Mini Adventure

CAR HORN BEEPS

We were never sure how far we would get.

If nothing else had turned up, I'd have been ready to hitchhike.

Some time tomorrow, we will have done 10,000 miles from London.

-We just knew everything was going to work!

-Amazing, when you think back!

-NEWSREEL:

-'This car was awarded the Dewar Trophy in 1960

'for the most outstanding British technical achievement in automobile design...'

'Twas in 1961, I bought myself an Austin Seven Mini.

It was a very basic Mini - £400 it cost.

Only came on the market about 1958 or 1959 - relatively new.

'It reaches 70 miles an hour...'

Just for running about Donegal.

'The quality-first Morris Mini Minor is the perfect family car.'

We had two shops, a hardware shop and a grocery shop.

Never really thought of that as my future - always had this hankering

to see the world, there was always a bit of a travel...bug in me.

CAR HORN HOOTS

Now, I had no idea that over in London,

there was this fellow from Lisburn, with big plans to go travelling.

I don't think he ever really thought of this as home.

He went to London and I think did his chartered surveying exams.

'Even jam-packed London's no real problem -

'you thread your way through the traffic with complete ease.'

There was a big world out there and he wanted to go and be part of that.

'The Mini Minor's transformed their lives.'

I think the ad in the Sunday Times must have been the starting point.

As I understand it, I think it was my father's idea.

He had placed an ad in a newspaper...

It read, "Young man..."

And I thought, "This looks interesting,"

and sent off a reply to see what was behind it,

and, erm, the plan...got hatched.

I knew Alan and my father wanted someone else to go on the trip,

and coincidentally bumped into David,

who'd been at school with my father.

-DAVID HARVEY:

-Went over to England to work.

Work was scarce in Northern Ireland.

I had met him at a party around Earl's Court,

and he told me about his plans.

And in the heat of the moment, I said, "I'll go!"

Peter had it all set out! We'd sat down and discussed various things,

like, should we carry guns and things like that.

The advice was that if you carried a gun,

you're more likely to be killed, to get the gun,

so we decided we wouldn't do anything drastic like that.

Very little baggage - spare parts, plugs and radiator...belts,

a few bits and pieces like that.

The only modification was, my local garage man, he said,

"I think you should put a steel plate underneath it,

"because the sump is quite vulnerable."

And really, that turned out to be a life-saver.

The plan itself took about a year, but the funny thing was that

the three of us never met up until the night before we left Belfast.

The first night I met Alan was in Belfast, when they were actually

loading the car onto the Liverpool boat.

It was the first time I'd met Peter as well!

They packed it all up together, and we were ready to go.

-ENGINE REVS

-'And away you go!

'You and your baby Austin are bound for fresh, exciting new horizons!'

Well, this was before package holidays came in,

and most people never thought about going even as far as Singapore.

And if they did, they certainly wouldn't have filmed it.

-That picture's certainly a lot sharper!

-Isn't it?

'I've always been interested in movies and film-making,

'so I had the camera and the tripod. It was a Eumig 16mm camera.'

So there, we're off!

# Mi-mi, mi-mi, mi-mi

# Mi-mi-mi-mi, mi-mi... #

The travel rules we set up more or less going through France -

maximum speed 50 mile an hour, nobody drives more than two hours.

That way, there weren't any rows.

I can't remember having any serious disagreements or falling-outs.

Amazing when you think back!

It was so much of an adventure - we were looking forward to it.

We just, er, knew everything was going to work.

Peter adopted all the cooking.

Dave was the mechanic, he knew about cars.

Alan did the photography and the paperwork.

I think I also ended up as, sort of, treasurer, or...

There wasn't a lot of money involved!

But we seemed to end up in those roles quite naturally.

And camping, three of us living in a tent -

the clothes didn't change for long periods of time!

We had a couple of shirts, and every now and then we got them laundered.

But we brought what we called our good duds.

We knew we'd have occasions where we might want to dress up.

Well, my good clothes was a black sweater!

I didn't have a jacket

The idea was to wash it and...wear it!

So we kept it down to as little as possible.

We all wrote home pretty regularly, keep sort of a diary of it.

In fact, Peter even brought a typewriter with him.

He was a great letter-writer all his life, so it doesn't surprise me

he brought a typewriter, obviously to be able to write to his family.

"I am typing this letter in the tent at the moment,

"and half the population of the local village,

"attracted by the noise of the typewriter,

"are standing outside the tent, watching me."

I suspect a lot went on that we'll never know about,

not the things you put in letters to your parents, I guess, so...!

-DAVID:

-With Europe, we'd always have an opportunity to visit that again.

But we were very unlikely have a chance to see the Middle East again

or possibly places like Iraq and Persia.

