Two weeks and two cars later, Mason and Hume are home.
The Scally Rally Arctic Challenge, officially starting in Den Haag, Holland and finishing in Bodo, Norway is complete. The Feckin Flintstones' Team, comprising of DriveWire's David Mason and Editor, Bob Hume completed the adventure last Tuesday but it was made more challenging by the fact that we started two days earlier in Portaferry, County Down and made the return trip, which saw us back six days later.
Ayrton - our elderly Mercedes C-Class at the start in Den Haag, Holland
Virtually all of the sixty-odd cars, vans and even an old Dorchester limo from Northern Ireland completed the challenge. Along the way, we had an absolute ball despite having to sleep in our car, strange hostels and tents.
Special thanks go to Nicky and Diane Mason, who gave us beds, food and booze in Scotland and my lovely Auntie Barbara, who made us dinner, lent us CDs and a fridge (complete with beer) made breakfast and gave us beds in Surrey.
Maso plans the route - channel tunnel train
Third day into the trip and we catch the Channel tunnel train to Calais - this is necessary because Maso doesn't like ferries - he gets sick on the Portaferry ferry to Strangford!
We then spend an afternoon, driving from France to Den Haag in Holland.
The rally start in Den Haag
Den Haag was a bit of a surprise - instead of the slightly dull, corporate banking capital of Europe that we were expecting, we found an upmarket Dutch version of Blackpool. Lots of sun, traffic jams and beautiful women!
We rested overnight with a few of the teams in a very laid-back hippy hostel and made for the starting point on the shore, early next morning. Vehicles ranged from a black taxi, several racing replicas, a couple of US police cars, a limo, a 'Fjord Escort' and of course the legendary Bad Girls' Bus, Team Turtle Volvo and the Chicken Run-inspired Merc E-Class Estate.
The 'Fjord' Escort
Things had already started to fail by this stage; the fuel gauge on Ayrton was reading inaccurately - we filled the tank and it read half-full, then crept up to full - we had a theory that we'd solved the world energy crisis with a car that produces its own fuel.
Maso's extensive MP3 library on his phone was made redundant by the fact that it went for a Burton on the M6 at Birmingham - luckily Auntie Barbara lent us my cousins' CDs without their permission. The bonnet also began to pop open with comedy timing and the heater wouldn't turn off.
The Bad Girls' Bus
The starting point was the first occasion that we met up with the Bad Girls' team - we'd been talking to them on Facebook for some time. The team comprised of Gary McKevitt, Mattie Pears and Phil Barker, all from Barrow in Furness, Cumbria. The guys were driving a 1995 Renault Taffic, that they'd completely rebuilt, resprayed and turned from a minibus into a pink and blue mobile glam-palace - they are veteran banger racers and the van was a tribute to their racing colours. Phil is the best and most enthusiastic mechanic that I've ever met.
Did I forget to mention that they did the entire trip in drag?
The Chicken Run E-Class
The Bad Girls volunteered to put our fibreglass dinosaur head on their roof as soon as they discovered that we wouldn't be taking the Flintstones Mondeo - they were true to their word and we were glad that at least part of Dino was making the trip.
From then on, we became firm friends with the Girls, camped together and travelled most of the way in convoy.
The Bad Girls fitting Dino to their roof rack
The bright orange dinosaur head would not bring the Girls much luck in Germany but I'll tell you about that later...
The A Team Rascall Van
The A-Team Rascal van was probably the most obviously challenged vehicle with a top speed of 50 MPH!
Extensive use of masking tape
This team completely covered their BMW 535 in different-coloured masking and insulating tape, with a fantastic result - it looked 'proper'.
Sex shop and safari park sponsored Volvo
Meet the team "Nice n Naughty... and Martyn!" - these guys provided a lot of the laughs not least with their antics in a gorilla suit.
Their improbable sponsors were a safari park and a sex shop. Their elderly Volvo 'Hilda' developed a propensity for jamming her own throttle open.
Swat Team - they sleep with both eyes closed
The Swat Team chose a 'stealth' Mk1 Clio as their transport - they don't look it in this photograph but they were sharp as tacks and ready for anything.
Probably...
A ratted-up Jag
This ratted up Jag looked great - the paint was partly stripped and it had a massive dent on the driver's side.
An insane Norwegian trucker later took a dislike to it and beat the roof in with a pink hammer (yes a PINK hammer) - this backfired slightly as it added to the aesthetics and also nearly earned the wagon driver a kicking from other rally participants.
On the road
After some formalities and a Le Mans-esque Start, we were off and our first destination was Copenhagen. We spent a bit of time in Den Haag, fixing the Dinosaur head to the Bad Girls' roof but we soon caught up with everyone.
