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Day 26 – Freedom!

Waking up in a car is never an overly pleasant situation. Don’t get me wrong; Pete the Saxo is a god amongst cars. After all, the little French car that attracted so many laughs and doubts had proved so many people wrong, having got us within 20 feet of Mongolia. But cars were designed for sitting, and not lying.

With the majority of the convoy visiting the local town’s hotel (i.e. a local villager’s bedroom, very willing to give it up to bring in £8), I had Pete the Saxo and Ed had Percy the Peugeot. Choosing the backseat rather than the front, the sleeping arrangement offers a full 4-foot something of length, and 2 foot of width. Not really a problem, apart from the legroom. Or lack of it. Or the non-existence of it.

It was another cold night, falling to minus six (our coldest of the rally so far). The temperature wasn’t overly an issue, thanks to our 4 season sleeping bags – the minimal insulation provided by the windows and roof helping, but these bad boy bags probably would have kept us warm enough outside. The leg space though.. That was the killer, having my legs at a constant 90 degree angle meant that waking up every 10 minutes to try and move them was an unavoidable definite.

With the sunlight pouring through the windows at day break for the second morning in a row, the pathetic attempt at curtains made by random items of clothing in the windows doing very little to stop the determined sun’s rays, it was another early start. 7am and the car had filled with the harsh reality that we were still impounded, we were still without comfortable sleeping arrangements, and we were still in the car. Although I (and Ed in Percy) woke up at 7, looking out at the day through the frost covered windscreen gave us reason enough to spend as long as possible in the relative comfort of our sleeping bags, and I happily lay there (scrunched up against a door and a fuel can) delaying the inevitable rush of cold air as I got up.

The rest of the party strolled back into our confine at 8.30am, Will & Emma much happier after a night with leg room. Mackey almost indifferent, as he had yet to experience the joy of a car’s night sleep. With the motley crew strolling back, I knew it was time to arise and bit the bullet as the back doors of Pete the Saxo were opened, and the frigid air came to greet me.

Getting dressed wasn’t a problem, as none of the “hard core convoyers” (aka those that had roughed it in their Mongol Rally vehicles) had bothered to get undressed to sleep, a combination of the temperature and impossibility of undressing in such close quarters. I muttered something about breakfast after re-welcoming everyone back to our prison, contemplating a culinary luxury such as a Russian breakfast bar (should you ever find yourself in a Russian supermarket, don’t be fooled by the colourful packaging. The grape variety in particular, the “all natural” breakfast bar is actually brighter than the luminous wrapper, and tastes equally ghastly). The hotel crew had actually been offered morning sustenance, all part of the bargain £2 a night bed & breakfast deal. According to Will (and bare in mind, the boy will eat anything), they had to resort to subtly putting the various breakfast components into their coat pockets before they left; they didn’t want to seem ungrateful when presented with a fine feast, but it seems Mongolians have a bit of a sweet tooth, and presented them with a range of hard, sugar based candy, each packed full of sweetness and threatening to put anyone who tried them into a diabetic coma.

My lone sleeping bag packed away, it was minutes before we’d settled back into impound life; various seats in various cars occupied by various team members, talking about any subject under the sun. Music was playing quietly around the pen, stories were swapped and water was being boiled for teas and coffees, everyone anxiously awaiting a hot drink to keep the bitter cold out a little longer.

The landscape surrounding the compound still held a certain wow factor, every morning we were greeted by rolling hills and mountains in every direction, all with a light dusting of snow from the cold night before, the tallest peaks never shedding their whiteness in days. The Mongolian border was a strange place, no doubt made even stranger by the now 50 Mongol Rally cars that filled it’s fenced off yard in a mish mash of European engineering, crazy colours and countless sponsors stickers. But, we weren’t overly stressed with it; we weren’t getting angry at the fact we were basically prisoners, we weren’t disgusted with the fact we had no facilities whatsoever (other than the 15ft hole they called the toilet), we weren’t disgruntled that we’d come so far and now all just sat around… doing nothing… I think we actually started to become adjusted to impound life.

