Day Forty-Eight to Fifty-One: Statistics confirmed

It felt very cold that night, heightened perhaps by the snowcapped mountains that seemed much closer in the distance than they probably were. We were keen to get up and get going but Doris was having problems again, perhaps caused by the doughnuts the boys carved into the mud the previous night. She kept overheating and leaking coolant so we had to spend a little while sorting her out before we could eventually trundle slowly onwards. We made it about 20 minutes down the road before we had to stop again. It was becoming such a regular occurance that I almost had a breakdown routine. Ask what the problem is, do a bit of filming, make a halfhearted attempt to offer some less than desireable female assistance, read my book, wait for it to be fixed. This particular instance was like any other, except for the fact that George announced the hapenning of a revelation at the end of the usual sequence. Apparently something had been disconnected meaning that the coolant could not travel round efficiently leading the engine to overheat. Could this be the end of problems for Doris?

After an hour or so, we managed to get on the road again and sped off over the sandy terrain. The tracks were pretty good except for the odd large rock that stuck up out of the ground like a razor blade, and it was one of these such rocks that caused our next stop.

Keeping an eye out the back window to observe the fellow convoy members we noticed that everyone had pulled over behind us. We made our way back over just as Matt was running off into the distance and everyone else was huddled around, the one and only Yak. Seconds later Matt came back weilding a large bent up peice of metal and George who had been under the car resurfaced, remarking on the vast quantity of oil spewing out from under the car. It was the sump. The sump guard had been folded in half as if it were made from paper and ripped from the underside of the car. The rock had then continued its damaging rampage and tore out the oil filter in such a place that it would not be possible to smply insert a replacement. In short and to put it politely, it was bad news.

Whilst waiting for the tank to drain and for various other  bits and peices to be removed, we were caught up by two teams that we had met in Istanbul on mopeds and motorbikes. (Team Eskimo Bruders and another team name I've forgotten) They briefly stopped to chat and hear of our woes, and informed us that the Norwegian team in a fire engine that they had been convoying with would soon be catching up with us should we need to get Doris towed, or need assistance in crossing any more rivers. They also invited us to come with them to the Ancient City which was the Capital city in Ghengis Khans time. It would be a small detour but it sounded interesting, although ultimately it would depend on the outcome of Doris.

They soon had to say their goodbyes and continue their journey but we agreed to try and catch them up just after the next town so that we could all camp together. We needed to get Doris to a mechanic if we had any hope of continuing so we hooked her up to the tow rope and took it in turns all the way to Bayankhngoro. The roads were a mixture of sandy muddy tracks and gravely paths over vast stretches of field. Occasionally there was a steep hill or series of bumps which made things a bit hairy but we got her there in the evening in as many peices as she started with.

It took us a little while to locate the mechanics and we ended up phoning the number and waiting for them to come and get us. As soon as we took Doris in the outcome was apparent. The mechanics seemed amused when George produced the sheared off chunk of oil filter, and when we enquired about fixing it, they all shook their heads and drew a single finger across their throats. Doris was dead.

It was getting late so we would have to go back the next morning to clear out all the boys belongings. We found a hotel which the bikers and the team in the fire engine were also staying in and put off the thoughts of leaving Doris behind over a few drinks.

The next morning Matt and George held a little ceremony to say goodbye to their dear car, complete with orange fur mankinis crafted by my fair hand. They pushed in into the rally car graveyard hanger, and whilst they were in there they saw Mad-Labs car, one the guys we had found the day of the fire but had not managed to catch up since. It was pretty ironic really because on the day we met those other two teams, and briefly became a convoy of six, George had said, 'statistically two of us will fail'.

We transferred all of the boys belongings into Kit and Alex's cars and after a morning of filming we eventually got on our way with Matt and George now riding seperately in the spare seats in the other two cars. We should have been able to make it to the next town in the same day as it was only around 200km away, and we had also heard rumours of tarmac apearing at some point before the next town which would make things an awful lot quicker, however we left a little late. The roads were pretty fun and relatively good for compacted sand. There was a tarmac road being built alongside the tracks, but when we managed to sneak onto it and discovered potholes 1ft deep and 4ft wide we deduced this couldn't be the 'good road' everyone spoke of and turned back onto the tracks.

