About a year ago or so, just about the time that we were getting into full fundraising for the Mongol Rally, I received an email from Tommy Heitkamp. Tommy and I grew up in the same sleepy Vermont town, Orwell. He lived less than a mile down Old Stage Road from my house.

While prepping, I received quite a few emails from people stating their desire to do the rally the following year. For the most part, I dismissed these statements, doubting that very many people would follow through. Tommy expressed the same ambition and for some reason I truly believed he would. When you come from Old Stage and a family as amazing as the Heitkamps, you just don't make idle declarations. True to form shortly after my return from Mongolia, I met up with Tommy to discuss the trip and the realities of the "greatest adventure in the world." The average person would be turned off by tales of being smuggled off borders and cars disintegrating at speed. Tommy just soaked it in and came out of the conversation more hardened in his resolve to participate in the 2007 Mongol Rally.

He has teamed up with a fellow Middlebury College grad, Joya. I have yet to meet Joya, as she is currently living in Sri Lanka, but from what I have heard Tommy could not have chosen a much better traveling companion.

It is with much pleasure that I welcome both Tommy and Joya to the Bad Colonies family as they start their journey to Mongolia. It is a tough road to travel and they will need all the support they can get. Please take the time to welcome them on their very own site, Team Ironsides. Perhaps the infamous leg will make another trip to Mongolia, continuing the tradition that Mrs. Tigglywinks and Lil' Larry started last summer. I am only a tiny bit jealous.

Good Luck and Good Travels - Seth.

A recent interview with a Sunday Paper about the Mongol Rally allowed me the chance to promote the Pan-Am.

Great racers go mad for charity by Caroline Smith, The Sunday Sun

"In Kazakhstan the terrain was very rough, there are basically no roads and we were trying to change tyres to help the suspension but the jack slipped out and almost punctured the fuel tank.

"We only had room to take clothes in a little sports bag and we only showered about four times throughout the month-long trip, so it was pretty disgusting.

"We were dirty and smelly and had long beards."

Let's get the show on the road!

Only 18 months or so to go, so let's get the show on the road!

a) What vehicles should be used? $ limit?

b) Intended month of departure?

c) we could have the launch on Hollywood boulevard, anyone good friends with Arnie?

d) possible charities to raise money for?

The Rickshaw Run is well underway in India. It is put together by the same crazy folks as the Mongol Rally. I snooped through some of the teams blogs and found the following. Enjoy

From Curried Away Team Site
"In the spirit of throwing caution to the wind, we also abandoned any ideas of not eating roadside-cooked food - opting to sample the delights of a curry somewhere on a hillside village. Yam, Curry, Eggs and spices all combined for a fabulous first meal on the road, with no ill effects (even after having doggy-bag seconds the following morning, and slightly fetid thirds the following lunchtime, once the temperature reached the thirties.)"

From the Good Korma Team Site
"there are 3 distinct odors so far in India:

one is of a city on fire.
one is of a city made of sandlewood on fire.
one is of a city built on the raw sewage and dead bodies of all those who have come before... on fire."

From the Boondogglers' Blog

From the Beagle Babies New Zealand Team Site
"10km west of jabalpur. we’ve all lost track of time. unsure at any point what the day or date is. today has been a very long one following last nights spiritual and soulful blessings that clearly didnt work. despite 400km of progress we had a rough old time after squeezing the limits of indian cartography, heard the vibrations of more missing bolts, discovered a true paper-only road, broke down twice (ran out of fuel twice in one day…) and received directions from an old man 13 times and still got it wrong. free oranges, a 2 kilo paw paw and 5 packets of biscuits in our bellies we destined upon the best dahl in the worst town."

I ended up watching the ole Mongol Rally this morning and figured it was worth reposting for others. Crazy times. Crazy. Check out all of the videos on the Mongol Rally Video Page

Patrick's photos have been developed, more to come.

It has been an entire month since I made my triumphant return from Ulan Batar and I just barely went through the minature mountain of video. I was creatively drawn after the website retweak and was less than optimistic about the quality of the footage we pulled. Its tough, when you are caught in the moment the last thing you want to do is stick a camera in someone's face. For a large portion of the trip, the cameras kicked around in the dust, grime, and trash at our feet in the Fiestavus. Its a miracle they survived, let alone captured a significant quantity of tape. Three days ago, I finally felt up to sifting through the 15 hours of Mongol Rally. I found a trail of evidence reminding me just how out there and unique the trip was. I pulled 6 minutes from the mini mountain into the below video. The meat of it is made up of 3-4 second clips loosely hobbled together in no particuliar order. Most of you are American, so this style will work well with your TV inspired attention spans. Its a quick representation of the rally in my mind, complete with an adequate amount of disorder. All the tapes are getting shipped to Harbinger Productions tomorrow so this will be it for new vids for awhile.

The video is set to "I will be home soon" by Sven Curth. This song, beyond all others, became the theme song for the Fiestavus. We chose to listen to it at the worst of times and the best. If you have not already, please check out Sven's CD me and JIM....

