'Sain bainauu' and 'Tavtai moril'

or 'Hello' and 'Welcome' (for those of us whose Mongolian is a little rusty!)

If you’ve made it this far then you must know a little about the adventure we are embarking upon this summer, in a nutshell:

“How does the greatest adventure in the world sound? What about 10,000 miles, 7 mountain ranges, 3 deserts, bandits, roads ranging from bad to non-existent and all this in a car you swapped for a bag of crisps?”

That’s how the official website describes the Mongol Rally. After some fierce bargaining we had to hand over ₤100 of real money to some chap for our beautiful car, which could have worked out at over 400 packs of crisps depending on what sort of multipack deal you got. His loss I feel!

Essentially it’s a charity rally from Hyde Park to Ulaanbaator, the capital of Mongolia.  The rules state that you must drive a car of no more than 1 litre engine capacity.  There are no other rules.  There is no set route.  There is no back up.  None.

Don't be fooled by the 'Scotland' in the Mercy Corps title, this is just their headquarters, we have an agreement with them that the money we raise will help with their Mongolian projects. We chose Mercy Corps because they do some seriously good stuff in Mongolia’s pleasant pastures including helping develop, diversify and strengthen rural businesses critical to Mongolia's agriculture sector.

The charity doesn’t just hand out aid, rather it helps individuals, families and communities become more self-sufficient.

Any contributions you make will be hugely appreciated.

Thank you

Duncan & Rob