In our last update, we had just finished building the outline of the storage units. Do you remember what the steel bars looked like?

Over the last two weeks, Patrick and our friend, Imran, have been cutting wood and putting each piece into place. This is a lot of work! You have to take the time to properly measure everything, buy the proper plywood (it has to be strong and durable enough to last!) and be sure you wear things like safety goggles when cutting out the wood with the power tools. I think Patrick and Imran made a good team! Check out the progress they made....Can you start to imagine what it will look like once all the wood is in place? See the photo galleries for more photos.

The other good news is that Patrick finished building the shelves for the back door! The shelf on the left hand side has a place for a plastic sink bowl. This will be really useful for washing dishes, and washing your face after a long hot day.The shelf on the right hand door will mostly be used for food prep--cutting vegetables, making sandwiches, etc. We even have 2 special racks on each door so we can store our everyday items- salt and pepper, spices, tea, sugar, washing brushes, soap, etc. Why do you think having these racks will make our everyday cooking and camping easier?

Did you ever notice what country our license plates are from?

If you guessed right, you know that the car does not have UK license plates. But, to register your car in the UK, your car has to go through a test at the mechanics shop called MOT. To pass MOT, your car has to meet the British road and environmental requirements to drive on their roads. Can you think of one reason a car from mainland Europe may need an adjustment for the UK Roads...

Hint...what side of the road do you drive on in the UK?

If you guessed right, you know that the Mog's steering wheel is on a different side than cars in the UK...which can mean that the headlights could shine in the wrong direction on the road. This is one thing the mechanics needed to change on the Mog (after all, we don't want drivers here to be blinded by our car headlights!)

But only if it were that easy! We found out about that there was only 1 big thing that needed to be changed for us to pass the MOT test....the brake lights.....

If you take a look at our brake lights (originally from 1966!), you will see the top is Amber color and the bottom is red.

Question for you...what is the typical color for tail lights on new cars when you hit the brake? White? Amber? Red? Green?

If you guessed right, you know it is normally red on new cars. But the Mog was made differently. When you hit the brakes, the top Amber light turns on. The red part is used for regular lights you need at night. To pass the MOT, test we had to change this!

So, Patrick and Imran got to work. Neither of them are trained electricians, but they knew what steps it took to figure it out. The first checked out the Mog's wiring diagram... Wow there are a lot of different wires, aren't there?

They then figured out how to make it work. The solution they came up with had to do with rewiring the war time lights--unlike many cars, the Mog has special lights they use in wartime (you wouldn't want the normal bright tail lights if you were trying to hide from the enemy, right?). Patrick reconnected some wires under the hood of the Mog (where the fuse box is), and made a new connection for a new brake light in the back.

The solution worked great! We now have an extra pair of RED tail lights on the back, which light up when we hit the brakes. You can see the new red light up on the photo. This is great news! We now can bring the car back to the mechanic, and hopefully pass the MOT test! Check back this week to see if we passed...

Checking out our ROUTE again-

Remember seeing the route we are going to take through Africa?
(Take a look by selecting the MAP button on the top right of the website).

You can see that the map shows a general idea of the route we want to take. We still need to plan the exact roads (or direction, if there is no road) we will take. But 1st......we did another check on the climate and how much time we had to get through west Africa before the heavy rains set in.

Take a look at the difference between the rainfall in Jan vs. June in west Africa. You can click on the maps for a bigger photo. The dark colors (black, browns) are places of very little rainfall, and the lighter colors (especially the pinks) shows lots of rainfall. If you were planning a route, what part of west Africa would you want to avoid in June?

Monthly average rainfall Maps

January	June

Visas

Do you know what a visa is and why you need it? You can read all about them on the Trip Planning & Prep page.

Since we are heading into west Africa first, we needed to check if there were any Visas that we needed. We figured we could only plan for the first 6 months--do you know why? Many times when you get a visa, you need to specify the dates you will arrive in a country. If you are late in your arrival, you may have to get a new visa (more $$ and time), if you can, or skip that country.

Example: Niger will grant us a 30-day visa. If we went and got a visa at the nearby Niger embassy (in Paris), we need to tell them the date we will arrive in Niger (but we won't be there for 5 months once we leave!) Let's say we estimated we would arrive in May.

If we then arrived in June, the visa we got in Paris would have already expired. We then would have to get a new visa (more time and $$), or we would have to find another route. Do you know why it may be difficult to plan our arrivals so far in advance?

But, after doing our research, we had some great news! We do not need to get any visas beforehand in London for the first 6 months of our trip. We are able to get the visas we need either at the border or in an African country. Stay tuned for more info when we arrive in Morocco. We need to get visas for 2 other countries when we are there--do you know which countries? (Check out the Route Map to make a good guess.)

More GEAR and the MYSTERY PHOTO

We also have been stocking up on all kinds of gear.

Our generator arrived this week. What we will need this for? You can see that it has 950 watts of power. Is this a lot? Hint: Find out how many watts 1 light bulb uses... or how many watts your refrigerator uses... then do a comparison.

And now the MYSTERY PHOTO. Another package also arrived this week.... Do you want to guess what is in it?

Click on the photo for a larger image.

Hint...These will be used on TOP of the Mog. And they need the SUN for power. What are they? Why do we need them?

Let us know your guess by emailing us!