"The Greeks we have found to be very helpful and friendly,

"though we have heard some pretty horrible tales from people

"who've accepted their hospitality for a meal

"and been served sheep's head and intestines."

Istanbul is a shock to the system, in a way,

it's a fascinating city.

Sounds, smells, spices, and...

The poverty - and unfortunately, that was just the start of it.

I would say that was the no-turning-back point.

I suppose we thought, "This is the journey started now,

"we're really getting going now, seeing a different world.

CALL TO PRAYER

I suppose that was the first place we really went to town with the camera.

It was an amazing place, blew our minds away when we drove in.

And these rocks have been eroded by the wind and the...

It's all natural formations, cones,

and the people have carved out homes out of them.

There was a haze of dust about 12 inches thick

on the ground all over,

and it had a Disney-like feel to me!

"We have found things getting cheaper the further east we come,

"and have only spent £25 for the last 10 days.

"Food is very cheap and petrol is three shillings a gallon.

"And as we only buy food and petrol, we're spending very little."

The Krak des Chevaliers, yes, that was one of the, er,

the old forts that was built by the Crusaders.

It was an enormous place.

It was built to have something like 1,000 knights and 400 horses,

and another 2,000 men helping them.

Lawrence of Arabia, THE Lawrence of Arabia, called this particular one

one of the most wonderful castles in the world.

See the two guys standing up on top of the round turret there?

HE LAUGHS

'That was why I was on the trip, like, to see these places.'

Such a unique place, and there may well be a lot of visitors now,

there were very few visitors then - we were the only ones that day.

Massive, big temple, Basically, the only remains

are, I think, six columns.

But they're about 150ft high, and how they erected them,

or got these big stones up on top, is just amazing.

Even now it would be a major job trying to move it.

It can be done with mechanical things, but you wonder how

they did it with just basically human labour.

There was one in particular, it must have been 150ft long or something.

I wanted to get the scale of it, so I got Peter to run up to the top of it.

And of course when he was standing there, all the tourists,

all the cameras were trained on Peter,

doing his Lawrence of Arabia thing at the top of this big stone!

We drove down to Petra.

Petra was a thing that we, er, went off the road quite a bit,

it was about 300 miles down there, but well worth it when we got there.

You walk through this narrow gorge for about half a mile or so.

You come to this opening and there in front of you

is this, what they call the Treasury, this amazing building,

that's carved out of the red sandstone.

FILM REEL WHIRRS

-It was very hot there.

-Oh, yeah.

-Did you find out why they did it?

-I think a lot of them were tombs.

There was a whole valley with hundreds of these carved buildings.

Columns and entrances, carved out of solid rock,

with nothing behind it.

What was the real thinking behind it? Was it to fool somebody?

It's hard to understand why that amount of effort was put into that.

Just before we hit Baghdad, while we were crossing the desert,

we had a bit of bad luck, health-wise.

I felt very woozy, had to stop a few times.

And, er, Peter was coming down with a...

flu or something.

So we were feeling pretty miserable.

But we decided to hurry on to Baghdad, and seek medical advice.

The embassy referred us to a doctor, and since his nephew,

I think it was, was at Queen's University, Belfast,

he treated us for free!

It so happened there was a girl from back home

working in the British embassy - Marcia was her name.

We met Marcia at the local embassy. She was from Ballyclare,

and she arranged for us to go to a nightclub,

and we had a right old night out!

The way it was in Baghdad at that time, all the British people

weren't allowed basically to tour around Baghdad,

they had to stay very much in their own homes, and...

one or two clubs that they could go to.

Their answer to that was to run a series of parties.

So their whole life was partying, one night after the other.

After a while, I think that got a little bit hard,

so bringing a couple of new people in, I think,

brightened things up for a day or two for them!

Turned out we had a good time in Baghdad.

NO SOUND

Until we decided, well, we'd better press on.

They'd had a revolution, I think, a year or two before that,

but we discovered a week after we left that local guy -

Qasim, was it? -

was overthrown by a very young Saddam Hussein.

So I think we just got out in time, basically!

And then we were into Persia.

Now we were on the real hard trek - corrugations,

boulders here and there, it certainly was tough on the car.

We were driving along at 25-30mph,

bumping along, getting shook to pieces.

Later on we discovered that if you actually went over 60,

you probably could get out of the ruts a bit more.

But we were concerned about making sure the car lasted,

so we slowed down to about 20 for hundreds of miles.

It got to evening and we thought, "We'll just keep on driving."

We did about 800 miles in... over 30 hours.

And it was during that trip that we heard this sort of knocking sound.

-So we stopped to investigate.

-The engine mount

on one side actually broke right through, cracked.

And that meant that the engine dropped,

as it happened, onto the base plate

that we'd put on to protect the sump.

