Andrew Ford

Andrew Ford
Of THE EXPATS
On the The Mongol Rally 2011

GO GO GO!

All the UK teams have now departed form the mighty festival of slow at the historic racing circuit. One car broke down on the parade lap, followed by an ambulance which lost two wheels on the way to dover. The Yaris has now blown eight fuses as we´re sitting here in Munich. Its a quick hop over to the Czech Republic this afternoon for the Czechout party, and then after that who knows...

AFM x

Andrew Ford
Of THE EXPATS
On the The Mongol Rally 2011

Visa la France!

The talk of the moment is of course Visas and Passports. Currently I have all of them except the Mongolian one, It's currently in the embassy! This is all good news. Harry needs a few more, but besides from that we're sorted. We just need them to arrive safely in France so we can get back to the UK now! The visa machine operatives have done sterling work at getting the visas sorted and sending them back and forth. We salute you!

Andrew Ford
Of THE EXPATS
On the The Mongol Rally 2011

Hasn't time flown?

Well yes actually it has! Lot's of things have changed in our camp over the last six months! Notably our theam name is now more appropriatly 'The Expats' as we are all English but live in France. For Harry and I, our time here is coming to an end. The final presentations for our Masters in l'management urbain et urbanisme at Lyon2 are this week. Harry flys back to England on the Thursday and I drive over on the following Tuesday. Ed is staying at work in France, hopefully he can make it in time for the launch at goodwood, otherwise we'll have to pick him up in Paris. Ed is a Nuclear Engineer which would be usefull if our car ran on a Pressurised Water Reactor instead of a 998cc engine. More updates and indeed video's soon!

AFM 

Andrew Ford
Of THE EXPATS
On the The Mongol Rally 2011

In the beginning...

*'We** shall **never cease from exploration**. And the end of all our exploring. **Will** be to arrive where **we** started. And know the place for the first time'** *T.S.Elliot

 

Well well well, after a whole year of bumbling on about the Mongol Rally, we're finally here, paid, present and correct! It's a peculiar thing sitting and waiting for sign-up to go live, pensively watching the screen, worrying if you have pressed refresh too many times, or on the other hand not enough. After the rally sold out in two minutes a few years ago I made sure my finger hit the mouse button quicker than an intercontinental ballistic missile, simultaneously securing our place and evaporating seven hundred and fourteen of the queens British pounds in less than a millisecond. The feeling? Ecstatic! Now all we have to do is buy a car, raise lots of money, drink some tea, get visas, get sponsors, get a tent/gazebo thingy, drink more tea and wait over three hundred days until the launch (oh and finish my masters degree and move to France but I'm sure that's going to be easy...)! I spent a whole day looking for cars and trying to cut some deals and then couldn't sleep for excitement! That's it for now, but things should get cracking on soon so expect more updates shortly! 

 

A F-M 

Team Principal