I am heading off to Italy on Saturday for a quick trip and will report back on the journey. Remember Hank III on Oct. 6th in Boston, we'll see you there. - ciao ciao Seth

Check out all the currently uploaded videos from the rally here

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TPS Report: England - Interviews and Wiffle Ball
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date:07.21.06
current location: Settle Down Inn, London, UK
mileage:0
price of gas: 97P per litre ($7.60 per gallon)
temperature: Jen says it susposed to be better than yesterday, the man on the BBC says 31 C in the big city.
comments:
Let's just say that its hot here, temperature wise and even more so politically. Jen and I walked by two fairly aggressive protests, one pro Palestine and one pro Israel. The bobbies were well represented at both which was appropriate considering the back and forth with the spectators was fairly heated. A few blocks up the road, we encountered another raised voice conversation taking place around a news stand. Honestly, this is as tense as I have seen it in Europe, its a tension you can actually feel. As my good friend Ernie likes to quote from Lily Tomlin, "Things are going to get a lot worse before they get worse." More to come, I am sure.

Vaughn and Dominic rolled up on the hotel around 8 pm or so and all bowed in awe. I was so overcome with joy that I may have started crying, its tough to tell. Its really difficult to convene in words how crap these cars are. The SEAT made me breakdown in a massive fit of laughter. I mean, one person could pick up the engine in their hands. The lads found out the SEAT is actually 843 CC. As the Brits would say that's bloody small.

Being proper rally participants, we conducted our first meeting on foreign soil at the pub. Real monumental stuff was worked, yo know wiffle ball rules and the ins and outs of the video diary portion
of the trip. Then we drank the beer, then we joined a flock of Aussie ladies and headed to the "club". I feel safe saying that some dancing occured. Upon our triumphant return to the hotel, Jen and I went on a mission to locate mayonaise for our room service. There was one weird dude from Cairo occupying the lobby. There was a lot of babbling from both sides of the conversation. He was quite the name dropper, you know the type, Bin Laden this, Bin Laden that.

Its morning, the team is packed into our shoebox in eager anticipation of our interview for Mongol Rally "The Movie".

Here's some notes from the morning.
Its been said that the rally is "very organized, very safe", I have my doubts. Vaughn and Dom seemed to have learned quite a bit up North, great stuff like cake apparently is good for flesh wounds and "leave no trace" which in rally terms means firebomb your car if you must leave it behind. Jen's still reading the book of liar. Just capital.

The rally was hot, not hot like Paris would but hot like sweltering. Our hotel room is small and it gets exponentially smaller when you squeeze six people with a camera and a mic boom in. We had to turn off the fans for the interview which created a sauna like experience. There were some memorable moments from the interview. Jen got to explain the poop shovel, Vaughn had some really classic lines, and I sounded like an idiot. You will have to wait for movie to learn the rest.
Later in the day, it was concluded that we should make coffee. By concluded I mean I thought was a bright idea and no one complain loud enough to stop me. We are not just talking the ole coffe maker, we are talking combustible gases, lighters, minor explosions and singed arms. Yup camping on Oxford Street.

So I am sitting at the bar right now in the midst of the send off party. The reality of this whole deal is starting to set in. We are awaiting the MOT for the fiesta, basically this means we do not have an inspection for the car and this may affect our entry.

*******************************************************
Seth's bag of poo
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Subject: Seth's bag of poo
From my bag -
1 broken camera
1 non functioning camp stove
1 sporadic minidisc player
1 stolen lighter
1 broken coffee mug
and we haven't even hit the road.

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Hurry up and wait
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We are sitting in Hyde Park waiting for the Mongolian Car passport stamp. There are some dark clouds on the horizons but spirits are high with the many participants. We are definitely lagging behind in the sponsor department. Just about every team has their car covered with stickers from their various sponsors. We started scribbling with paint sticks to try to fit in. We definitely have some of the worse cars here. That's reassuring. The MOT arrived for the fiesta and the Mongolian entry deposit is settled. We continue to wait, I will write again once we hit the ferry. Nathaniel on location in London.

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Out of London
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We have successfully navigated our way out of London. Vaughn has started breathing again. The send off was pretty cool, a lot of spectators, everyone was very friendly and excited to see some Americans out for the trip. We met up with the team from MIT, The Technomads. They were some great guys and very funny. The guy from Afganistan did a phenomenal impression of George Bush. Jen got it on camera. Classic. We did another interview with Simon and Jon from Harbinger for the documentary. I sounded like crap. Whilst waiting Dom and I took a few swings with the ole wiffle ball bat. I broke my flip flop. Finally all the documentation was in order and we were off. The crowd cheered as we drove off into traffic. They cheered again when we came around again having been foiled by a round about. There were some tense moments and strange looks but eventually we made it out successfully. We have a 6:45 pm ferry to catch from Dover to Calais, then onto France, Belgium, Ge!
rmany, finally ending up in Prague for a party tomorrow evening.