It did give us a chance though to talk, with each other and our team mates, and talk a lot we did. Everything that we’d ever done, ever thought of, ever aspired to be, ever achieved, ever failed at, we talked about it all. I was chatting to Emma of the Mongol Mongrels about the rally, and how people thrown together from all walks of life (but with similar enthusiasm to do crazy challenges) seem to end up such good friends after a comparably tiny amount of time. Emma’s response was of agreeance; “Other than you three boys, I don’t think there’s anyone else I’d let see me after a week without showering or hair washing”.

9.30am soon came around, and with it the handful of border guards arriving for work as they strolled through the front gate into the office building, along the only road separated to us by a small chain link fence. There was only 4 or 5 of them, the most armed wielding a biro or clipboard (I’m sure I wasn’t the only one weighing up the risks of making a break for it at some point on our 48 hour border crossing) and no doubt smug with the attention and smiling faces they received as they passed 130 weary and desperate ralliers. I take that back actually – although many thought that, they were genuinely nice people, just unable to do their jobs with the 1970s style equipment provided for them. We were happy to see them, and for a good reason; for the previous night, we’d attempted to bribe them to get us out with The Two Mongoleers…

(a quick recap; Mongol Mongrels had been released, as had the Two Mongoleers. Laura from the latter had the genius plan of refusing to leave and bribing the guards to stay a bit later and process the other three cars from our convoy, Pete the Saxo included. All was going very well until the rubbish computers crashed constantly for an hour, and the guards were forced to concede defeat. The nice guards even offered to give back the twenty dollars as they’d failed. Instead, Laura told them to keep it if they promised to get our wonderful convoy out first thing)

The guards had just stepped inside the office building, and the doors barely had time to close behind them before the convoy car owners had darted in behind them. Mackey and I both agree, it was a great thing Will ended up being the registered car owner on the V5 – any tedious paperwork, and problems at borders and the car owner would often be the one called to sort it out. Poor Will, but I think he began to enjoy it in the end!

Despite the fact that our three remaining impounded cars were the first to go, the car owners were gone for a few hours before any sign of action (another testament to the ancient Mongolian technology they have to use. I almost considered giving them my Macbook Pro if it meant securing our freedom a day or two earlier). The action did arrive though, in a spectacularly anticlimactic fashion – our wait of 50+ hours, being locked inside a concrete yard and fenced off, anxious to see the stunning country that lay so close (and yet so far), the metal gates and fences keeping us as political prisoners, was all over and done with in seconds.

A suited border came out, armed with a clip board and wandered through the compound towards our car. Attracting the eyes of over a hundred fellow ralliers, all he did was glance at the chassis number, laugh at our stickers and gave us the hallowed pink piece of paper. The pink piece of paper (that was actually white) that gave us our freedom, the pink/white piece of paper we’d waited days for, casually handed over after a 10 second inspection.

Not to worry though – we were free!

Although we were re-packed and in the car, mentally revving and ready to go, we had the issue of the other two teams in our convoy to wait for; The Desert Beagles and This Is Our Everest. Luckily though, the obvious mountain of inspections and checks meant the rest of our convoy were done within the hour. Each with our slip of paper in hand, we began to leave the compound and headed towards the (already) open gates towards Mongolia. Sending ourselves off with a torrent of horn tooting and even some cheers from those poor, poor prisoners still locked up, we pushed onwards and the cars tasted Mongolian roads for the very first time.

Whatever happened from here on it, it didn’t really matter. Technically, we’d done what we set out to do (in a technically, cheating sort of way). Driving from the UK to Mongolia – we had officially driven thousands of miles, in pathetic (sorry Pete the Saxo) cars, across unbelievable terrain and through incredible countries. If we broke down a couple of miles down the road, for me anyway, it wouldn’t be the end of the world.