We found a piece of wood

and managed to jack the engine back up into position,

and then hold it in place by putting a wedge under the engine,

between that and the steel plate.

Initially we used cardboard, because we didn't have any wood.

We just had like cardboard boxes and things,

and we tore off various bits.

We then drove something like another 200 miles on corrugations,

and about 600 on pavement, before we could get it fixed!

We drove for the next 400 miles and saw nobody, met nobody.

"To get to Pakistan, you have to cross the state of Baluchistan.

"They say here that when God made the world, Baluchistan was made

"with the bits that were left over, and a more desolate

"or God-forsaken hole it would be hard to imagine!"

We eventually reached the border.

There was a sign, "You're now entering Pakistan."

We enquired about, you know, we're going to Peshawar,

He says, "Now, do you not know that's over the mountains,

"and it's full of bandits?"

And, er, "We strongly advise you not to go that way,

"because you'll not survive, basically."

So we thought, "No, it's not worth the risk."

So we had to do a long detour.

We were no longer in desert.

There were a lot more people, a lot more animals.

Everywhere we stopped, people crowded around, even on a main road.

"Where are you going? What do you want...?"

We eventually found our way up to the north of Pakistan,

up beside the Khyber Pass.

The Khyber Pass was something we'd all heard about,

it was very, very interesting driving through it and seeing

all the shields and so on that had been carved in the rock,

the various regiments that had served there.

We thought we might have got into Afghanistan, to Kabul,

but we discovered we couldn't get visas to get into Afghanistan.

-We got as far as the border.

-We put our foot across the border -

at least Peter did! He just went up to the guards,

put the foot over and took off!

On the way up we met a few locals that were a bit, er, scary,

waving guns around and so on.

It was rather funny, we were sitting beside a river,

chatting, and a bus turns up, and the bus is bristling with people.

Half a dozen guys get off it, all armed to the teeth,

and start coming across the bridge toward us!

So we began to say, "Whoo-oo, what's going on here?!"

Then they all stood up, raised their rifles and their guns,

but we discovered they were posing for the camera.

Thank you very much!

Then, soon after that, we got hit by another bout of illness.

Dave I think came down first of all with, er,

he had sort of flu-like symptoms.

They took me to a doctor and he immediately took me off to hospital.

I think my temperature was 104 or something,

and I was getting a bit, you know, didn't know what was going on!

Poor Dave had to stay in hospital for...basically a week.

And, erm, Peter and I decided to... take off

to the Himalayas!

Oh, yeah, oh, yeah!

Yeah, Alan and Peter took off and flew up into Gilgit.

They had a fantastic trip

and views over the Himalayas, flying out there.

It was quite hairy, because we were flying

in a non-pressurised DC-3, basically a cargo plane.

There was no landing strips there, if anything happened!

-Was that a bumpy ride?

-Quite bumpy, yeah.

That's the one where they put the seats in for you,

-in the cargo area.

-Yeah!

It was the first time I'd ever flown in a plane

and looked up at scenery - you looked out the window

and you were looking up at the mountains up above you.

Because this old thing could only fly at 13,000ft or something.

They were very close, yeah, it certainly was...

It thrilled me, anyway!

I was sorry I missed that, but...

I was very comfortable in hospital at that time!

I'd recovered in about a week, and then we headed south again.

Then we proceeded back down to Lahore,

and then across into India.

That was basically the main road,

what they call the Grand Trunk Road - you had this strip of tarmac,

and then you had, sort of, two bits of sand on either side.

The bullock carts and the camels and all, they went on the sandy bit.

And the big trucks and lorries and... You know,

they stuck to the centre tarmac.

And the trucks would come barrelling down the centre,

and somebody had to move.

We couldn't argue with a big truck, we had to get off!

Very busy, very noisy and busy and...

There's so much going on all around you,

there's such a very large population.

It's just crowds everywhere.

Everywhere you look, there's something of interest.

You know, using camels to walk in circles to draw water up and so on

-is still happening.

-Smells and sights and sounds -

very colourful. Sadly there was the occasional

body lying on the side of the road, just...

We didn't stop to look but it was obviously a body.

Life seemed to be pretty cheap.

Going into Delhi, it's just a beautiful city,

it's very well laid out, big, wide roads and malls

leading up to major buildings.

It's not your typical Indian architecture.

Big, modern city.

All over Delhi, there's kids running around

trying to polish your shoes. We both got ours done,

then we got hounded - kids from all over wanting to do them again!

We didn't stay too long, either,

because we were moving on down to Agra,

to the Taj Mahal.

The Taj Mahal is definitely more or less the star of the trip.

That was one of the places that lived up to expectations.

Engineering-wise, it's a very precisely-built building.

And the choice of material and all that was ideal for the location.

It really was a beautiful sight,

one of the highlights of the trip, I'd think.

