After the excitement of day one and with the teams rested and settling into their various roles and personas on the Rally, one could be lulled into a false sense of security. The Blues Print Brothers hit problems 10 miles outside Cergy with the temperature needle again heading towards the red on more than one occasion. Forced to make a run to the next service station in 24°C heat with the warm air blowers on full chat to ventilate the engine the ADL team had to endure temperatures of 32°C in the car. On arrival Elvis (the cars nickname) dumped what coolant it had left on the forecourt for the second time in as many days. Thankfully help was just 5 minutes away! Step in Steve Birdwood (Clinker) and Anthony Pease to save the day. Before their car (an awesome Nissan 300ZX) had even stopped Clinker was out and under the Legend's bonnet. 25 minutes later and with the offending thermostat removed and mounted on the nudge bar as a war wound Elvis was back on the road. That's to be expected when you buy an 18 year old car from Ebay and could not have been predicted even with the masses of test runs Elvis had before the rally. Rally Organiser, Rob Head, suspects the Legend was ok in practice but developed stage fright during the main show.
Once back on the road the mini convey of The Blues Print Brothers, M.A.D. Colts, A.W.O.L, The Lost Boys, The Beach Boys and Just Japanese headed into the local town of Orleans for lunch. Hands down the best burgers in France, maybe the world! Really pretty place too - if you're on a trip through France I highly recommend it!
With 175 miles to get to the next stop - Clermont-Ferrand and with coolant still in the engine - ADL's Senior Designer Stuart Harcourt took to the wheel of Elvis for the first time in the Rally (and since Rob purchased it back in March!) Happy to report no problems on the long run to the hotel. Kudos to Clinker and all the Blue Print parts fitted which are performing perfectly. We even received a big cheer from the rest of the teams on arrival. Many had been there for some time. A couple of teams even visited the Palace of Versailles - home of Louis the 13th. Apparently he wasn't in.
Spirits are now higher than ever as the teams prepare for the 340 mile trip to Perpignan tomorrow - including the awesome Millau Viaduct - as seen on Top Gear.
The Kia Pride teams continued their weird and wonderful rally by arriving at the hotel an hour after the last car and then preceded to get stuck in the hotels lift! Thankfully they were rescued 10 minutes later by Rob who managed to get the lift door open. Oh for a camera during that situation!
