TWO WEEKS TO THE GO(BI AMBULANCE)!

51'19N 0'33W, (somewhere south of London) 5th June 2008

In exactly two weeks we’ll be rumbling into North Carriage Drive, Hyde Park in London in the Gobi Ambulance ready to set off on our epic trip to Mongolia via twenty odd countries! Make sure you come along from midday to see us off, the Gobi Bar is going to be open, you can have a guided tour of the Gobi Ambulance and of course we'll be glad to take your money for our charities!

We’ll be updating the website regularly on the build up to the rally and during so be sure to check back for all the latest. We’ll be blogging all the way to Mongolia with video and photos to share our journey with you all.

In team news we've taken on another few sponsors: Realy Usful Box, Contact Roller Shutters and TWM. The ambulance has had her livery applied, she's looking great! We'll get some photos posted soon!

Russ, Stu, Mark have been flat out preparing the ambulance this week, often working until one in the morning. It’s fabrication time, things like sump and fuel guards, roof racks etc. We have cleaned up the mess after our jaunt to Wales – the ambulance looked like a dirty protest cell with all the mud in it! Two speakers fell out of their brackets and some other bits had to be fixed but we learned good lessons. Including how to cook up bacon sarnies and tea on a motorway!


We have decided to wing Europe – we had planned on heading though Romania and Bulgaria but word is the roads are poor so we might opt for Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia, Serbia, and Macedonia and into Greece. There’s a great drive along the Mediterranean and it’ll give us a bit of watery scenery before we get land locked in Central Asia. From there the routes fairly set because of our visas.

There have been reports of civil unrest in Mongolia over the last few days. We’re monitoring things closely and it looks like things are going to settle down. Some of the locals are claiming the recent government elections were rigged so they started throwing things at government buildings. That coupled with burning things down and four deaths it looked a bit messy for a while. The government put in a state emergency and things are looking better now. For more information see Reuters: http://www.reuters.com/article/rbssIndustryMaterialsUtilitiesNews/idUSSP9004820080705

Don’t forget you can still sponsor us! Just click on donate (to the left) or send a text message to 82010 with the word GOBI

- Mat.