Day One saw us travel the remainder of Holland, the full length of Germany and a lot of Denmark. We took it in 3-hour shifts to drive - the first day was a very demanding section, covering roughly 900 kilometers.
Germany was not kind to the Bad Girls - their bus overheated 50k North of Hamburg, causing the head to warp and the head gasket to melt - a dodgy radiator was to blame.
This did not put the guys out of the running - they simply ordered a head joint from a local Renault dealership, left the bus in the car-park of a friendly local Kwikfit-type garage, hired a VW Touran MPV from Avis and carried on!
The Great Belt Bridge in Denmark
The highlight of the trip was crossing the Great Belt Bridge. The Great Belt Fixed Link is one of the largest bridges in the world - we got some inkling of the mammoth work that went into its construction when we crossed it.
The structure incorporates the Eastern Bridge (a suspension bridge), Western Bridge (a low-level bridge) and the Eastern Tunnel for the railway (an undersea bored tunnel.) The complete link between Zealand and Funen is 18 km long and was built between 1988 and 1998.
Oresund Bridge
Having overnighted in Copenhagen, in possibly the smelliest, most unfriendly and weirdest hostel in Europe we set off for Oslo - roughly 650 kilometers.
We crossed the Oresund Bridge, which starts as a tunnel under the water and becomes a bridge halfway through - an amazing piece of engineering.
Oresund Bridge
That night we stopped just short of Oslo, setting up camp in a truck stop. This is where the Bad Girls caught up with us.
We had a brilliant night's craic and this is where our bottle of Feckin Spiced Irish Whiskey became a casualty.
It was VERY nice...
Friendly local cops
A friendly police patrol dropped by to see what was going on and were quickly reassured by the silver-tongued Maso that we weren't mental.
They even posed for photographs.
Ayrton the Incontinent
Day three of the rally saw us travel from Oslo to Bergen in Norway on a long route - the scenery was fantastic. Fjords need to be seen to be believed - they are massive.
It was during this drive that Ayrton sprung a leak. The water pump became incontinent and we quickly found that it only leaked seriously when the engine was turned off. We took to filling Jerry cans full of water and topping up every 50 miles or so.
Phil 'Philis' Barker waiting for a ferry
We caught countless ferries on our way to Bergen - it's a great way to see the Fjords.
Racing the Evo-esque Audi 80 down the Trollstigen Pass
Day four saw the journey from Bergen to Trondheim.
We loved the amazing Trollstigen Pass, a true driver's Shagri-la and comparable to the Stelvio Pass. It zig-zags down the side of a huge Romsdal mountain, into the valley and up again to the summit of another huge mountain - I should have counted the hairpins but there were dozens of them!
Trollstigen, translated literally, means path of the Trolls. These are mountain-dwelling, goat-consuming, mythical, bearded creatures that feature in Scandanavian folklore.
Cooling down the cooked brakes
The rigours of the Trollstigen Pass were nearly too much for Ayrton's brakes. The whole way down and back up we were laughing at the smell of someones brakes cooking - turned out they were ours!
Ray Mears-style field-dressing to the exhaust - spot the Red Bull tin
By then the exhaust was blowing and we sounded like a Works Manta with bangs and pops on the rev over-run.
It sounded great echoing off the mountains.
We lost a bit of power so we decided to administer a Ray Mears-style field-dressing to the exhaust using exhaust putty, chicken-wire and one of the many jumbo-sized Redbull cans that were rolling about in the car.
There has to be a Torro Rosso punchline there...
following the 'Turtle-Power' Volvo into Trondheim
The weather begins to turn on the road to Trondheim - it had been sunny and pleasant until then. We'd even managed to get 'trucker's arm' style sunburn. However a huge deluge of rain was pre-empted by a thunderstorm accompanied by huge hailstones.
Gaffer tape was our friend on this adventure
Finally arriving in Trondheim, we set up camp in the car park of the local Ikea with the Bad Girls and got some rest before the final push to Bodo the next day.
We' kept a video diary of the entire trip and I'll post it up once it's been edited.
Day five saw the final leg to our journey; Trondheim to Bodo.
By now our coolant and exhaust problems were becoming serious and it became evident that we weren't going to drive Ayrton home. To complicate matters, our car had now developed double incontinence; a small fuel leak had the potential to become downright dangerous.
Our only answer was to get another car in Bodo.
The further North we limped, the colder the weather got and the steep mountains along the route meant that we were losing coolant only slightly slower than we could pour it in.
The Torro Rosso exhaust system was now noisier than ever.
By our calculations, we'd be entering the Arctic Circle at about three in the afternoon.
