Last time I was in Brazil was 1992, for the Brazilian Grand Prix at Interlagos. Fond memories of sequential all-nighter’s and flooded garages from a F1 pitlane nothing like what we see on TV today.

This trip I hope will be more relaxed, offering an opportunity like every Marathon Rally, to see massive chunks of another continent glide past the window aperture of a very familiar door frame. Lola, the ’64 356, veteran of the 2010 Peking to Paris is fresher that ever and supposedly sitting in Rio waiting for us now.

We took what we learned from P2P and added even more capability to Lola, the car is lighter, has a more advantageous weight distribution, a more powerful motor and a short but significant list of revisions that will offer even more reliability and durability.

We will be carrying a “Yellowbrick” tracking device and over the next few days, I understand these devices will be activated and any chance of anonymity will be dashed as you will be able to establish exactly where we are and how we are progressing.

Lola will wear car # 5. Driven by Steven Harris, navigated by Hayden Burvill.  There will be an organizers website and blog with reports and results, see H&H Rallies. This blog or our Facebook page should lead you directly there as soon as those specifics are available too.

Time to pack up that small bag of clothes, a few more spares for the car, a razor, a hat and a renewed sense of adventure.

The false start on the 2011 Budapest to Bamako Rally left some unfinished business, much like when Steven and I missed the 2009 London Casablanca because of bungled shipping.

 The remedy is my participation in the World Cup Rally 2012 from London to Capetown.

Looking to recapture the vibe is always a risk, the enhanced recollections of good times past etc, etc, risky business.

I am aiming low, for me the fascination of being on the road takes very few extra props, the alignment of very few priorities, but a willingness to surrender to whatever-happens-next. It takes a few days to get there and then it wont last long enough.

This relatively featureless photo sums up all that in an image. A grass field in nowhere Kazakhstan, a bowl of nutritious but ordinary and unrecognizable food on a plastic plate, a barely cool beer and my dining buddy for the night Erdal Tokcan from Turkey. The exhaustion of the past 7 days is cut through with half a smile for the camera, then our bi-nation conversation continues in the middle of nowhere. This is what I hope to recapture, new friends on the road, exhaustion and the need to accommodate everything that comes along, right now! as it comes along. No extra stopping, no resting, no falling behind, stay just on top of everything, managing enough reserves to keep going and see if that makes you a contender.