Fiat Panda Cape Town to London Record Attempt - February 2013

[mtc1tony]

Newsflash! Veteran regional news broadcaster Fred Dineage is interviewing Philip Young and Paul Brace on the ITV Meridian network, which may or may not go across Southern England or just a bit of it, around 6.0pm. (18/1/13)


No excuses allowed for a spot of snow then… with the Fiat Dealer in Basingstoke also trekking to the Southampton studio to provide the essential prop – a white Panda to wheel before the cameras.

TV debut follows on from the half page in the Sunday Telegraph, and national BBC radio broadcasts. Meanwhile, the ship carrying the Panda is inching its way through high seas towards Southern Africa, but due to the winds cant dock at Cape Town. Problems, problems…and the planned border crossing that is all new - opening up a land-based frontier between north Sudan and southern Egypt - is now not opening in January, as was originally announced… the headaches continue.

http://www.africarecordrun.com

 

[mtc1tony]

Here is the interview:

The real car must be near South Africa by now.

 

[panda panda]

Fantastic (but totally bonkers) thing to do

Wish you all the very best and will be following with interest

 

[Batfalcon]

3 days and 20 hours to start the race. I suppose that everything has been taken care off.
Good luck and drive safe.
Records are made to be broken, humans don't.

 

[mtc1tony]

Just 17 hours to go.

Yesterday was spent unpacking, checking and cleaning the car.

After much heated debate it was decided to ditch more items, both personal and car spares in favour of weight and more space for sleeping.

This morning Philip and Paul have been on the Expresso Breakfast Show:
http://www.expressoshow.com/articles/Cape-Town-to-London-Africa-Record-Run.html?articleID=3829


For more go to www.africarecordrun.com
The YellowBrick tracker is now live on the car.

 

[varesecrazy]

Good stuff,
thanks for keeping us informed ,
Charlie - Didcot

 

[mtc1tony]

They crossed into Zambia on the Kazungula ferry just a day after starting, having covered 2,400 km:

The Panda is performing magnificently.

http://www.africarecordrun.com/map.html#ybm

 

[mtc1tony]

It sounds like poor-quality fuel is already a problem for the Panda. They have heard pinking, and have tried mixing some Avgas in with the fuel.

Hopefully Zambia's Motor Sport Association will provide them with some better petrol.

 

[mtc1tony]

3 days in, and they have crossed the equator, half-way across Kenya.

The road to Ethiopia is the very rough Marsabit road, which will really test the car today.

http://www.africarecordrun.com

Tracker map here: http://www.africarecordrun.com/map.html#ybm

 

[mtc1tony]

They survived the Road from Hell with time to spare before the border opened.

The Panda Pair pulled into Moyale two hours sooner than the predicted 12 hrs. Philip texted: "Track ten times worse than last year. Car even surprised us, churning through deep sand with many troughs carved up by trucks". We also hear from Marsabit that the word on the street after they left was that they would never make it... They don't know Philip, Paul and the Panda.

They are now well into Ethiopia, and making much quicker progress.

 

[mtc1tony]

They have had a very long and hard day in Ethiopia yesterday, where the roads were slower than expected and petrol very hard to find. After a long economy run, they reached the Sudanese border on empty.

They are now bouncing down the road in Sudan - the rear shock absorbers are clapped out.

The next border crossing is across water into Egypt. Turbo, the Egyptian fixer, is waiting at Abu Simbel equipped with a drum of 95 octane fuel.

http://www.africarecordrun.com/map.html#ybm

 

[mtc1tony]

They have successfully crossed from Wadi Halfa in Sudan to Abu Simbel in Egypt by barge - the first to use what should become the regular border crossing in future. It went so smoothly that they are now 3 hours ahead of schedule.

More here: http://www.africarecordrun.com/blog.html#07a


http://www.africarecordrun.com/map.html#ybm

 

[fingers99]

Brilliant!

 

[mtc1tony]

That wasn't in the plan - they drove across some glass in Cairo, and collected 4 punctures!

After loosing some time buying new tyres, they are heading quickly toward the tricky Libyan border. Will they be let through when it is closed to all tourists?

 

[mtc1tony]

After three hours stationary on the Yellowbrick map, they are now on the move inside Libya - the story of the successful border crossing is here:
http://www.africarecordrun.com/blog.html#08a

Just 1500 kms to Tunisia, and then head for a ferry from Tunis.

 

[Reuuk]

what great fun this would be! be interesting to see what there MPG was ;P

 

[Batfalcon]

Are they ON schedule or not? It is not mentioned in their blog.
Either way, may God protects them and guides them.

 

[mtc1tony]

They seem to be going well. The punctures and damper replacement ate up the time they gained with the quick entry into Egypt.

The ferries to Palermo are close together - one leaves at 23.00 on Saturday and the other leaves at 00.01 on Sunday. Looks like they have plenty of time to catch the first one.

It took 18 hours across Libya, and they are now in Tunisia, and currently 300km from the ferry at Tunis. No waiting for dawn at that border.

The story of their trip across Libya is here:
http://www.africarecordrun.com/blog.html#08b

There is a Video Gallery on the web site with a piece about the Marsabit Road, and the Expresso interview:
http://www.africarecordrun.com

 

[Batfalcon]

They are in Tunis right now. Hope they catch the first one. They only have 2 days and 16 min to brake the record . It's 20:00 in Athens Greece, so it must be 19:00 there. They have 4 hours to rest.
How many hours is Tunis - Palermo ?

 

[mtc1tony]

If it is a quick ferry run, 10 hours. Hopefully they arrive at Palermo at 9 a.m. on Sunday.