Lee and I have spent the last year getting ourselves organized and ready for this event. This includes the usual papaerwork with Visas, vaccinations, collecting the vast array of meds to help with ‘Delhi Belly’ and generally making sure the car will ‘go’ and come back in one piece.
The car was a big undertaking. Since our last rally entries in the Peking to Paris event (www.pekingtoParis.net) we had a couple of years of greating travels with the Bentley in France, Scotland and England covering many miles on the same tired engine and worn tires that brought us through the Gobi desert. After one of its last trips the car was consuming more oil than gas with every fillup! We knew that the long delayed engine overhaul was needed. We left the car in the able hands of the crew at ‘The Priory’ and started a year long project to rebuild the engine.
It was’t until we had disassembled the internal components that the sad state of the engine became readily apparent. It meant that all the major internal moving parts would likely need replaced or significanllty reworked…. a long and expensive proposition. At that point we decided we should repair the sagging running boards (bent and twisted under the load of hundreds of gawkers and spectators that used them to jump in board to check out the car.
Carl, our man at the Priory, had spent a considerable amount of time sourcing parts and engine components, he even managed to find some original new Bentley pistons (I don’t know who he had to bribe for those!!). It was well on 8 months after the original strip down before the engine began to take shape again.
When finally put back together it looked fabulous and we promptly drove it off to Portugal to join the wedding of Desmond and Julie. They had a great time with it after the wedding driving the coast of Portugal, Spain and Basque country……there was the small matter of some overheating along the way….but I don't think it spoiled the honeymooning….!
