evening in a gas station with Igor and his co-worker. These guys are the night-shift attendants and give us the use of the sleeping room in the gas station.

Total so far - 5,328 miles

Igor got a call from Jonny that he was ready for us, so off we went. 74 miles later we were in Fargana and parked up near the sports stadium.

Now we had a problem. How do you have a phone conversation between two people with no common language? The solution was obvious. You talk to the first people you see on the street. Who turned out to be the 3-piece Russian metal band "EdinoRock", one of whom spoke pretty good English.

EdinoRock phoned Jonny for us and the meeting was on. Jonny and friend arrived and suggested that we all go to lunch with EdinoRock acting as translator.

The 7 of us retired to the nearby Istanbul cafe and had cheeseburgers and coke. After lunch Jonny suggested we all go to the border. So we did. Only the border was closed to Vehicle traffic. So we went back to Fargana and were pointed in the direction of the other border (actually the one we were originally aiming for before this whole fiasco occurred).

We were at the border by 4pm and through just over an hour later. Most of this hour was taken up bantering with the Kyrgyzstan customs official. He was far more interested in discussing Golden Barney's likeness to Benny Hill and the comedy merits of Mister Bean than actually searching the car. At one point he did ask if we had any guns or drugs before changing subject and picking which Hollywood stars we resembled. Tom was Bruce Willis, I can't remember who I was and the customs guy was Jean-Claude Van Damme. Welcome to Kyrgyzstan!

By this point it was apparent that the fuel gauge could no longer be trusted. After reaching the half-way mark it would drop no further. From here on in the trip-counter was reset at every fuel stop and we had to go on the miles covered to tell us when to refuel next. Only thing was, we didn't know how far the car would go on a full tank. We would tomorrow...

We camped at the side of the road up in the mountains at 1am and then played around with long exposure photos for the next 2 hours.

Total so far - 5,706 miles

We bought a litre and a half of honey from the side of the road. It had a bee in it.

And then we ran out of gas. But we were expecting it. We put in 3 litres and then ran out again. So we put in 5 litres that we bought at the side of the road, served up in a big water bottle. We ran out again so we broke out the big Jerry can and stuck another 11 litres in. We filled up at the first gas station we came to and now we were pretty sure of our miles-per-tank figure.

At another of the frequent Police stops the copper stuck his head in the drivers window and asked if he could have our compass.

"No. We need it."
"You sure?"
"Yes, we need it to navigate."
"You got two?"
"No. Only got one."
"Oh, Ok."

We sent the night in a Hotel in Bishkek. We walked around and even though it was Saturday night we couldn't find the party-zone. Every other rallyer we've talked to since has said Bishkek was a great night out. But we missed is. The lack of a guidebook was working against us.

Total so far - 5,976 miles

The driving randomly around town looking for a hotel thing wasn't working too well in Almaty so when we saw a sign for an Irish bar we stopped with the notion of asking an Irishman for some directions.

Instead we came across Igor, a couple of his friends and his son Grecia (The only English speaker). And very friendly they all were too. Inviting us for a couple of drinks to start with and then dinner in the evening.

Grecia helped to sort us out a hotel and then the three of us took a drive up to Chimbulak, the nearby Ski area.

After that we headed back to the hotel for shower and a change of clothes then headed out to the Soho restaurant for our dinner meeting.

Igor had brought the rest of his family. His wife, Oxanna, and youngest son. We had a great meal and Igor was a very generous host keeping us plied with high quality Russian vodka. Many toasts were made. Including a great number to "The Queen!".

We had already learned that Igor was in the gun trade but when I asked if he imported guns for hunting the reply came "No. For war." Alrighty then, moving on...

Suffice to say things went from sober to not-so-sober and that was the end of that.

Total so far - 6,159 miles

We all went to SoHo for dinner again and came across Igor who, although he wasn't sitting with us, sent over a bottle of Vodka and paid off our bar tab.

