Making Aliyah: It's all going along spiffingly old chap...

Day 3: It's all going along spiffingly old chap...

Let's be honest; mishaps, disasters and fallings out make for better reading. Otherwise newspapers wouldn't do the business they do without the constant flow of junkie celebrities having nervous breakdowns or natural disasters wiping out entire populations. Sadly dear readers (of which by now I am sure there are thousands ;) ) Day 3 did not contain any fallings out, near death experiences or mechanical disasters. In fact one could say (despite one of the roads on our route being closed) that day 3 of our mission to Jerusalem could not have been any more perfect.

Myself and Aly were on time for breakfast, the cars looked fantastic lined up along the front of Chateau de Gily

And we were confident that would could once again squeeze at least 100 miles out of our pitifully small petrol tank. Lunch at Restaurant Des Gottes in the depths of a beautiful gorge with soft flowing waterfalls and and beautiful wildlife ( I am referring here to my good friend Alan the furry Zionist caterpillar I met on a leaf as I walked up the side of the gorge) was wonderful; made more so by the fact that we no longer required a round of applause from our fellow rally participants for coming in 2 hours late looking like we'd run there from London. We weren't on time... WE WERE EARLY!! In fact even the 1923 Buick which had reached the chateau at 12.30am the night before, had no problems getting to our pit stop and a genuine round of applause was reserved for Mark and Ronny for sitting down for a meal with everybody else for the first time since the journey began.

I will leave you dear readers with the top 5 things myself and Aly have learned so far.

1. 1948 Rolls Royces need a lot of care and attention.

Especially when being prepared for 2 complete putzs to drive half way round the world with. Making sure that fuel can get to the engine is key before setting off (I'm not bitter about our day 2 experience.... honestly I'm not / I definitely am)
2. The JNF can not really be classed as a truly Jewish organisation. Yes of course they do some fantastic work for Israel and are a cornerstone of British Jewry. However they seem to go by a clock that I wasn't aware existed within Jewish circles: GMT. Everyone and everything is on time and sometimes even early! We have learned that the hard way and as we speak I am hurriedly writing this to ensure I am not the last one to breakfast again.
3. Myself and Aly actually get on quite well. I can only speak for myself, but I am pretty sure Aly isn't plotting to run me over with the Roller during our quieter moments on the open road.
4. The enormity of making Aliyah still hasn't hit us yet and neither of us can quite believe that all this is really happening. To think that in just over two weeks time we will be starting out on new lives in a new country seems ridiculous as we wind our way round the leafy foothills of the French and Swiss Alps.
5. Dudy Starck (the man who made all this happen and to whom we are very grateful) from Nefesh b'Nefesh is the next star of Israeli musical theatre

We'll speak to you next from Italy. . .

Yan