Retracing classic rally routes on the Col dE Turini involving a borrowed MINI, debacles with Gendarmes and strange uses for gin.
\r\n\r\nA short budget airline flight, declining the microwaved mess masquerading as an in-flight meal, Dr Octane and I landed at Côte d’Azur airport in the south of France. Presenting our papers at the rental desk we collected the keys to our car, I was driving as Dr Octane’s licence has been repeatedly sullied by the dark hand of the DVLA, the car was a MINI. No, the Caps Lock isn’t stuck on this keyboard and I am not shouting. Since BMW’s re-working of Rover’s remnants the ancient but beloved Mini has had a considerable makeover, as you may have noticed, and is now branded as (brace yourself) MINI. \r\n\r\nOur plan was to re-trace the route of the 1964 Monte Carlo Rally and, more specifically, the exploits of perhaps one of the UK’s greatest motorsport underdogs: Paddy Hopkirk. Hopkirk started in Belfast with an archaic Harding 22 donated to him by a local Priest, moving on to win the Rally of Ireland. Then following some success in the UK, he found himself driving a works prepared Mini for British Motor Company (BMC) in the 1964 Monte Carlo Rally. In ’64, the Rally was essentially a long-distance endurance event covering half of continental Europe, with some fast timed stages on largely inappropriate roads towards the end. Hopkirk and his co-driver Henry Liddon had chosen to start in Minsk, then in Russia, chosen simply because they hadn’t been behind the Iron Curtain before. We started in Luton, now in Bedfordshire, simply because EasyJet flew from there. The focus of our roadtrip was on the final leg of that famous rally starting with the infamous ‘Col de Turini’ stage. This became known as the ‘Night of the Long knives’ as yellowing headlamps struggled to penetrate the January darkness a mile high on the mountain stage. Having driven nearly 3000 miles on the Rally, and with many of the entrants already fallen by the wayside, Hopkirk and Liddon got stuck into the stage between the mountain villages of La Bollène Vésubie