Day 9

We are sorry that the blog is behind what is actually happening but the Internet connection in our hotels is pretty poor and for some reason does not like blogs, Facebook is ok.
Anyway yesterday we incurred a 17 second penalty, but we are still in 5 th place, which is quite amazing, Julie is now a seasoned navigator, and getting quite stroppy if I don't drive fast enough ( how cool is that ?)
We were 4th but one of the other competitors took the time keeper out for an evening of culture at the ' Ladyboys are Us' bar and some how they are now 4th :)

Today is a rest day and we have been round the temples and markets. The temples are all set in there own ornamental gardens and have a fantastic feeling of  peace and quiet.
In the evening was a most incredible storm, luckily we were in a bar and managed to stay dry but all the lights went off which made the journey home fun.

Another reason the blog is a bit behind is that we have had two major disasters, more to come.
The hotels we are staying at have been fab, and the H&H team brilliant. Over the next few days we come to call on their expertise quite a lot ( I should be a suspense writer)
Looking forward to tomorrow where we drive from Chaing Mai up to the Golden Triangle.

Day 7

It's called the Tiger Rally and has lived up to its name. Yesterday morning we visited the Tiger Temple at 7.00 just after the Tigers had been fed. These are wild tigers being looked after by volunteers to try and save the Thailand Tiger from poachers and big game hunters.

It's an amazing place and humans are encourage ( in more ways than one) to interact with the Tigers big and small. These guys in the photo below are having quite a fight in the water and then a few minutes later Julie and I are stroking one of the biggest. 

One of team put his hand in the wrong place and trust me these are very fast and very powerful cats. They say they should be able to stick his arm back on :)

Moving onto yesterday's test, this was about 19 Klm long up a narrow mountain road, with trucks, cars coaches etc all deciding to use it. Remember what I said about pulling out in front of purple cars, well, it really came into play on this run. We had to average 49 kph, we managed that till the last 50 yes and did not see that the finish line had been moved :( ended up finishing some 17 sec over our time.

However others also had problems and after the 1st week of the rally we have moved UP to 4th which is quite incredible and we are finding hard to believe.

Molly now has proper petrol and is running fine. There should be some great footage of us overtaking a double length truck on a blind bend with a sheer drop on MY side. 

Adrenalin running at 100%, fantastic run followed by some of the most breath taking scenery you could imagine.

Day 6 evening

Just had the results for today's competition, and Molly has won her first ever rally stage. This is down to 100 percent luck :) well perhaps the navigator had something to do with it and of course some amazing driving skills :)
We think we should stop now while we are ahead :) this result lifts us to 5 th overall. The teams in front all do 4 or  5 rally's a year all over the world. We can not believe how well the £10 we  'leant' to the time keeper has paid off :)
Just about to start day 7, lets hope mollys fuel problems are gone now she has cooled down.

Day 6

Hi,   Sorry we have been off air but Internet access is not as good as we had hoped for and for the technical among you Apple and Google systems don't like each other, chuck in the fact that the commands are in Thai :)
Today we started at 5.00 and visited a Tiger Temple, have now fed a baby tiger and played with a full grown 10 year old one, julie wanted to bring a some home for Heather, Becky and Gill :)
We have competed in 3 more very hard test up and down mountain roads with no traffic and some very hard times to match. One car tried a bit to hard and missed a bend completely. Pleased to say the pulled it out of the bushes and it has carried on.
Molly managed all of the test but the last down hill section was a bit hairy with boiled brakes ( shows we were trying)
The results will be out later tonight. Julie has done an amazing job, by the time we had finished the 3 stage she had nearly lost her voice shouting at me.
We have driven 650 Klm today, all along the Burma border, quite stunning.
Over the last 150 Klm Molly suffered from severe petrol starvation. We think this was due to the extreme heat, the very long fast drive and some dodgy Thai petrol. Hopefully she will be ok tomorrow, only 350 Klm tomorrow and only 1 test stage.
We are both very  tired but a glass of wine should fix that.
The mechanics are doing an amazing job keeping some of the other cars going. The only vehicle to be trailered in has been one of their own land rovers :)
Just going to have a look on the Internet to find a car for the round the world rally in 2015 :)
Diner beckons.
On to day 7

Quick update, just finished day 3, bit mixed with 4 cars needing medical attention, very pleased to say Molly is still going well. julie is getting into the swing of this navigation stuff. We have just finished a very hard and very rough stage coming on 1second outside the target time, this was over 21 Km over the roughest roads you could imagine, even put Kents roads to shame :)
We this result we have some how managed to get to 5 th place. Think we should stop now :)
We are staying in an amazing beach side hotel, diner on the edge of the beach was rather pleasant.
Long day tomorrow another early start, we are up at 6.00 quite a record for Mrs H :)
Hope to have some action photos soon, and better Internet connection, this is the hotel in Penang,

What an amazing adventure, two days in and two days of competition and by some strange fluke we are in 7th position. We were 8th yesterday only 4 seconds behind the 1st place team.
The route that this rally is taking us through Malaysia and Thailand is so breathtaking that the competition pales into insignificance. Never having been to Asia before there is just so much to see and wonder at. It's not every day you see a road sign saying 'danger elephants crossing' or a whole family moving house on a Honda 50 motorcycle.
The weather has been a bit unkind either baking hot or monsoon type rain washing down mudslides onto the roads.All this and its only the 2nd day with all the good bits still to come.
Molly is going really well but it seems compulsory for every lorry and bus driver to pull out in front of any purple coloured car, some of them even coming right across the road to have a good look.Tomorrow is a much shorter day allowing us to do a bit of sightseeing and check the cars over. .My technical knowledge is a little limited so will check all 4 wheels are in place and the engine starts that will do us. Julie's navigating has been superb and in two days we have made one wrong turn and guess who's fault that was.
All good fun and on to day 3.
Molly on the ferry out of Penang

The local guard at the hotel, julie wants one like this at home :)

The start of the rally is nearly here and just to give you an idea what is involved our 1st day is to drive from Penang to Krabi some 525 kms.

To travel this distance we will have to AVERAGE 75 kph or in English about 45 mph.
The route is laid out in what is known as a Tulip book, Julie has to keep a careful eye on this and tell me where to go (she is quite good at that ;) ).
Just to spice things up we have competition sections along the way.
Today we have to lap a circuit in one direction,  turn around and lap the circuit the other way round and try and do that in exactly the same time !!
Faster or slower than your first time and you get penalty points, less points is the winner. I think a folded fiver in the timekeepers hand may help :)

This is Julies 1st page in the Tulip book, all those drawings represent a different instruction and that page gets us a whole 12.5 Km, only another 512 km to go.
If we are still talking to each other at the end of this rally it will be a minor miracle :)
The weather forecast looks interesting 30 degrees and rain, lets hope the windscreen wipers work :)