The Mongol Mongrels lead the way, leaving the compound (as they’d actually been allowed to leave the previous day) and heading a few hundred meters up the road, towards the border village. It was here, Ed was flagged down by a man in a little hut – if you’ve seen Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, it was a “grandpa’s hut” sort of hut. In our experience, we’ve found these huts to be occupied by two sorts of people 

1. Official police/border soldiers
2. Chancers looking to make a quick buck

 Ed duly pulled over, not risking smashing onwards in the case of the occupier being a number 1. The man, although dressed like a number 2, claimed to be an official insurance salesman. His goods for sale? The official Mongolian insurance that we needed to buy, most definitely required to buy, despite looking like something he’s just typed out on notepad and printed on a cheap printer. Ed and his sensibly cynical mind decided that this guy wasn’t the real deal, and obviously spotted us Westerners with untold riches, and wanted some for himself. What followed was a hilarious example of the language barrier accelerating an already brewing argument…

Ed tried to gauge how essential this essential insurance really was, and asked basic questions. What with the salesmen inability to speak English, he assumed he was questioning his legitimate nature (which he sort of was), and began threatening Ed with the police if he didn’t buy the insurance then and there. Ed, realising the causing trouble for $20 wasn’t the best thing to do, agreed but told him to wait 5 minutes – he’ll get his friends (aka us), and we’ll all buy in a big group. Lots of insurance sales for the man!

Of course, trying to act out this little plan didn’t go to well, and involved the Mongolian salesman and his wife chasing after Ed and his car, whilst taking a photo of his number plate and shouting “SEND NUMBER TO POLICE”. Usually that would be cause for worry, but we were soon to find out that it would have taken the nearest police officer about a day to get here. Not really worth it over an argument!

Once the last few convoy cars had caught up with Ed, we re-approached the insurance salesman, his crazy wife and little tiny shed – and straight away started smiling, nodding and waving dollar notes around. Funnily enough, the Mongolian soon changed his tune and happily provided us with the very legitimate insurance documents (although no doubt chuckling away to himself, how he’s just made more Mongolian Togrog’s in one day than he did the previous month).

Now fully within the law (although we all think we were firmly legal from the second we entered the country), we finally left sight of the border and our home for the past three days, and pushed onwards. We were in Mongolia! And within 30 minutes, we realised that Mongolia was as epic and mysterious as we’d all imagined it to be. The scenery was incredible, rolling mountain ranges all around us, the entire landscape swathed in a monotonous colour of greeny grey. The roads were.. well, there were no roads. Literally, we thought we had it bad going through the Ukraine or Kazakhstan – but in Mongolia, there was absolutely no sign of tarmac! Instead, we followed well worn paths through the plains stretching out as far as the eye could see, yet still managing a maximum of 30mph dodging the natural obstacles that littered our way – boulders and rocks, pot holes and crevices, each with the potential to cause some serious damage to convoy.

We had no idea where we were going – road signs would no doubt be erected as the Mongolian’s discovered tarmac, and instead used the age old method of following the sun. The convoy of 5 cars headed in the best direction we could, following the paths and passed a single vehicle in a few hours of driving (a rather bemused local in an ancient truck), before reaching another small village nestled amongst the hills.

We thought it might be a good idea to check we were headed in the right direction, and stopped in the middle of the settlement. As it turns out, we stopped right in the middle – we think in the village square, on the common green, as even the village had no roads. Just gaps amongst the gers we drove through, before finding a Mongolian man on a motorcycle.

Out came the map (luckily we purchased a map in Cyrillic – if you ever find yourself travelling across Russia, the ‘Stans, Mongolia or surrounding area – don’t buy a map with the place names in English, no matter how tempting it is) and pointed at our destination. Within 2 minutes, half the village had come out to greet us, all excited about a random car let along 5 of such strange origins. Children ran from their gardens with smiles and waves, locals watched us intently (although seemed to keep a few meters away, as if we were an unknown evil!) – such attention, such friendliness, was incredibly endearing. We’d (officially) been in Mongolia a few hours, but we’d already fallen in love with the country.

The motorbike rider offered to take us past some deceiving paths, paths that we’d no doubt take the wrong one, and point us in the direction we wanted; if we’d be so kind to pay him $2. Bargain! And so we did, following a speeding Mongolian on his dirt bike as we waved goodbye to the hamlet and continued towards the first city of Olgii.

The convoy pushed forwards, each car deciding which route to take – countless paths cut through valleys, all ending up meeting a few miles down the road but each providing their own set of obstacles. Some looked like soft sand, willing to swallow the car up to the axles; others looked more like the lunar landscape with countless boulders. Water became an all to frequent feature, as our 5 cars made every effort to avoid the boggy routes. At one point, all five of us had taken different routes; separated from the next car by only 50 meters or so, convoying in a horizontal formation. If we only had a film crew in a helicopter, it would have looked awesome.

