We bloody made it

Just in case any of you were concerned for our well-being, given the lack of posts since before we started getting snowed under with rally preparation - we've been to Ulaanbaatar and back in our mighty Renault Kangoo!

Read the blogs from the trip here: http://mongolia.charityrallies.org/teams/11725/blogs

and here's a little video I cobbled together when we got back, just to prove we were actually there... Will do a longer, better edited one soon

My Mongolia Charity Rally website is up and driving

Just in case you weren't aware....

We have an official site for the Mongolia Charity Rally, which has a blog, photos, news of our sponsors and route and a whole host of other fascinating tit bits of information.

With just over four weeks 'til the off, things are pretty mental, so I'll probably only be updating the rally blog when I get a moment. All I talk about is the bloody rally these days anyway, so it's probably more appropriate.

Our website is http://mongolia.charityrallies.org/steppebysteppe

We'll be updating from the road via text message as well, so definitely keep an eye on the rally blog from 10 July.

Cheers!

International relations

Well, the witching hour has just arrived, as I make the finishing touches to my Russian visa application. I started at 9pm.

The process saw me pay the price for the somewhat strained relations between our two nations over the last 50 years; three screens of pretty searching questions for me - my current and previous two employers' details (which considering I've been working in my current place ...

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39 days

hello you lovely people. How the devil are you?

We've got Mongolian visas! So if all else fails, we can still make it to Ulaanbaatar - although clearly if all else fails it might make the trip that little bit more difficult.

Our passports are currently huddled together, shivering, in an unfamiliar cupboard in South Kensington as they endure their next right-of-passage at the Kazakhstan Embassy. ...

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It's apparent from scanning down the page that updates to old faithful STTR are somewhat infrequent these days, even by my standards. What can I say, it turns out this whole rally planning malarkey is proving somewhat time consuming.

the major stresses at the moment are regarding visa applications - I never realised that completing two sheets of paper correctly would be so difficult or have so ...

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Woooaaahhhhh! We're halfway there.....!

Not to Mongolia, obviously. That would see us somewhere in Kazakhstan.

Nope, where we are is pretty much just as exciting - a chunky donation from Colin yesterday took us through the magical £500 mark and meant that I could finally break into some classic Bon Jovi. It also gives me the perfect excuse to post the video - a benchmark of wacky, hair-related antics and no mistake....

Thanks to ...

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more route planning

This Mongolian driving looks to be a piece of piss! Check out Google's directions... at least it appears that there is absolutely no chance of us getting lost. Mind you, roundabouts can be confusing...

Route planning

We finally got the ball rolling on our visa applications tonight, sending fof the required info to apply for Letters of Invitation to Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. In what I think is a hangover from the former Soviet days, many tourists need to be "invited" to visit by someone in the country - no rocking up on the border and milling about aimlessly once inside. In reality, the process has become ...

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We can do it too! With Kangoo

We have wheels! And a dashboard! And seats! And.....well, you get the picture...

We received official confirmation from Mongolia today that our vehicle has been approved! On July 10th, we will purr out of Highbury fields in a pretty dang sexy little white Renault Kangoo van. It's a veritable young pup of a thing - only emerging, blinking, into the world in late 2002 and currently almost as ...

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back

Hello! Can't believe it's been nearly two weeks since my last, rather painful post from my phone. Flat stuff somewhat took over, and it took a deluge of one comment to prompt me to get back on the computer to update the blog. Unfortunately it demanded that the reader be entertained, a skill largely outside my realms of expertise. But you never know, I might wing it.

So... the last couple of ...

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3 months and counting

The clock is ticking. Moving house is complete but we're still in disarray, the only plus point being we're now in a bigger place so can close the spare bedroom door and pretend it's not piled high with boxes!

Moving was a mission, and one we couldn't have managed without the amazing help of Laura, Craig, Jennie, Lucy and Kev. It looked for a second like it was going to be me and three girls ...

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on the move again

yup, moving again. Leaving our beloved wee shoebox in the sky behind for pastures already well-known, as we move across Brixton into a flat recently vacated by a couple of friends. Our heads say it's the right thing to do (bigger, near a park, we can put pictures on the wall, the only bathroom isn't en suite); as we sit here surrounded by boxes on our last night before the big day, our hearts are seemingly not of the same opinion. Gonna miss the wee place, gawd luvvit. Looking forward to the happy memories of the last 15 months though.

New sprog on the block

Huge congrats to Im and Simon on the arrival of George Oliver Martin on Tuesday. Im's one of my oldest friends, since we first met via a shared mailbox in university halls, and it's got me all emotional that the first of my closest uni friends is now in the family way.

Lookin forward to meeting the young fella, and impressing on him just how lucky he's been to end up in the family he has.

