This trip had seamed like a good idea six months ago, but with the arrival of July the reality of getting wet and doing the longest trip in the Mojo so far sunk in.

The trip was to be with a group of people who make the annual trip the Le Man, normally to the full 24hr race, this year they were doing the classic in the hope of better weather. I joined them through a work colleague John who has a Caterham. Joining me in the Mojo was Richard a friend of many years more use to being in a Range Rover than the small Mojo.

As there is no luggage space in the Mojo, modifications were made to accommodate a few items. Under the bonnet we managed to fit in the warning triangle, a set of spare bulbs, and a fairly small but comprehensive tool kit, including the hi-vis jackets, and puncture repair can. In the engine compartment brackets were made for 2 tuppaware type boxes, to take a tooth brush, refreshments, and anything else that could be squeezed in. In the cockpit a document wallet was taped to the tunnel, and every thing else stuffed under your legs at the front of the seat squab. The fire extinguisher was taken out of the passenger side to make more space. The car has European cover for breakdowns, Richard was added to the insurance, and the headlights were taped. Wet weather gear consisted of 2 umbrellas and our coats, the only other changes were raising the tyre pressures and checking the oil and water levels.

Departure was on Thursday the 10^th of July, our tent and bags had been passed to John at work on Monday to be carried by the stretch limo that was going with us. So Richard and I did our final packing and set off to meet up with some of the others. Richard drove to the meeting point at the little chef on the southbound A34 Oxford, we were apprehensive about the weather but there were only a couple of short showers before we left, and while we were in the little chef. It’s a bit weird being driven in your own car but every thing performed OK. From Oxford the next meet up point was Gibbo’s pub in Winchester to which I drove following the others, its always fun trying to keep someone in sight when you do not know where you are going. After a great helping of bangers and mash at the pub, it was the final blast to Portsmouth for the ferry, I still don’t like the M27! No Problems getting on the ferry though, and lots of interesting cars to look at.

After a long night in the bar Friday morning saw us arrive in St Marlo, and the good news was that the sun was shining, our meet up point was Dol du Bretage about 20 minutes away. We descended on the market place and took over a poor unsuspecting café. Added entertainment was the fact that our group were in changing into fancy dress! We had 3 nuns (1 pregnant!) a monk, 2 Elvis, French onion sellers, noddy and big ears, 5 arabs, and a couple of cross dressers. I am not sure how we were looked upon by the locals, some where between amusement and bemusement. From here the trip down to Le Man continued with a lunch stop, mostly we travelled as a group of 2 or 3 cars as keeping together proved difficult. The French roads are great to drive and have a lot less traffic. Due to a wrong turn by the car we were following we had a slight detour after lunch. We took the lead and Richard did some excellent map reading, on what was some of the best driving roads of the trip, to get us into Le Man. Once we found our campsite that was the end of driving for a couple of days. Our site and pitches were right next to the circuit, you could see the top of the cars from the tent.

The classic was very interesting cars from the 1920s to 1979, they ran in 6 groups each being about an hour, so each group ran 4 times during the 24hr period, 2 daytime, and 2 night time. Each group got faster as the cars got younger, and when it got to the GT40s you could see how they blew away the opposition, the noise was fantastic.