Total so far - 6,159 miles

Coffee Shop.
Storm.
Chinese Meal.
Kasanova Strip Club.
Ultra's Brewery Pub.
Weird place somewhere.
0700 Back at Hotel.

And let's leave it at that.

Total so far - 6,159 miles

We met and had lunch with and Irish Team that had just done the Pamir highway in Tajikistan (one of whom had nearly drowned swimming the river to get to Afghanistan) and two Americans in one of the most battered cars we saw throughout the rally.

We had hoped to find a turnoff from the main-road to a road that ran past a lake but we couldn't find the turning and so stayed on the main road and ended up camping in a lovely spot just off it.

Total so far - 6,390 miles

At lunch we met a Turkish guy who lived in L.A. and was solo motorcycling around the world. He also joined us for a couple of days.

That evening we found a beautiful lakeside camping spot.

Total so far - 6,722 miles

The border was a straightforward affair taking just under 3 hours to get through. We didn't really notice at the time but our immigration cards hadn't been stamped. This would prove to be an issue when we came to leave the country.

Having been in TxT contact with Ulaanbaatared we knew they were only just ahead of us, in the first town, so we put the pedal to the metal to catch up.

We met them at a roadside cafe in the town of Rubtsovsk. They were there with Team "The Banana Hammocks" who were having their gearbox fixed at the mechanics next door.

They had all become chummy with an Armenian fellow named "Vitalli" who worked at the cafe. He said it was his but we're pretty sure his Mum owned it and he just cooked the Kebabs. He did do a mean kebab though.

Vitalli said he'd sort out a hotel for us but when he took Tom and I there the hotel said their photocopier was broken so they couldn't take a copy of our passports and therefore we couldn't stay. And that was basically the only hotel in town.

We went back to the cafe and Vitalli started saying things about camping and compounds. He disappeared with Mike/Ulaanbatered and one of the Banana Hammock boys to check out a possible campsite.

They got back about an hour later (After we'd driven around looking for a hotel and had no joy) and said they had a place for us to camp. It turned out to be some kind of Vehicle compound just up the road. So we set up camp and then Vitalli took us all to what can only be described as a Disco Marquee in a park because that's exactly what it was.

This place had a strictly "locals only" feel about it. We got a table and kept a pretty low profile. Although we did still manage to close the place and got back to our compound about 3am.

Total so far - 6,987 miles

An uneventful drive on good roads put us in Barnaul around 5pm. We drove around and found a very odd boutique hotel on the 13th floor of a tower block. Each of the rooms had a theme. Tom and I were in the Revolution room complete with newspapers for wallpaper and busts of Lenin and Ulaanbaatered were in some fantasy room with giant posters of girls on the walls.

We hit the town and more by luck than planning we found a club above a cinema that was just great.

Total so far - 7,180 miles

We had decided to avoid the queue of rally cars by arriving at the border on Tuesday thinking that Monday's queue would have dispersed by then.

So that meant another night out in Barnaul!

We started by going to a Snooker/Pool bar to watch MotoGP. After the race we hit the pool tables and met a guy called Igor (there's a pattern developing here) and his girlfriend who was a Russian billiards champion.

We played a few frames and then Igor's girl had to go home and Igor said he'd take us out on the town. It turned out that everything was shut by midnight on a Sunday so Igor suggested that we go to his friends place. We agreed and stopped off at a shop to get a six-pack of beer.

Igor's friends place turned out to be a street corner and we spent the next couple of hours drinking there with a load of Russian kids. Then someone came up with the idea of going to the Sauna. Turns out you can just hire the whole place and seeing that it was 3am on a Sunday night it was, unsurprisingly, available.

So we all had a Sauna and played on the slide into the cold plunge pool.

After that it was back to the hotel via the kebab shop.

Total so far - 7,180 miles

After hours of driving an amazing mountain road we decided it was time to camp and conveniently saw another rally team. We camped that night with Team "The Kernow Pirates" and had our first campfire of the trip.