Colin, Euan and Anne reflect on a good morning's work

I'm a little teapot

I REALLY need to work on my post race poses

(First) mission accomplished

Well, after 3 months of trudging round the streets of South London in the freezing cold darkness, it all proved worth it as I completed the Reading Half Marathon on Sunday.

It was a success - I finished in under 2 hours (1hr 56) which was my goal before I started. I maintained an almost completely even pace throughout as well, despite the fact my right leg was in a fair amount of pain from the ...

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Is that the time?

Really is getting close to bedtime. Up with the larks / clubbers tomorrow morning - a 6am start to get to Reading for the Half Marathon. Nerves are jangling and carbs have been loaded to the point that pasta is oozing out my pores.

Hard to believe it's finally here - I've been training since Christmas and signed up for the race way back last autumn. And yet here we are. It's almost the end ...

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Just in case you doubted my rediscovered commitment to the cause

Trainspotting arrives in the cinema
Pulp are top of the hit parade
England is gearing up for Euro 96

and a plucky young lanky, slow, winger made the local paper (in Derry) after falling over "when it seemed easier to fall over the line and score" in our Schools Cup second round victory over Foyle & Londonderry College.

I hasten to add, our eventual quarter final exit at the hands of local rivals Coleraine AI was nothing directly to do with me. Which, in my rugby career, represents something of a result.

Happy St Patrick's Day!

Well, the witching hour is upon us in the build up to the Reading Half Marathon, resulting in a far more subdued Pat's day than in previous years. Needed to do my 'final' run tonight - a cheeky wee 8km - so avoided being the token Irishman down the pub at lunchtime and hot-footed it home.

Afterwards, I settled down to watch the Ulster Rugby Schools Cup final, shown live on BBC2 NI and accessible ...

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Thank you and Good luck to Simogen

Just wanted to shout a massive "THANK YOOOOOOO" to my friends Imogen and Simon for the most generous donation to the charity so far... Im stumped up £20 the other day, which over-whelmed us as she is due to give birth any day now and surely needs all the nappy-cash she can get...

Then , due to what I thought was no more than an embarrassing clerical error on behalf the Elkin-Martin accounts ...

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Routemaster

Have been out frolicking in the sunshine today for the first time since last autumn, but am now back home watching the last of the sun dipping behind the local estate and steeling myself to work out what route we're going to take.

We know where we're starting (obviously) and where we're going (the name of the rally being a bit of a give away) but the bit in the middle is still giving us a ...

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May be over-doing the training

I've worn a perfect hole in my foot. Considering emailing it to everyone to try and encourage sponsorship: "Give Go Help money or I'll send you a different raw body part each week". Could work.

We got one!

I tried to find a suitable Ghostbusters clip, but to no avail...

So imagine, if you will, a lady in '80s glasses whacking a bell and screaming.... "we got onnnnneeeeee!!!!"

Yup, my mass email of everyone in my Hotmail address book (updated c.2005) has resulted in our first sponsorship!

The beautiful, talented, exotic and wonderful Julie-Anne has sponsored us a whopping £25 for the rally! Well, ...

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Like a puppy knowing it's being taken to the vet, my car's battery has miraculously held its charge for the first time all winter, just before going for its MOT.

I'm in the slightly uncomfortable situation of experiencing paternal feelings towards a Renault Clio, and am concerned at it being locked in a strange garage overnight before being probed and prodded by strange blokes in overalls. I had to resist the urge to give it a little pat for reassurance as I left Kwik Fit earlier this evening. Odd.

Just done a sample exam for tomorrow

88%

Eat my Risk Management Strategy!

May sleep a wee bit easier now

Back to Skool

I'm cross eyed with confusion after spending the past few hours cramming for my Prince2 project management exam tomorrow. I haven't really sat an exam for 10 years, so I'm a little concerned, particularly as "no one fails the foundation course". The thought of being sent back to work tomorrow afternoon as our first failure is at the forefront of my mind.

Failing (or, err, I mean, "passing") that ...

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Mon the Irish

Half day tomorrow!!! Will be in the pub by 2, down at the rugby for about 6 or 7, and stumbling around south London by about 10-ish, I imagine.

Peter "The Claw" Clohessy heads up our motely crew of Irish Legends, journeymen and never-quites against Martin Corry's rag-tag bunch of coppers, bankers and estate agents at the Stoop, home of Harlequins, tomorrow night.

A perfect build up to the main ...

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Bruges?!

One other "minor" point - I'm off to feckin' Bruges at some point in the next few months!

Directly inspired by the film, and aided by J winning two free tickets on Eurostar at the Adventure Travel Live show a few weeks back, we're off to Belgium! Woot!

