Mini World Adventure Part 4

We then just crossed into Malawi one of my favourite African countries. We drove south beside the beautiful Lake Malawi to Lilongwe the capital where we met Mary and Tony’s wife and children.

Malawi was a special place as it was the country chosen by Save the Children fund to trail their eradication program of Polio. A cold chain is required to keep the vaccine and the correct temperature and this was running very successfully with an over 100% immunisation rate (mothers were bring children across the boarder to have the vaccine). We were taken to a Polio School run by an Italian vicar, children had boards with little wheels on and dragged themselves sometimes up to 5 miles to the school as they could not use their legs.They performed a show for us and at the end we gave out pencils and 'Fly the Flag' balloons, blowing them up and giving them to them so they flew in the air.
It was an extremely moving day and we really felt that all the money we could raise would be going to an fantastic cause.

Malawi is a beautiful country and very varied, from the mountains and tea plantation, jungle and of course the wonderful lake.

 We managed a few days rest at a place called Monkey Bay on the lakeside staying in little thatched huts, it was absolutely idyllic and so called, as we found out in the morning, when the monkeys came down and stole our fruit left out from the night before!

By now our second cameraman had left and returned to the UK with the Save the Children fund staff, this meant that Mary could ride with me and Joan and the children with Tony. It was fantastic to have Mary with me as we drove through southern Zambia into the recently renamed Zimbabwe. In the evenings we stopped beside the road, put up our tents and just listened to the sound of Africa. 

The Border between Zambia and Zimbabwe had recently seen some very fierce fighting, we stayed and a rundown holiday camp that still had bullet holes in the walls a reminder of what a volatile area we were in. The actual crossing was over Kariba dam, a fantastic structure producing vast amounts of cheap hydroelectric power for both countries. It was not the only sign of a more affluent society, the roads were improving and Harare was a very modern city, although it was difficult to navigate as all the road names had recently been changed, so maps were wrong and asking directions was also fraught. We did a little PR work here for our sponsors and Save the Children Fund and headed south again.

Crossing into South Africa was like coming back to Europe, the bridges, tunnels and road network was just fantastic we could really cover the miles and soon arrived in Johannesburg. We were really treated here by Compair and put up in one of the top hotels; it was pure luxury after what we had endured over the past several months. It was not all play, British Leyland had just re-launched the Mini back into South Africa so were very interested to get some photos. We arranged to meet at the Joburg Lion Park.

We just took one car; Mary and I were asked to drive through the park, occasionally stopping when instructed by the photographer from his car we were following. This was going well until the Lions decided they would attach the little Mini. When Lions attack a Mini I can tell you the car feels very very small. 

They sniffed the front and rear of the car, put their paws on the roof and rubbed their cheeks against the windows.

Mary's window was slightly down and I said to wind it up, she asked me which way made it go up, I couldn't remember so we left it as it was as we didn't want to wind it down any more! We drove forward slowing and they then fully attached the car eventually biting through the front tyres meaning we had to be rescued by the wardens. Looking back this is so ironic, after crossing the whole of Africa we had to come to a park to be attacked by the wildlife!

We then drove south again, mile after mile of straight road though cowboy like countryside towards Cape Town, we had a couple of weeks before the boat left to South America and we very lucky to have been offered help by British Leyland to rebuild the cars at their ‘special development workshops’. 

This was a dream for me, working with some very clever technicians with all the help and special equipment required. We changed the 1000cc engines to 1275 Cooper S units, new sump guards, exhaust systems and air intake systems were designed and built especially for the cars. 

The roof rack on Jack were 'beefed up' and by the time we had finished the cars were ready for anything. At this time South Africa was under the minority white rule and many Africans were protesting, I can remember ringing home and my parents being very worried that they had seen rioting on the TV from the same street I was working on, but I saw none of this.

The cars were finished just in time but the ship changed its destination to Port Elizabeth, by now we had found our third cameraman, Martin Stubbins, so the three of us drove the cars via the garden route up the east coast.

Mary and Joan flew up and waited for us to arrive.The scenery was fantastic and it was good to 'run' the cars in, the only problem we had was one morning we woke to find the glass sun roof had shattered. We were not sure if someone had tried to break in, this was unlikely as we were sleeping next to the cars, or the low temperature had caused it. we were unable to get a glass replacement so had a plastic one fabricated, but suffered from water leaking through it for the rest of the trip. When we arrived we were informed that the ship was now going to dock in Durban, so we drove north east again..

The cars were eventually loaded onto the ship to Uruguay and we had a couple of weeks with our loved ones in Durban. Mary and I found it difficult to live with the apartheid system, the beach was segregated into White & black, and we tried to catch a bus but were not permitted on any of the black or coloured buses. Durban itself it a beautiful city, the politics were not.