It was also the coldest night of the whole rally and the £9.99 Halfords sleeping bag just wasn't cutting it.

Total so far - 7,494 miles

We got to the border just after 2pm and found Ulaanbaatared a bit more baataared than usual. Turns out they had got a puncture in the No Mans Land between Russia and Mongolia and the Jimny had done a complete 360 degree roll.

Unfortunately Mike was standing up filming some other teams at the time and sustained some serious injuries as he was thrown out of the car. By the time we arrived at the border he was in hospital in a Russian town about 50km away. (I should point out he went on to make a full recovery and is doing fine).

After talking with his teammate Tom and lending a few tools to help fix the Jimny we realised there was nothing we could do to help and so made our way over the border.

Remember I said we didn't have stamped Immigration Cards? Well that ended up costing us $16 each in bribes down from the original request of $65.

The Russian border posed no further problems and we drove the 25km of No Mans Land to the Mongolian border. And that was where we were herded into a compound along with all the other Rally cars who had left Russian on Monday. In the end there were 39 teams there.

There was some sort of paperwork problem higher up the chain but Hey! "It's all part of the Rally Experience_TM".

We had dinner and spent the night in a room in the border town. Which was great as we had a wood stove and therefore, Heat!

Total so far - 7,682 miles

After half the people there staged a sit down protest in the immigration hall and an Italian team tried to block the border gate with their Fiat Panda things started to happen.

Ultimately we were released around 5pm and nearly 40 rally teams piled into the Mongolian desert heading for the nearest town. It really was a sight to see. People taking all sorts of crazy routes (there are no roads just dirt tracks), some getting punctures, some losing rear bumpers and some even breaking down.

We made it to Olgii and got a four bed dorm room with CraigDavid. One guy is called Craig the other David. Generally referred to as CraigDavid after the singer of the same name. You'll have to take my word for it that it is extremely funny.

We also met Tom/Ulaanbaatared who had recently arrived and learned that Mike was in Hospital in town and that they had dropped the Jimny off and were going to fly to Ulaanbaatar.

Total so far - 7,743 miles

Suffice to say Mongolian hospitals leave a lot to be desired. But he assured us it was a step up from the Russian one. After an hour or so of banter we said our goodbyes and went back to town to go to the bank and get supplies. We randomly met Tom again who had been busy sorting plane tickets.

We left town at 11am and drove until we were in Khovd by 6pm. We camped by the river next to the Unofficial Mongol Rally Camp setup by an enterprising Mongolian to provide enthusiastically priced food, beer and showers to Rally teams.

Total so far - 7,892 miles

After an initial assessment we decided to remove the base of the sump and walk to a settlement that looked to be a couple of miles away to try and get repairs.

Then a bunch of Mongolians stopped (they were in fact the first people to drive past us) and offered assistance. By "offered" assistance they all simply pounced on the sump and started hammering it back into shape and covering it in Araldite.

After the sump was fixed the chief "mechanic" took a look under the bonnet and pointed out that one of the engine mounting brackets was broken and the engine was nearly falling out of the car. This was bad.

He said we should take the car back to his Ger in Khovd where he could repair it. I should point out that he spoke no English so this was all done by hand-waving and speaking in our native tongues.

We took ratchet straps off the roof-rack and used them to hold the engine in place. We then began the slow creep back to Khovd. The 50 miles back took 3 hours.

We arrived at the Ger and once again the locals jumped on the problem and a plan was formed to make a steel band to go around the engine and bolt it back to the original mounting bolts. They had some steel sheet but unfortunately no power tools. After an attempt to use a hacksaw someone was sent to borrow a grinder from somewhere and Tom and I were sent inside the Ger for Tea.

We started off with weak tea and bread puffs and then graduated to a small bowl of meat before the rest of the family came in and the big bowl of boiled offal arrived.

There is a communal bowl and when you want something you simply pull whatever entrail takes your fancy from the bowl, hack a bit off and throw the remains back into the bowl. The delicacies on offer included stuffed stomach, tripe, neck, liver and various other "bits". We also had some sort of Fat soup.

