Well, we made it safe and sound to our starting point of St Omer. Setting off at 9am on Thursday morning, with the rain beating down, we had a good run down to Dover in plenty of time for an early lunch and to make our ferry across the channel, when the sun also made an appearance!

Just short of an hour's drive and we were checked into our hotel and it didn't take us long to register for the rally and get to know some of our fellow scallies over a few well-deserved drinks in the local watering hole! Par for the course, a few turned into many, and there were a few delicate heads on Friday morning.....

...none the less, we were on the start line for 9am ready for the carnage to begin, Mike with wig in tow! There are some fantastic cars participating, and some great themed ideas and there was a great buzz about when the sirens sounded to indicate the start of Scally Rally 2008.

Despite a long day of driving (we have covered 630 miles so far), we had a good drive down to Basel, although we had a minor hiccup just near Epinal, when the master cylinder connecting rod came away, leaving us without a clutch. Graham, our mechanic performed minor mechanical miracles, and saved the day by taking a washer from the front wing and fashioning it into a retaining device to get us back on the road! Mike passed him the spanner, thereby laying claim to performing a minor minor miracle! We passed many rally cars and took plenty of photos for our first day's challenge, which was to take photos of other scally rally cars in motion! Once we got passed Nancy and off the motorway, we went through some beautiful towns and it really was a lovely drive. Mike has come up trumps with some of our favourite tunes, the banter was flowing, and it didn't take long for the delicate heads to recuperate, so that we were all back on fine form and ready to meet up with our fellow scallies and share stories of the first day's adventures!

Photos have been uploaded and are available HERE ;O)