Off to New Zealand in a 1948 MG
Bob and Lynne Douglas and their 1948 MG TC sports car they are diving to China in from Barnsley
WHEN Robert Douglas bought his £150 MG sports car as a teenager more than four decades ago, he intended it to be nothing more than a cheap run-around.
But 45 years later, Mr Douglas and his wife Lynne are set to embark on an epic 30,000-mile journey in their classic 1948 MG TC, travelling from Barnsley to New Zealand via Europe, Russia, China and south-east Asia.
Mr and Mrs Douglas, who met two weeks after the car was purchased in 1966, are set to depart their home in Dodworth, Barnsley, on Wednesday and admit that people say they are “totally, completely and utterly mad”.
Mrs Douglas, 60, said: “We’ve done long-distance touring in the past. We went around Australia in 2002 and in 2008 we drove from the southernmost tip of South America, through central America, up the west coast of America and to Alaska, to the furthest point you can get to in the north in a car.
“We left the car in Colorado and then went back the next year, picked it up and spent three months driving around the USA, ending up in Virginia.”
On their latest trip, the couple will be joined by friends Mark and Sheila Masters, who own an MG that Mrs Douglas describes as “exactly like ours – a virtually identical car.”
She said: “We’ll be going through Europe, heading down through Venice and then through the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and entering Russia between June 14 and 17.
“We’re then driving up through St Petersburg, down to Moscow, through Siberia and crossing into Mongolia. We’ll then drive west to east, ending up in Ulan Bator and then south east to the border with China.
“We’ll spend 31 days driving in China, following the road down south into Laos and then north Thailand, We’ll pop into Cambodia, where we want to see [the temple complex of] Angkor Wat, then south into Malaysia and into Singapore, from where we’ll ship the cars to New Zealand.”
The Douglases accept their MG is bound to break down en route – but say they’re prepared for any emergency.
Extra storage compartments have been fitted to carry not only the luggage and camping equipment for their four-month-long journey, but spare parts for repairs.
“They made 10,000 TCs after the war and most of those were exported to the States. Not many stayed in Britain”, Mrs Douglas said.
“It isn’t exactly a rare car, but it was in limited production. Back in 1966 it was a young man’s cheap run-about, it cost £150 then.
“That’s what men did in those days, they bought these cheap old cars and got hooked. It’s a simple engine, a simple system to fix.”
They have also made arrangements with the MG car club in China, where modern MGs are made, to get any necessary repairs carried out.
Mrs Douglas said: “We’ve had it restored twice and they’re really easy to fix. If we did a trip like this in a modern car we wouldn’t stand a chance if we broke down, whereas with this type of car we can carry basic spares and fix it on the road.
“Mechanics in places like Laos and Cambodia will also know what to do with it – whereas if we turned up with an S-class Mercedes and the central computer had broken, we’d be stuffed.”
Mr Douglas, 64, said he was “really looking forward” to hitting the road. He said: “It’s taken a lot of organising, getting visas and working out how to get money, but now we’ve got that all sorted and our friends are here we’re raring to go.”
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Thursday 23 February 2012
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