Despite our best driving, the cars took a hammering, with 35mph being a convoy top speed for the entire morning. We moaned so much about the Romanian and Ukrainian roads – in their own right, they were terrible. Compare that though to the complete non existent road surfaces we now travelled on, and we realised we’d acted like spoilt children all that way back.

The scenery continued to amaze us, driving for hours in awe as we climbed up and down hills, snaked through valleys and crossed wide steppe. Half way to Olgii, the Beagles at the tip of the convoy came to a stop. As with the camaraderie of the rally, and even more so in the brotherhood of a convoy, we all came to a stop. First thoughts were of a puncture, although no doubt every member of the convoy sharing that deep down fear it was a more serious car issue. As it turned out though, the car was fine. The team was fine. The reason they stopped however, was a large sign in the middle of the road – a notice, 5 foot high, declaring explosive mines in the area.

Do we continue? This was the only way we could head, the only path (or group of paths) we’d seen going in this direction for a few hours. Mackey decided to test the water by throwing some rocks ahead into the road, and along side, perhaps hoping to detonate the waiting ordnance and clearing the way. No explosions though, probably a good thing but I know the males of the group were hoping for some dramatic excitement. Still, we remained parked up with trepidation. Luckily though, a few minutes later, we saw the tell tale dust cloud of an approaching vehicle, a Mongolian truck older than us all, charging down the road towards us without sharing our worries. That was good enough for us! As soon as he passed, the huge wheels kicking up a dust storm which too rushed passed us, we again set off.

By lunch time, I noticed that Pete the Saxo was struggling a little – third gear just didn’t provide the power any more, relying on second to continue along the road. Before too long however, even second gear (the usual workhorse of any small engine) began to stumble, and first gear had its chance to shine. Looking at our team mates however, it didn’t seem to be a problem limited to Pete the Saxo – all cars had slowed to a crawl, and began to get slower. Looking at the car behind us however, gave us the answer. Without really noticing, we’d ascended half way up a mountain, the sprawling valley below giving us an idea of how far we’d actually gone.

There was still mountain to climb ahead of us however, but it was no longer a regular drive. Now, each car was shed of its excess passengers, and us drivers had the sole responsibility to get up the gravelly path. Jason and Matt in the Desert Beagles took first attempt, and the 997cc of the Swift rallied up the path, kicking up dirt as the tiny engine dragged them to the top. Laura in the Two Mongoleers, and Marco Polo (the 1 litre Volkswagen Polo), was up next. Not being an overly aggressive driver, and probably worried for the potential damage to the car, decided to take a run up. Laura reversed 50 meters back down the path to a slightly flatter stretch, in order to give herself some forward momentum before the push onwards and upwards.

A slight hiccup did occur here, with Laura reversing a little too much and straight off the path into a ditch. We won’t go into this too much, to save her blushes, and within a few seconds had half a dozen men pushing the car back onto the path. Back on (semi) horizontal ground, Laura accelerated in a cloud of burning clutch, and the Polo reached the summit.

Ed took heed of Percy the 106, and followed her without problems (although managed to miss the reversing into a ditch part). I had control of Pete the Saxo, and with some awesome wheel spinning before traction was finally found, I too began skidding and sliding up the steep trail towards the top. As each of the cars successfully reached the top, cheers and applause echoed around the expanse from jubilant team members.

The Terios boys however, not much attention was paid to their attempt. After all, they had a 4x4, and such a challenge was laughed at. (Although we were all secretly very happy to see them at the top). The passengers, who’d given up their seats to lighten the cars, sauntered to the top and the waiting vehicles.

At the top, myself and Ed checked on our GPS units to find out what sort of altitude we’d reached. Fear not though, as I imagine we have a few readers that would be appalled to read that acronym on a Mongol Rally blog – this GPS unit provided nothing other than longitude, latitude and altitude!

2,535 meters above sea level (roughly 8,300 feet). No wonder the cars were lacking in their usual aggressive power, and we too felt some effects of the thinning air. Will, someone who spends his working day outdoors and rows competitively, was completely out of breath after the 250 meter walk to the top. Mackey followed quite a long way behind, but eventually made it, struggling for breath and taking a well deserved seat to regain his composure. (Which he did in usual Mackey style by lighting up a Marlboro!)

