On 11 and 12 November 2023 I went to the briefing where everyone who has entered the Peking to Paris Motor Challenge gathers.
From Kansai Airport via Korea to Amsterdam and on to England. As ever, getting a cheap ticket means hunting for routes and working the air miles to save money.
I normally leave the country for a rally, and since there was no driving this time, both my mood and my clothes were rather more relaxed.
The Peking to Paris Motor Challenge is organised from England.
The meeting point, the British Motor Museum at Gaydon, holds the world’s largest collection of historic British cars — over 300 vehicles of British motoring heritage on display.
Queuing at the desk after arriving, I met again the people I had driven with on the warm-up events.
I cannot speak English at all — and for all that, perhaps we did communicate?
Everyone remembered me:“It’s great seeing you again!”
The timing crew, the medical staff, the mechanics from the Sahara Challenge in Spain and Morocco,
everyone who supported us then, will run these 37 days with us too.
Naturally the whole briefing was in English. Missing something would be serious — I intended to check it all afterwards with translation software, but for the day I hired a translation device.
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The outcome: it barely worked. So I filmed and recorded instead, and translated an enormous amount of data afterwards. Well — that effort counts for something too.
At the briefing they handed out the official merchandise and the plates to be fitted to the cars for the event. Here? Now? There are months to go before we leave Peking — what happens if I forget it on the day?
But thinking that this plate will run all 37 days with us and be battered by the finish, I found it rather moving, and brought it carefully home.
Along with the official jacket and merchandise, they even handed out the number stickers. Again — disaster if forgotten.
We are number 11, and start eleventh.
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And I checked the entry list properly: one Japanese entry, and we are number 11.
With video: tents, crossing borders, medical matters, the competition itself —
two days so full that my head was bursting.
But —
11 November 2023 was, by my lifetime fortune, my yearly fortune and my daily fortune, a day of results.
A lottery day?
I was not in Japan and could not buy a Japanese ticket, so in the gaps I bought British scratchcards and enjoyed myself.
So — did the vast sums spent on Peking to Paris turn into the American dream?
Enjoy all of it.
Look at this smile: two pounds turned into fifty-eight. That this is the scale of luck I can pull off is part of my charm. |
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This trip was not a rally, so having come all that way we decided to see something nearby before going home — and the next post is a report from Spain.
Look forward to it.
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Komochan will cry with joy.
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Motorsport ranking
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