Czechout Party, First interaction with the Police, Losing keys, and Mongol Rally Handbook

Czechout Party
Yesterday we spent the night at The Klenova Castle where the Mongol Rally organizers threw a Czechout party attended by most teams. We arrived late, as usual, but we were greeted by teams screaming “the horn, the horn!” Our “La Cucaracha” horn made its loud chant in the Czech countryside.

We proceeded to feast and drink at the Castle where we thoroughly enjoyed eating a roasted boar that must’ve been walking two hours before. Delicious. We talked to a bunch of teams and met some fine and crazy people. All in all it was good fun… It was also our first night camping, which proved to be quite the breeze.

First Interaction with the Police
After a night filled with full extensions, histories of adventures, no showers, and lots of dudes, we woke up early, and started driving towards Budapest. The first stop was the Pilsner Urkell brewery. While circling around the city looking for the brewery, we were stopped by the Police. A lot of hand gesturing and smiles were exchanged but we still had absolutely no idea what the hell was going on. Finally we realized that it was mandated by law to drive with your headlights on. The police were really friendly and we continued to Pilsner Urkell were we enjoyed some great food and beer.

Losing Keys
We went back to the car only to find that we were missing our one and only key. Mr. Marcos was definitely to blame since all our memories recalled him as the last key-holder. We proceeded to follow the old advice of “retracing your steps” only to find the keys comfortably sitting next to a set of Polo shirts at the Gift Shop.

We crossed the Czech Republic, touched Austria, traversed through Slovakia, and finally arrived to Hungary where we were greeted with a fantastic exchange rate, friendly folks, good pizza, and good vibes.

Mongol Rally Handbook

The day of the launch in the UK we received a small booklet with lots of useful information. We want to share some of it, straight out of the handbook:

To even get this far you’ve done really rather well. Many more mere mortals are too afraid to sign up and stay at home instead.

On this year’s Mongol Rally there are about 300 teams between the two start lines. The adds are that 4 teams will not make it beyond Europe and 1 team won’t make it even as far as Czechout. 70 remaining teams will not make it to Mongolia. 49 of these teams will break down in Kazakhstan and a further 21 scattered generously across a third of the Earth’s vaguely drivable surface. 225 teams will make it across the Mongolian border but 76 will not make it to Ulaanbaatar with their vehicles. So, as we point your granny-mobiles eastwards, we wish you the very best of luck…

There is a reasonable chance you will find yourself sitting in a desert somewhere having driven in to a pot hole the size of a semi-detached house. All your wheels have fallen off, the car has burnt to the ground and a wily local has stolen the charred remains of the steering wheel.
At such wonderful moments one should of course scoop up the remains of the car and carry on.