Quick update

As it's Sunday and I am taking a break at my mum's between red wine and post-dinner g&t, I felt the time was right to give a quick update on where things are in general.

Half marathon - ran 17.25km on Friday night, largely unintentionally but was aiming for 15 and mapmyrun.com is apparently not overly concerned with accuracy. Pretty chuffed, and barring any major mishaps or attacks of ...

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brain freeze

Cripes. Finally got down 'n' dirty with a bit of rally organising admin this evening. I have constructed a highly professional looking spreadsheet with columns and numbers and lists.

So far have discovered that we shouldn't need any jabs, as long as we have diphtheria and hepatitis A vaccinations... Do we? Who knows. Sounds easy enough to sort at any rate.

Visas, on the other hand....

...

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Rain stops pain

I've been pretty committed to training for the half marathon since the New Year - which seems like an eternity ago even though it's probably only been about 6 weeks.

Not tonight, however. For verily London doth splutter and bubble under a downpour of biblical / Glaswegian proportions. It was chucking it down on my way to work, continued all day, and is still pishing now. Every pavement is flooded, it's pitch dark and I am soaked through. Not even my free London Marathon reject jacket can save me this evening.

So I'm taking a, err, rain-check. Feel guilty, which is a bit pathetic, but instead will use the time to try and get some more rally sorted.... Every cloud....

A journey of a thousand miles....

...begins with the first step. Or "Steppe" (sorry). Or - two quid.

We have our first donation to the rally charity!!

Ok, so it was from one of the organisers, kick starting our efforts with some 'seed money' - but out of tiny acorns, etc...

Was really nice of him, and great to get the fundraising underway after what seems like an interminable amount of time spent thinking "we need to get the ...

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Ever wondered what pain looked like when plotted on a graph?

Allow me to demonstrate.....





I have drawn blood through thigh chafe. Blood!

I've had to lather Sudocrem on it to soothe the pain. Sudocrem!

I had to pretend I was a babyfather when buying the creme in Tesco, just to hide the embarrassment. But then I had to hobble out like an 80 year old John Wayne and they knew. They knew.

It'd better be worth it. As had the £22 I'm about to invest in a pair of Nike lycra running shorts.

See That Tattie Prance

Going nowhere fast

cripes, things are moving at a snail's pace on the organisation front. It suddenly doesn't seem like such a good idea to be doing a half marathon whilst simultaneously trying to make time to get rally goodness sorted.

For the record, I'm now up to 8-10km runs without too much bother, with 5 weeks to go until the race. What that means in reality is that during the week, it's pushing 9.30pm by ...

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Our actual theme tune....

Take a bow, Mr Jesse Winchester

No apologies if you haven't yet seen the first season of The Wire. Your fault, not mine.



all in the game, y'all

One small Steppe

Yep, that pun will be done to death over the next few months....

I sent my first begging email today - well, discounting the few that we fired off as a threesome to several disinterested vehicle manufacturers in the run up to Christmas. Pretty good going that it's only take us a further month and a bit to get round to following it up.

I got in touch with our Asset Finance division this ...

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All the good ones are taken

phooey. Turns out there're a couple of Aussies doing an even more epic trip than us, who have adopted the Steppe by Steppe moniker and are already out there, pedalling round Central Asia on a 4 wheeled trike. But, it being our 4th attempt at coming up with a team name, we're not changing now. We've already ditched "One Steppe Beyond" - my personal favourite (well, after Ulaan Book Tour, which ...

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We have a ready made theme tune

hmmm. Maybe the team name is more naff than I thought on Friday night...

Steppe by Steppe

Right. After much deliberation, confusion, soul-searching and general faffing, we've finally done it. We've decided on a team name.

This is our fourth and final name choice. Our original two were based on unrealistic ideas of what vehicle we might take, and our third - borrowing heavily from a classic Madness tune - was ditched following a Google search which revealed another team making the ...

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Adventure! Travel! Live!

Last Saturday saw my team mate and me get, err, lost in central London. I say "we" got lost, what I mean is "I" got us lost by misreading a map. Of Victoria. A familiar part of a city I've lived in for the past 7 years.

Bodes well for our trip of 10,000 km across 2 continents and about 7 time zones, doesn't it?

More encouragingly, the "Adventure Travel Live" show proved to be really useful as ...

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Attention Central Asian Border Guards

Would you let this man into your country?

Thought not. That'll be £80 for a new passport added to the budget then.

8 more Km tonight

I got a rather unpleasant case of inner thigh chafe. I can only assume it was due to the speed with which I was running.

In search of knowledge...

We're off to Adventure Travel Live on Saturday to get some first hand tips for our "overland expedition". As well as talks on Central Asia and the Silk Route, I'm most looking forward to the Travel Photographer of the Year exhibition.