Once at the top though, apparently the tallest peak we’d be facing and signalling the end of the mountain range (the name of which I’ll find out), we continued our drive and reached Olgii a couple of hours later.

Olgii was as expected of a Mongolian city, a cluster of buildings of varying styles, condition and age, the local inhabitants still looking slightly unsure about their own city. Mongolia is generations behind even the most underdeveloped nations that I’ve ever experienced; but certainly not in a bad way. Olgii, and Mongolia in general, had already struck me as being one of those untouched places on each, where development and progression hasn’t been needed for millennia, and only begin to creep it’s way in.

We stopped for a spot of lunch; or rather a convenience store to pick up some lunch worthy items. This sort of stop was a game in itself, the plethora of random goods with Cyrillic wrappers, where we hope they show at least an artist’s illustration of the goods inside so we could make an educated guess of what to eat. We managed some strange cheese, some peculiar meat and some very regular bread, along with some biscuits to keep us company on the hundreds of miles still to go.

We had gotten word that another team was on its way to Olgii, and the Beagles really wanted to wait for them. With not knowing how long we might be waiting for (it could have been a matter of minutes, or could have been a day), we were anxious to push on. Ourselves and Ed & Emma had the weakest cars (I’m sorry Pete the Saxo for saying that), and we decided to continue to the journey towards Khovd. We were confident that our slower speeds and less power would mean the few hours head start we’d get would be good for the convoy, and they’d easily catch us up. All was agreed, and the much reduced convoy of two set off once again.

10 minutes after leaving the city limits (by city, it was a quarter of the size of Penzance, if not smaller), we’d once again been thrown into the Mongolian outback. The steppe now stretched ahead of us as far as we could see, distant hill ranges on either side providing a landmark to ensure we were going the right way. The road and the tarmac we so love still had failed to form, our driving surface just a worn route through the grassy steppe.

We passed herd after herd of camel, and dozens of gers, as we drove onwards. Gers are incredible structures – providing ample warmth and space for a traditional Mongolian family, yet able to be constructed within a few hours by a knowledgeable family. There is no owned land in Mongolia, the thousands and thousands of square miles of emptiness simply shared between the people. A family and their herd of livestock, usually goat/camel/horses, will simply pack up their ger once the animals have temporarily stripped the nearby grassland of food, and move somewhere else. Such a simple, sustaining way of life; no materialistic desires to make them unhappy, as they all seem completely content with their lives and at one with the earth.

Before we knew it, the sun began to set as we approached a grouping of hills and meant our driving for the day was over. We were surprised that the other half of the convoy hadn’t yet caught us up, but presumed they’d waited longer than anticipated or perhaps found somewhere comfortable to sleep for the night. Driving without the sun to light the way had been a dangerous game for the last few thousand miles, and no more so than Mongolia – the paths we had to follow, that would hopefully take us to the next city on our journey, were hard enough to spot at noon – let alone in the dark.

With 15 minutes or so of dusk remaining, we drove a short way towards the foot of a hill and set up camp. Being just the two teams now, and such veteran campers, we had our sleeping arrangements organized and erected within minutes. Being such close friends, and the fact the temperature was dropping alarmingly fast, we decided to do without a tent each. I shared with Mackey in one of our new, luxury tents (bog standard 2 man tents, although comparative luxury when imagining the coffins) and Ed & Emma invited Will along to share their absolute palace – their tent was so big, it had rooms. Actual rooms! Their foyer was twice the size of a coffin. Oh, how they lived.

The cooks got about creating a culinary feast, Emma as head chef and myself as sous/KP, and before long we were sat under the stars between the cars, eating army rations and marvelling how we’d managed to actually get to Mongolia. This was proper camping in the wilderness – other than us, there was no sign man existed. No artificial lights, no roads, no pylons or cables, absolutely nothing for miles around us.

It wasn’t long before we all headed to sleep, another day of constant driving taking it’s physical and mental toll on us all, and we quickly drifted off anxious to see what the next day would bring….