July 31st Now to do some serious driving

We drive through the night and Marvin sits at a comfortable 60mph on the flat lands of Belgium, but as we start hitting the mountain ranges of Germany the speed drops to 45mph in 3rd on the upgrades, and then swooping downhill and building up speed for the next climb. 4am and its time for more fuel and Neil takes over the driving after a double espresso while Jan washes down her medication with a hot chocolate. It turns out to have been a bad move. As Jan sleeps Neil drives through the endless ranges of hills, in and out of banks of fog giving the drive an eerie feel. An hour or so into the drive the sky starts to lighten, with occasional sights of pink streamers of cloud, only to be blanked out by the next bank of fog, but by about 7am the sun broke through and we enjoyed our favorite time of day. 8am and time for yet more fuel and a change of driver. Neil remembered that there was a hundred pound fine if you run out of petrol on the autoban so we got a 1 gallon can just in case. We also check tyres and oil, and are pleased to see we aren’t using too much oil. Neil is totally wasted and falls asleep almost immediately. Then wakes up a short while later to find us heading into a petrol station. Jan’s tablets haven’t worn off and she has almost fallen to sleep twice at the wheel so sensibly decides is time for a one hour sleep break.
It’s 10am and Neil gently wakes Jan up to see how she is feeling. Fully recovered - Jan sets off behind the wheel and Neil goes back to sleep! He wakes up to see a junction looming and Jan asking which way we should go, apparently she had been trying to wake me for a while.
Without a second thought I decide on a road... the wrong one as it happens! But after a quick bit of map reading we were back on the road to Prague. With half a tank of gas I tell Jan not to bother pulling in at a station to fuel up. Mile followed mile, new roads appeared to connect the German network to the Czech one, but it seems when they did the route no one remembered to build petrol stations. 80 miles later and there is still no sign of petrol and the gas gauge has been sitting on empty for a while.

Spotting a bus stop we pull in and untie the recently purchased jerry can and pour 5 litres of petrol into Marvin. Just then we are joined by Matt and Andrew (Baron Von Ungen Sternberg’s Revenge) who are the first car we have seen since we set off. They are also going north and after a chat we set off soon to be overtaken.
Oh and they tell us that Mongol mini were 200 miles from Prague at 8am!

At the border they take our passports and ask us to pull over and wait..... We wonder what’s wrong but he soon comes over with them and we are on our way. Need to buy carnet to use motorway but in typical comecon style there are half a dozen places offering them as well as currency. Eventually we get it for 200 cz and with some funny money in our pockets we set off (39 cz to pound).

50 miles out of Prague we get phone call from Leonard. They have arrived at The Bohemian Bagel (our first check-point) and the staff there have no idea what he’s on about but will wait for us.

We get into Prague centre and find Malokowska park. Looking at the map we must be close to the checkpoint but can we find it? We stop locals and with much waving of arms get directions it’s only a couple of minutes away and one more accosted cabby gets us to The Bohemian Bagel and Leonard is parked outside!

Just then Paula the Panda and two other teams arrived – we enjoy a beer and a chat then head back to our car.

We spot Gassed up Geysers arguing with a local about parking and they still think we going to Tashkent as the third checkpoint whereas the rest of us think its Samerkand.. time alone will tell!


Before we set off we decide to fix our charging set up only to find Neil has left the pliers in that bus stop. So we stop in every petrol station we pass looking for replacements. We also investigate the stereo and work out how to get the front speakers working... giving us real surround sound, we can hear over the engine! We end up buying a leatherman copy which is a rip off for 195kr (less than a fiver). 15 minutes work and we have a charging system and the phone can go back on! Jan celebrates by texting many people. We will leave the sound system set up till later. We spend the rest of our currency on 200 Malboro for bribing police, and some food for us.

When we come to a little town called Hradek Kralove we spend half an hour trying to get away from it, at one point every direction leads to it even though we are driving away from it! Then we see a sign for a motel and decide we will stop for to the night 30 miles from Polish border. It has the most miserable receptionist but a lovely room facing the main road for £17. We nip to the petrol station to fill up and buy some beer and wine to celebrate. We must have been tired because one of Neil’s beers turns out to be alcohol free. We realize we have no bottle opener so we drench ourselves in wine opening it! And then to bed!!