As the sun set we decied to find somewhere to camp and get there early the next day,when disaster struck. In the dusk light, Alex had hit one of those razor rocks just where we had pulled off the road to camp and now the car wouldn't start.

The morning didn't shed any light on the situation so we would have to tow him to the mechanics. As Kits clutch smelt pretty horrendous from his towing the previous days it was up to us. Luckily about 20 minutes into the journey we managed to pull onto a proper tarmac road! It was pretty unbelieveable really considering the roads we have spent the last 10 days getting used to but there were no complaints. After an hour or so we reached the penultimate town before Ulaanbataar, Arvaykheer. We went straight to the mechanics but before we found anyone that could help us, we noticed three more cars that we recognised, one of which was the fire engine belonging to the Norwegian guys we had just seen the previous day. We thought it was a gonner but then noticed a ratchet and spanner set laid open by the bonnet and deduced that they had just stopped off for a fix up rather than a drop off.

When the mechanic arrived and looked at Alex's car it didn't seem to be good news. He poked around under the bonnet for a short while then scurried away with no further explanation. We weren't sure whether he was coming back or not and were just going to try and cme up with an alternative plan when another Mongol rallier appeared, pressed something under the bonned started the car, and it sprung into life! In very crude layman terms, some models of car will disconnect the electrics when it has a major collision so all it needed was this button to be pushed to reset everything again! Although it had started and we were very grateful to this man who strode in from a panda 4x4 and saved us a lot of time and agony, it still didn't sound great and had developed an awful rattle that it didn't have before. So Alex trundled off to the other mechanics across town to sort out the other problems whilst the rest of us wasted the day by browing the black market and buying traditional mongolian dress.

By the time we all re-grouped it was mid afternoon. Alex's car fixed and sounding much better, we were still set on going to the Monastary and Ancient City in Kharkhorin, but we wouldn't catch the bikers or make it there the same day as time was getting on. Rather than spend more money on a dingy hotel we headed to the shops for some supplies with the intention of stocking up, heading out of town and camping near the road ready to head straight to the Ancient City the next day. We had just pulled up to a cashpoint when an American guy called Babs came over to introduce himself. He was volunteering with the peace corps and also knew Andrew who had taken us to the cave paintings. He told us that all the volunteers were having a party tonight and wanted to invite us if we were staying in town for another night. We couldn't say no to this invite and before we knew it we were in an appartment in the middle of Mongolia surrounded by 12 or so English speaking volunteers, eating western food, drinking vodka and playing games with an Absynthe forefit. It was pretty surreal and brilliant but like all good things, came to an end in the early hours of the morning.

Babs was kind enough to let us all sleep in his lounge which is where we all found ourselves this morning, some a little more worse for wear than others.

We did take the detour to the monastary today which was beautiul, but as we didn't leave the town till late we didn't get a chance to see everything we wanted to before sunset so we plan to get up early and see the remainder tomorrow before the final drive.

If I can be presumptous, we've just had our last night of camping in Mongolia; last night in this tent (good thing too as two of the rods have snapped rendering the entrance and porch fairly useless), last night of cold windy eating and sleeping, last night planning what route to take tomorrow, slightly bemused at the necessity to use an actual compass to find the right path, last night trying to find a concealed place to wee in the middle of some of the flattest landscape the world has to offer (though thankfully tonight our current location is a little mountainous and boulderous which offers some options), last night in the same dirty dusty clothes I was in last night, last night on the Mongol Rally as we should reach UB tomorrow.

If statistics are still on our side.

Morale: High
Car: Grumbling a little after her ressurection from the watery grave but still going strong!
Current Thought: I hope they have proper toilets and hot showers in UB
Miles: 8926
Country Count: 15