Hopefully we'll pick up some tips on how best to prepare for the big trip (I was in Kathmandu this evening (the shop, not the....y'know) and whilst looking at the ...

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Fever pitch

less than 24 hours to go in the most exciting countdown since dear old Dickie Whiteley's timer ran out for the final time....

Yes folks, my first ever sale on Ebay is drawing to a close, and it looks awfully like someone's in for a bargain. My spare Ikea sofa cover - rrp £49 - is currently wedged at a top bid of a whopping 600 pence.

Never mind, it's all cash I wouldn't otherwise have, and has ...

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Training is continuing apace

Round trip to Dulwich Village yesterday - roughly 8km in total. Not bad for a skinny legged freak who only started jogging again three weeks ago. Starting to believe I can do this. Not so sure about my fellow 'team mates' though; of the five of us, I would say our chances of making it to the starting line are thus:

Me: 95% (barring injury or other catastrophe)
Euan: 95% (as above)
Coco: 90% ...

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Team name required

If you were doing a 10,000 km road trip with your beloved other half, what would you call yourselves?

Utterly devoid of inspiration - winning choice gets, err, the person's name on the side of the car or something. When we get a car.

good times

I'm currently selling my first item on Ebay. The rush is amazing - the price has rocketed from a starting price of £0.01 on Sunday, to a whopping £1.20 by this evening! Who knows what heady heights my Klippan 4 seater sofa cover will have scaled by the time the auction ends in a week....

In other news - positive vibes coming from our 'new' rally about the vehicle choices, and the discovery that ...

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still running y'know

Oh yeah, and I have run 11km so far this week (over two sessions) in preparation for the half marathon. Roughly doing 50% of the distance I apparently should be at this point (if the official 7 mile training run taking place on Sunday is anything to go by).

Pah.

I laugh in the face of well defined training schedules, choosing instead to go for the "run a little bit further each time" method. Seems to work. I'll get round anyway. Only gotta run 3 times further than I did tonight and I'll be almost there.

Vehicle rules for our "original" Charity Rally finally released...

We can basically take a commercial van or truck, or find an additional USD 2500 to cover import tax on any of the vehicles that, in my mind, I thought would be ideal - i.e. 4x4s

I have been fannying about, unsure about making the switch to the rival rally until these vehicle rules were confirmed, but feel comfortable now that we're making the right decision. The prospect of trying to get one of ...

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my 800th post

I could use the occasion to tell you something momentous, fascinating or exciting, but instead I will use the platform to advise that I think I have a hernia. It sort of makes sense - weird lumpy bit in my side, starting to be painful since I went running this evening, and it only appeared after I spent the weekend hoiking furniture around my mum's new house. Well, it's either that or I'm just ...

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Best of British

My extensive research on Ebay this evening has led me to the conclusion that the only make of car that it will be possible to get for around a hundred bucks is a Rover 400.

This is no bad thing, combining as it does middle-management semi-luxury, a sense of patriotism and just the right amount of - well - shitness to satisfy the 'banger aspect' of the rally. I am keen to find a car that needs ...

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72 days

until the Reading Half Marathon. The Reading Half marathon, which I am entered in, and competing alongside 5 of my friends. That's only 10 weeks, and my legs are hurting after a 3.5 km jog on Tuesday. I would have gone out again this evening, but the snow has turned to sheet ice and, whilst a broken ankle may be a good idea nearer the time, it's not high on my list of priorities for the time ...

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Cars for courses

Hmm, a new rally, a new issue when it comes to finding a vehicle. Honestly, you'd think they were trying to make us work for the privilege or something.

Been trawling Ebay this evening for something that fits the critieria of our "new" (as yet unsigned up for, but the decision has been made. I think) rally.... No older than 1998, but costing no more than £100.

It is, as you may expect, a bit ...

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Home from school early

The view from my window and the time it's been posted to the blog tell you that the snow has arrived in my corner of South London - and not before time. I was starting to get jealous of the hysterical news reports from all points of the UK. Thankfully, I expected it and managed to purchase a pair of trackie bottoms yesterday before trialling them last night - so Reading Half Marathon training has officially started! 10 weeks til I take to the streets and alleyways of Reading to prove I can do it, beat my friends, and hopefully raise a bit of cash towards the Mongol Rally....

Happy 2010!

Here's hoping it's suitably epic for all of us. In a good way, obviously.

(wo)man down!

Things have not been progressing particularly on the rally front. Bureaucracy, unrealistic (in my book) requirements from the organisers and radio silence in response to my queries have not filled us with confidence.

Somewhat predictably, none of the major vehicle manufacturers wanted to know or help, despite the fact we were only asking for the odd contact name of firms who might be able to ...

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