All this talk about traveling vaguely inspired me to tell all those who
care about my first classic car regularity rally.
My wife driving, now she had to listen and I navigating completed our
first rally on Saturday. The rally was bout 5 hours 41 minutes long and
about 280 miles, we were in the novice category so they gave us some
scheduled arrival times. The cars tripmeter doesn't reset so that made
things kinda complicated and of course in South Africa all speeds and
distances were in kilometers which meant converting all round. We left
as car 25 (and finished as car 25) at 9:18 and off we went the scenery
was beautiful bushveld which is out of Africa type scenery grasslands
with scattered thorn trees and such the sun was shining (the top was up
but not the windows) the temp was about 30 C which is hot
We didn't get lost but at times when we were behind I have to admit
doing about 85mph to try to make up lost time, losing time happens very
easily.
We both enjoyed it and the barbecue afterward was great fun, much beer
and win was had by all, accommodation was free for the night in the army
camp.
However going home we had bad luck, driving down the highway at about
85mph, no that's not the speed limit (75mph) while overtaking and then
changing back into the slower lane I saw something lying in the road
which I tried to miss. No such luck in hindsight it was a piece of a
leaf spring which punched a 3 inch hole into the petrol tank, slight
panic here. I pulled over turned off the ignition and coasted to a stop
(I had a full tank of petrol), The local AAA wanted a small fortune to
tow as we were about 50 miles out of town, luckily another rally car
stopped on its way home and towed us all the way a Ford Capri how
humiliating but Was very grateful for the toe.
The moral of the story, I don't know. But we were lucky the piece of
metal didn't a)go through a tire and burst it, b0hit the engine and c0
hit the gearbox.
But anyway a bit of a bummer way to end a nice weekend.
'57 MGA 1500
Safety Fast
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