Memories of the Hog Charge Team

The first thing really, is to explain who and what the 'Hog Charge Team' is.
'Hog Charge' is the name given to an annual competition held at Peponi School Nairobi, that involves children from neighbouring schools in a cycling competition with a format similar to the official Rhino Charge, raising money through sponsorship towards both Peponi Schools help and contacts with a local orphanage and it's commitment to preserving the essential forests and habitats of the Aberdare's.
This year, the money raised for donation to the Rhino Ark Kenya Charitable Trust was sufficient to sponsor two entries in the Annual Rhino Charge, one entry included Gareth Collier (sports master at Peponi amongst other things) and the other, driven by Mark Tilbury and owned by Ian Mayo, was the team I joined.!

This is a short description of what the Rhino Charge experience can be all about.

Our team consisted of the cars owner, Ian Mayo, the cars Driver Mark Tilbury, navigator Bill Kirk, and three 'runners', myself, Robin Tilbury and Gene Fondemere.

We decided to send our Rhino Charge Vehicle,
     - christened Range Less because in a previous life it had been intended to represent a 4 litre Range Rover, but had not only had     it's rear end removed, but a further 18 inches was cut out of the middle of it's chassis before half it's roof was removed, and     now resembled a Range Rover not in the least, -
by chauffer driven escort to the start of the event - the drivers check in at 9 Am Friday, at the Nanyuki Club, for the first release of the location of the venue for the event. So accordingly, the Range Less was loaded onto its transport, a 3 tonne truck at 10 am on thursday morning, and was on it's way by 11am.

Packing the rest of the equipment we would need occupied us until 3 pm and seemed to involve endless check lists and counts, but finally we were all ready to depart, Ian had arrived on time in his Range Rover, on time at 3pm, Mark made it through the afternoon traffic by 3.15, and we sat for another 30 minutes waiting for the rest of our team, Bill and Gene.

Finally taking our leave of Nairobi we set off for Nanyuki, a small town on the foothills of Mt Kenya, and arrived just at dusk at the Nanyki Arms Hotel. Friday morning followed all too quickly for most of the large crowd of Rhino Chargers with the foresight to stay at the Arms, and many were a little late for check in at the club.

Directions and instructions were issued efficiently and as early leavers from Nairobi were starting to arrive we set off for the Rhino Charge 2001 venue, some 40 kms north west of Isiolo. We had sent the truck carrying Range Less on ahead to Isiolo, having had a good idea, not to mention a tip, that Isiolo would be a starting point, so when we arrived an hour and a half later, we found the truck waiting for us on the side of the road. Turning off onto a rough track we drove for 38Kms into an ever increasingly thick bush, before sighting the 'Mega Dome', a huge semi-circular tent used as the organisers HQ.

With typical efficency competitors and spectators were advised of the location of the scruiteneering and camping area and we soon found ourselves a nice secluded area to camp, while we waited for the lorry to make its way over the terrible tracks. While we were waiting, it was decided that one of us should wait at the site while the others waited for the lorry at the check in site, and I volunteered for the job. Once everone had left, I sat down on one of the bags, and soon noticed a plover running towards me, darting from bush to bush, until finally it stopped about 10 yards away and promptly sat down on what later turned out to be two eggs, half buried in the soil, that it was apparently hatching.

Finally the lorry arrived and Range Less was immediately off-loaded and taken off to scrutineering, while the lorry was coaxed over the dry river beds to the camp site with the rest of our camping equipment including the tents. We moved our campsite so as not to disturb the nesting plover and by 5.30pm had erected all the tents and assigned everyone their berths. By this time the camp site was still filling up, with vehicles driving all around as late arrivals looked for a convenient site to camp, and before long we were closely surrounded on all sides by other camps. This was to prove troublesome later on, as many of the campers were spectators, enjoying many drinks too many through the night and making such a racket that at 2.30am on Saturday morning, Robin and I found ourselves wide awake listening to inane cackles of laughter filtering through the bush from our immediate neighbours.

With a 4.30am start, we had little sleep, and by 5Am were joining the ever increasing stream of competitors travelling to the check in point. The previous evening, competitors had been issued with a 1: 50,000 series Ordanance Survey map of the area, and the co-ordinates of 10 'guard posts' and two 'passage controls' (one at each end of the Gauntlet), and competitors were invited to draw the name of their starting point - one of the guard posts - from a hat.

We chose the guard post sponsored by the Co Op bank and arrived a little after six am. Start was at 7.30 and we headed for our first guard post some 7 km away. Travelling in a more or less direct line through the thick thorn bush, over rough, boulder studded terrain with frequent sign of elephants, we were forced to skirt an increasing number of lugas, - deep gouges in the ground caused by flash flood run-offs, constantly searching for the start of these faults where the ground was firmer and the gap across shallow and manageable. Using our GPS, we calculated we were 400 metres from the hidden guard post, when we came accross a huge luga, some 30 ft deep and at least that many wide. Sending the runners uphill, we searched along it's length when we came accross Gareth Collier, a member of the other Hog Charge entry, who told us he had already run 1.5 km up towards the head of the luga, but had not found it, and beleived we were wasting our time trying in that direction. Changing direction we headed back the way we had come until we encountered some tracks through the bush that we followed until we encountered one of the access routes used by the organisers to transport the control tents and equipment into position, and despite the penalty of increased distance, we followed it to the first control.