If our car made it...
Maso at the Arctic Circle Centre
As luck would have it, we arrived at the Arctic Circle Centre bang on time.
We'd made it that far so the next stop would be Bodo (if you didn't include the twenty stops that would be necessary to stop the engine from blowing up).
Bodo in sight at last
Five hours later and we had Bodo in our sights. We'd been looking forward to the 'wrap party' and the only proper hotel of the trip.
Another Irish team celebrates
Success! We're among the first of the arrivals in Bodo - the finishing point of the rally.
It's raining champagne and the locals are not exactly welcoming us, but standing about wondering what the Hell is going on.
Celebrations well underway
Team Turtle and the 'Naughty n Nice... and Martyn' team were soon to arrive with the rest of the pack.
Celebrations were already well underway.
Awards at the wrap party
The awards ceremony took place later that night in a local bar - some of us still managed to get drunk despite the mad price of beer.
The Bad Girls even got a special award for completing the challenge, despite the adversities they experienced with their bus breaking down.
Thanks for the cow car!
Maso and I had chosen our car for the return journey. One of the teams had a Volvo S40 that had been painted up in the style of a Fresian cow and fitted with a moo-ing siren.
They saved the day with their cow car.
Thanks Mr Johansen! Keep us updated on Ayrton's new life as an Ice Racer!
Next morning as we were checking out, the City Hotel's manager, Stein Aage Johansen innocently enquired about the rally. The result of this conversation was that Mr Johansen became the new owner of a slightly worn, black and gold Mercedes C-Class.
It turns out that he's an enthusiastic ice-racer. Every Winter, all the lakes freeze and locals take to the ice in rear-wheel drive cars.
We were delighted by this revelation - Ayrton had found his true calling! By November, he'd be doing Scandanavian Flicks in the place where they were invented!
He even gave us our lunch as thanks!
Cheeky!
We'd had an incredible time on our trip to the Arctic but the return trip was still ahead of us. We decided to make a couple of stops along the way, the first of which was Neumunster, North of Hamburg, where the Bad Girl's Bus was parked.
We witnessed amazing mechanic, Phil Barker dismantle and reassemble the engine of the Renault Traffic van at least four times before getting it started.
Pink nail polish and engine oil...
Special thanks go to the management of Auto Tiel Unger in Neumunster who let us use their carpark, tools, bathroom and showers. They also kitted us out with T-Shirts.
Thanks also to Heino Nohrden of Autohaus Suverkup Renault Dealership in Neumunster who sourced parts for the Bad Girls and generally took care of us, even to the point where he was calling round after work!
Neumunster in general was a fantastic place - we became a local attraction.
Feckin Flintstones and the Bad Girls unite
The amazing Phil got the van started and we all headed to Amsterdam for a couple of nights to relax.
Mason and Hume meet Santa
It seems that Santa got wind of the fact that we couldn't make it to Lapland, so he came to us to collect the kids letters that we'd brought!
Maso repairs another exhaust
The rest of the journey home was fairly uneventful, the cow car held out well (except for another blown exhaust which we mended with a non-Redbull exhaust bandage.
The Scandanavians love their cars, especially classic Americana.
We got so many photographs of classic cars that it's probably going to be another story.
As for the bikes...
A garage hotdog
We ate nothing but hotdogs and moose-burgers all the way through Scandanavia.
Maso - in love
Maso even found time for a little romance....
Maso - sleep deprived. Sleeping is illegal in Amsterdam
We're still talking despite Maso's Olympic-standard snoring and my 'fuel-inefficient' driving on the Autobahns.
Bob - breaking the law by sleeping in Amsterdam
We got time to recharge on the return journey.
Bob - inside an engine
We took a crash course in roadside car repairs.
The elements of a staple diet
We kept our fridge well-stocked with the essentials...
...had a few pints (at 50p a mouthful)
Made lots of friends
Wrestled a gorilla...
made Dave wear a silly hat...
...and saw Phil's arse more times than can possibly be considered healthy.
Our deepest gratitude to all those who donated to our charity, Action for Children, sponsored us and generally helped us out:
Mulsanne Casinos
Feckin Irish Whiskey
Crown Limousine Hire
Arlene Creighton from Action for Children
Sue and Neil Thacker from Scally Rally
Barbara Carroll
Nicky and Diane Mason
The Whitehead Over 50's Club
John Johnston from Caledonian Trucks, Prestwick, Scotland
Stein Johansen from the City Hotel, Bodo, Norway
Heino Nohrden from Autohaus Suverkrup, Neumunster, Germany
The Bad Girls - Mattie Pears, Gary McKevitt and Phil Barker
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