After dinner we all restarted work on the car and worked into the night under the light of our camping lantern. It was around 10pm by the time we were finished and we were offered to camp in the grounds of the Ger.

We set up our tents and then went back inside the Ger for a nightcap. There were more bread puffs and some cheese each bite of which tasted like shoving an entire lemon into your mouth.

The Vodka came out and after Grandpa hurled a cup-full into the roof of the Ger as an offering to the Sky God we each got a cup of Vodka that, bizarrely, tasted kind of like the cheese.

Total so far - 7,993 miles

With our engine now held in place up-and-down by a steel band and left-to-right by a ratchet strap we set off out of Khovd toward Altai.

It was a pretty uneventful day apart from overheating a couple of times as due to the engines new position it kept knocking the fan's temperature switch out of place. A quick re-jigging of the ratchet strap solved this little problem.

We also came across an abandoned Rally car from Team "Mojo & Mr E". One of the front suspension arms had broken and that was game over for the car. Mo had left taken the keys with her and got a lift to Altai to sort out a recovery truck.

By the time we found it all the wheels had been taken and there was a team of Mongolians trying to figure out how to get it into the back of a truck without a crane. Needless to say this wasn't the recovery truck. They even suggested we give them our wheels so they could tow it away. We declined.

We passed through Altai and camped about 20km later using the time before dinner was ready to knock off one of the photos from the "Team Swift" photo contest..

Total so far - 8,286 miles

In the early afternoon we came to a river crossing and over the other side of the river were two other rally teams. "Blame it on big Dave" and "Around the World in 80 clays".

We crossed the river and our three teams convoyed together for the next two days until we got to the finish.

We setup camp at 8pm and had a great campfire fueled by dried poo found around the campsite and some wood Tom and I had found on the road during the course of the day.

The solid block of Marshmallows was brought out and we had a pretty good attempt at toasting it.

It was about this time that the right rear spring on our Skoda snapped. Luckily it broke at the top of the spring and after bouncing around for a bit it reseated itself in a new position and gave us no further trouble.

Total so far - 8,555 miles

That was then replaced by wide expanses of nothing and the general feeling from the locals we asked that we were heading in the right direction.

Time to do another photo challenge.

We persevered through a variety of offroad terrain and eventually found ourselves driving under some power lines a sure sign we were going in the right direction.

And then it happened. We hit tarmac. There was much rejoicing.

We passed through town stopping only for supplies of petrol and drinking water and then headed back onto the sweet, sweet tarmac to get within a few hundred Km's of Ulaanbaatar so we could arrive at the finish line at a decent hour then next day.

We stopped an hour or so before dark in a field just off the road. We had planned to have a campfire but there had been no wood to pick up along the way and there was very little dried poo around.

Conveniently at that exact moment a guy with a trailer full of firewood drove past. We flagged him down and blagged some wood which he was quite happy to give us. We repaid him with a couple of bottles of beer, some cigarettes and two doormats.

So we had another good campfire and a great dinner as everyone was using the last of their food. Tom and I had a sort of stew made with rice, noodles, onions, carrots and Marmite

Total so far - 8,736 miles

We pretty much gave the kids everything we didn't need including about a litre of honey that we had left over. They were chuffed with that.

We were on our way around 9am and after a couple of hours of driving Mongolia threw one last challenge at us. About 100km of offroading.

We got through that relatively unscathed. Although we did knock the brush-guard off and give the sump a little knock so that it started weeping oil.

Then it was back on the tarmac, onto the city gates and then straight into a traffic jam.

But after just under a hour of traffic we made it to the finish line. A car park at the side of a cinema.

And that was it. 8,953 miles. 228th team to finish. The sump had made it, Barney took a lot of fly strikes but he made it, Mishka made it, the car made it, Tom took some photos with other people's cameras because they'd made it and then people took photos with ours because we'd made it.