Grabbing a quick bite to eat and a cold drink, we set off towards our second chosen guard post, keeping as close to a straight line course as we could. However this was not to be our lucky day, and no sooner had we lost site of the control than the car suddenly cut out. Opening the bonnet we were unable to pinpoint the cause, and after inspecting the electrical connections around the coil and distributor, we were able to start the car and travel a little further before being forced to repeat the process again. Finally we arrived at the guard post, stopped the car to record our distance, and then, when we were ready to attempt our third post, the car refused to start. We changed the coil, condenser and points, and attempted to re-tune the engine several times before we managed to get the engine running, and 3 hours later started towards our third guard post, straight down a steep slope towards some thick thorn bush at the bottom of the hill. We had hardly travelled 200 metres when the car cut out again and, perched precariously on a steep slope we spent another 10 minutes trying to start the car, by which time we decided to reverse it up the slope back to the guard post we had so recently left, which we achieved some 50 minutes after leaving it. After a quick conference we decided our best chance was to head back towards HQ, and if the car's performance picked up, to try and drive to as many of the post using the rudimentary road network set up by the organisers.

We arrived without mishap at a fork in the road, and decided it was worth trying to reach a nearby guard post, hidden at the top of a nearby steep hill, approached by driving over 2 or 3 dry river beds, steep sided with sandy bottoms and difficult to exit, on the second of which two of our team were forced to jump off. Shortly afterwards, the slope became so steep it was considered unsafe to hang on the back of Range Less, and Robin and myself left the car too, leaving Mark and Bill to drive to the top of the hill and register at the guard post.

On the cars return, we all jumped in the back and sped off for the 'Guantlet', a short section between two guard posts that all competitors are obliged to attempt. Invariably difficult, this years choice of location was the only river in the area with water running in it, and although the water level was low, the height of the the sides, and the width between the banks, gave mute testament to the strenght of the river in full flood. The course invloved crossing the river by driving down one bank, accross the water and up the other side. Easier said than done, and to prove to be the ultimate undoing of our attempt, when the car attempted to travel up the distant bank, it hit a huge rock that had become exposed, and tore the rear differential. With front wheel drive only it was impossible to climb the far side and we had to resort to using the front winch, attached to a scrawny thorn tree at the top of the bank. After several minutes of winching the car reached the huge rock and the winch overheated, the cableing inside the engine compartment caught fire and everyone was worried the car would slip back out of control. Finally, with the fire extinguished, we attached a manual Turfor and winched the car to within feet of the top, and even closer to the scrawny thorn tree which was looking increasingly like letting go of it's tenuous hold on the ground. Unable to release the turfor, we turned to a fellow competitor, Jas Singh, who incidentally made it up the bank in his Willis Jeep only moments before our attempt, and he assisted us by getting us over the last few feet to the top.

By this time it was past 5.30pm, the competition closing time and most of the spectators had started to return to HQ. We decided to send one of our team back to HQ to collect the lorry and drive back with it to collect the now imobile Range Less. Fortunately we were near to the camp site used by the controllers of the guard post, and were made very welcome around their camp fire with cold beers, until at around 8pm, the lorry arrived on the far side of the river.

Too late we realised the ground on the far bank, with it's thick sand drifts was most unsuitable for a 3 tonne truck, and before our eyes it became stuck in the sand. We decided to send the accompanying vehicle, a 4wd Pajero round on the access road to our location on the far bank to tow Range Less back to the firmer road, and try to get the lorry out of the sand and back to the firmer road too. Sadly the Pajero got lost on its way round to us, and it was another hour before, with the help of the people at the nearby campsite, we managed to get Range Less hitched up to the Pajero. Meanwhile I was trying to coax the lorry back to firmer ground, and it was distinctly reluctant. Finally, after 2 hours of struggling, we managed to get the lorry turned round and headed off on firmer ground to rendevouz with the towed Range Less. Once again, things didn't quite turn out according to plan, and the broken rear diff intervened when the half shaft decided to seize and we had to stop and remove it.

We got back to HQ just after 12.30 and were happy to find that warm water was available for everyone to shower in, and by 2.30am we had finished a make-shift supper and large number of concilatory drinks.

It had been great fun, but was dissappointing too, perhaps next year we will do better, our final position was 41, the other Hog Charge entry, led by Gareth Collier beat us by 1 point to 40, and together we one the 'Most Meritorious' prize on behalf of the children of the Hog Charge.