"We went to Benares, and I've never been more horrified and fascinated.

"They burn their dead along the banks

"and scatter the ashes into the river.

"There are literally hundreds of beggars, cripples,

"people with leprosy, smallpox and deformed limbs."

We had to get the car shipped to Malaysia.

We had looked at the possibility of trying the Burma Road,

but all the reports were that that was pretty well impossible.

There was a tour of shipping agents.

We eventually got a quote, and signed it up,

duly delivered the car to the docks, and away it went.

We booked flights then to Bangkok,

and it turned out we were able to stay in Rangoon, in Burma,

for 72 hours.

Rangoon was very hot and sticky.

We were boarding in the local YMCA,

under mosquito nets, not that they were any great help.

It was a very beautiful country. We flew from Rangoon into Bangkok.

PROJECTOR WHIRRS

Those beautiful stewardesses, remember?

-Yeah, there she is.

-There she is, yeah!

That doesn't look like a Guinness, does it? Too small.

Quite a spectacular city. All these

temples and pagodas and everything, covered in gold, and...

You didn't have to spend money, you just walked around,

it was terrific to watch.

We certainly noticed that all the girls were very beautiful.

Very beautiful girls, they're all quite young, of course,

but they... Very heavily made up.

To get to Malaya was a bit of a problem,

but we decided to go by train.

The train only went to the border with Malaya.

We rented a cab to Penang, which is about 100 miles.

So we found Penang to be...paradise,

just palm-fringed beach, golden sand, palm trees, warm sea.

It was just beautiful.

"This is the most wonderful place you can imagine.

"You can lie on the beach drinking coconut milk,

"and the island is completely unspoilt.

"If you had a house here, you could just forget the rest of the world."

But the boat arrived,

and the boat was unloaded,

and we piled in and off we went.

On the ride from there to Singapore is where we saw some Malay girls

who were running around the trees, collecting rubber.

They just cut a track round the tree,

put a little cup, and the rubber flows down into it.

They were shy about being photographed,

so they kept running around behind the tree,

and Alan would go the other way,

and it turned out to be very funny,

looking at them chasing around the trees.

I felt, er... It was almost in silence. Pretty quiet trip,

because we realised, "Boy, here we are!

"Believe it or not, it looks like we made it."

I think at that stage, we were quite happy to come to an end.

We were getting a bit weary of all the travelling,

and really wanted to get on with whatever the next stage was.

Actually, I found it was a bit sad!

We knew there were all kinds of things happening coming up,

but we also knew we weren't going to be together.

-We knew we were splitting up.

-It was a matter of...

finishing up the journey, and, er, trying to sell the car.

We got it all cleaned up and spruced up as best we could.

Took off all the stickers and so on that we'd had on it,

cleaned it up as best we could, polished it up,

and the car was put up for sale.

It sold pretty quickly, I know that.

We got what we thought was a very good price - we'd bought it for 400,

and it was...360 or somewhere in that region, so it was all right!

After 14,000 miles!

I've always found the end of the trip the interesting bit,

because I think that's defined where they all went in life.

Initially, Peter and myself were going to go to Perth.

We had intended to go to Sydney but the boats were going to Perth,

so Perth was the place!

There was literally only one berth left on the next ship going out.

There were two boats, one leaving a week before the other.

We tossed up as to who was going to get on which boat.

He went off to Australia with £5 in his pocket,

and Peter was to follow ten days or a fortnight afterward.

When I got to Perth, I had this note at the local Post Office from Peter,

saying, "I got a job, I'm staying in Singapore!"

"I may as well come straight to the point,

"and tell you that I have managed to get a job here.

"It happened so quickly that I have been tearing around the country

"trying to get things straightened out.

"I think it's a very good job and I would be foolish not to take it."

I literally think, he lost the toss of the coin,

he went into a bar that night,

and he met someone who offered him a job.

And, you know, from then on in, he stayed.

This was tough for me because I was almost completely out of money,

and I knew Peter still had some.

Poor Dave landed in Australia with his £5, and, er...

slept on the beach for a couple of nights

before he got on his feet!

So I ended up with a different saga in Australia!

One that I ended up enjoying very much,

but it was a bit challenging initially!

And I got my flight to, er, New Zealand.

But then I got a telegram from home

to say that there had been a serious fire at the shop,

and could I come home...

immediately?

MUSIC: "Get A Bloomin' Move On" from The Italian Job

I think it made me appreciate how much...I had,

and that we do have, in the Western World.

I think it was life-changing because it got him out of Northern Ireland,

it gave him a life he might not have expected to have.

He was a high-profile part of the expatriate community in Singapore.

It was special - very special - for me. It was a lot of luck,

but then, what's luck, you know?

You can make your own, if you work hard enough!

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd