The Adventurists, the legendary lads behind the Rally, have announced updates to this year's schedule:
Luckily this lines up pretty well with our current schedule although we’ll now be starting the rally closer to London instead of out at Goodwood, heading to Prague instead of Klatovy for the Euro launch, and now catching up with some rally peeps at a pub in Transylvania for some Romanian craft beer.
Even more luckily for us, despite for several weeks of initial planning having our hearts set on travelling east to Ukraine and trekking around the northern edge of the Black Sea, through Crimea, and then into Russia before catching a ferry to Turkey from Sochi, we decided against it. We figured the ferry was too unreliable and the alternative which would be to drive the atrocious roads of Southern Russia and Western Kazakhstan would take too long and decided instead on taking the Southern Route including Iran...our research on border crossings tells us that even the locals don’t know which country Crimea belongs to, however, we believe it now looks something like this:
- July 19th - From 2pm - Team registration - Battersea Park
- July 19th - Pre launch drinks - The Doodle Bar & Test Bed, Battersea
- July 20th - The launch cannon sounds - Battersea Park
- July 20th - Noon - last teams leave Battersea Park
- July 22nd - Prague Meet-up - Prague
- July 24th - Mongol Rally Pit Stop - Sibiu, Romania
- July 25th - Black Sea Beach Party, Romania
Luckily this lines up pretty well with our current schedule although we’ll now be starting the rally closer to London instead of out at Goodwood, heading to Prague instead of Klatovy for the Euro launch, and now catching up with some rally peeps at a pub in Transylvania for some Romanian craft beer.
Even more luckily for us, despite for several weeks of initial planning having our hearts set on travelling east to Ukraine and trekking around the northern edge of the Black Sea, through Crimea, and then into Russia before catching a ferry to Turkey from Sochi, we decided against it. We figured the ferry was too unreliable and the alternative which would be to drive the atrocious roads of Southern Russia and Western Kazakhstan would take too long and decided instead on taking the Southern Route including Iran...our research on border crossings tells us that even the locals don’t know which country Crimea belongs to, however, we believe it now looks something like this:
On the home front, we’ve researched all possibly nasty diseases that could be encountered on the way; turns out we can’t catch “food neophobia” - the extreme fear of new foods, so that’s one worry out of the way! However, we still needed enough needles between us to start a tattoo parlour. Fortunately for us, most of us have been to obscure places recently including Vietnam, Thailand, India, Kashmir and Canada and have already had most of these shots.
We decided to pass on these other immunizations as they are very expensive and the risk of catching the diseases is low if we behave.
Aside from getting stabbed in the arm repeatedly, we’ve stocked up as much anti-food poisoning meds as we can carry. After various encounters with stomach bugs in third world countries, including one team mate soiling himself as he tried to scurry back to his hostel in the Himalayas, we know that it's best to come prepared.
- Polio ✓
- MMR (Measles, Mumps and Rubella) ✓
- Chickenpox ✓
- Diphtheria ✓
- Tetanus ✓
- Whooping Cough ✓
- Hepatitis A ✓
- Hepatitis B ✓
- Tuberculosis ✓
- Typhoid ✓
We decided to pass on these other immunizations as they are very expensive and the risk of catching the diseases is low if we behave.
- Cholera and Meningococcal ✗ - Low Risk
- Japanese and Tick Borne Encephalitis ✗ - Plenty of bug spray and we should OK
- Rabies ✗ - No fondling of animals and we should be OK
- Malaria ✗ - There is malaria in some of the countries we are heading to but luckily its not a nasty variety
- Yellow Fever ✗ - Some of us are already infected
Aside from getting stabbed in the arm repeatedly, we’ve stocked up as much anti-food poisoning meds as we can carry. After various encounters with stomach bugs in third world countries, including one team mate soiling himself as he tried to scurry back to his hostel in the Himalayas, we know that it's best to come prepared.