CHAPTER 12
I had attempted the East African Safari Rally in 1973, but that year I didn’t get very far. I had been teamed with a very unsuitable co-driver, a young American girl with high heels and tight jeans who had never been in a rally before in her life. We only got as far as Aruba.
In 1974 my co-driver was Pauline Gullick, an excellent navigator and someone I had driven with many times. She was thrilled to be going to Africa with me, and as usual I was up for everything and anything. When Pauline heard I was recounting this episode in my book, she very kindly sent me some observations to assist my notoriously faulty memory. In her notes she wrote: ‘I was amazed at Rosemary’s skills in driving the car … it was incredible,’ and she concluded, ‘Thank you, Rosemary, for keeping me safe.’
In 1974 the Rally ran from 11 to 15 April. It was the first year the rally was run entirely within Kenya, and also that year it was renamed the Safari Rally. It was a 6,000-kilometre, five-day ordeal. The journey began in Nairobi, from where we headed west through the Serengeti to the Victoria Falls, then east via Malawi to the coast at Mombasa and north again to return to the starting point. Since 1974 the rally has stayed within the borders of Kenya due to political unrest in neighbouring countries. Nairobi is traditionally the start and finish point, as well as being the midpoint where the rally’s big loop stages meet.
We travelled by Kenyan Airways to meet up with our team-manager, Sidia Desai, who was working on our Datsun 1600SSS in the back streets of Nairobi with the rest of the mechanics. Sidia’s father owned the Datsun dealership and most of Nairobi, from what I could see. Final preparations were being made to the Datsun to cope with the extreme conditions that it would encounter on the rally. By the time they had finished with it, the car looked very different from the cars I was used to driving in Ireland.
The Safari Rally is regarded as the toughest rally in the world, even in reasonable weather, but what we encountered in 1974 was unprecedented. The Kenyans had never seen such a wet season, and it rained in the desert for the first time in five years. Since its inception in 1953 the Safari has remained a road event as it is impossible to close a bush track and keep it free from all moving things except rally cars. The road is open to animals of all kinds, broken-down trucks, wandering buses or whatever might be on its way to somewhere else. It is not just a competition between cars and their drivers but a struggle with Mother Nature and the elements, as we soon found out.
We had two days in hand to do a recce and drove some of the stages to check conditions so that Pauline could make notes in the road book. The weather had been unseasonal and there were floods forecast, which threatened to sweep cars off the roads. When we did the recce, the weather was good and we were optimistic. You can never rely on the road being exactly as it was when practised as there are so many unexpected things that can happen, particularly the weather conditions.
We spent our first night in the Samburu Game Lodge, which gave us the unforeseen opportunity to meet some of the wildlife of Kenya. In the restaurant, as we ate our supper, monkeys joined us to share our food, while in the bedroom the large beds were taking up the whole of the room with mosquito nets covering them. I walked into the bathroom to see a snake writhing in the shower. I ran screaming to reception and the manager came back with his gun, only to find that it was a centipede and not a snake, which was a bit embarrassing. He took it away and we got to bed, although I don’t think either of us slept very well.
The following day we continued our recce, and returned to Nairobi to make the final preparations for the start of the rally. The first section of the five-day event used the road from Embu to Meru around the eastern foothills of Mount Kenya, where there were torrential downpours severely affecting road conditions and we were in the middle of it all. The unrelenting East African rain meant that many of the cars didn’t even get to the control and the ones that did were severely delayed. This section, which we had anticipated would take 82 minutes, was covered in 13 hours, 23 minutes! The only consolation was that weather conditions affected us all. Most of the entries were 10 hours late, even the best of them, including Roger Clark. The floods threatened to sweep cars and their occupants off the road and the mud made the going dangerous, with extremely deep drops on either side of the track.
Everything was gravel, dirt and dust until it rained, when it was turned into thick red gumbo mud; if you stopped, you just couldn’t get going again – you would be stuck in the mire indefinitely. Cars stopped on the track, unable to move, and if we wanted to pass them they had to be bumped out of the way. So that’s exactly what I did: I bumped them. I had a marker pen and I put a swastika on the side of our car every time we knocked one off the track, just like bomber pilots did in the Second World War. I think we ended up with something like 11 down the side of the car. People don’t understand: you go out to win and you have to do whatever is necessary. I have always been told that I take rally driving too seriously – I don’t know any other way.
Sidia and the team knew we would be encountering sludge and mud along the way, and so to combat that they had inserted a plate between the bumper and boot for the co-driver to stand on to help get traction. When we encountered roads which were reduced to running mud, Pauline did her best to jump energetically up and down on the plate at the rear of the car, while at the same time trying desperately to stay on board. A frightening experience for her, no doubt, but I just kept going, shouting encouragement from the safety of the driving seat.
There were times when the mud was so thick, even Pauline’s frantic jumping didn’t work, and we would come to a complete halt, stuck firmly in the mud. That is when the local tribesmen appeared, blocking our path and demanding ‘push money’. The Masai tribe were very tall and thin, with long earlobes adorned with earrings, and they could be intimidating. But I wasn’t going to let them know how threatened we felt and decided to resort to magic to frighten them. I revved the engine until the radiator was boiling, and even though I was terrified I got out of the car in the midst of the crowd, opened the bonnet, took the cap off the radiator and the boiling water gushed up like a fountain, scalding anyone approaching the car. The men ran off, terrified, looking back in fear and trembling at my witchcraft!
We carried bags of Kenyan shillings and, when we needed to, we could pay the local men to get us going again. Some of them just took the money and ran away, without giving us the push we had paid for. This was so frustrating until I got the bright idea to draw an x on the men’s hands and told them that, once we were on our way, only those with the cross on their hands would get paid.
At the end of the first leg we had lost a lot of time, and although we should have had a 12-hour rest halt in Nairobi we couldn’t afford to do so. If we were to stay in the rally, we estimated that we could only stop for 40 minutes. Exhausted, we lay down under canvas on the steps outside the Nairobi City Hall and slept. When you lose sleep like that, the mind plays tricks on you, and that’s what happened to us the next night. The rain had stopped and we were driving along in the pitch-dark in the middle of Africa. Pauline was very quiet; I thought she had dropped off to sleep until she suddenly said, ‘I don’t know where we are.’ Pauline, the most efficient navigator I have ever driven with, didn’t know where we were! For some reason I wasn’t worried, but continued to drive for miles, turning as we got to forks in the road in whatever direction seemed right to me. I remember we passed a tree with a noose hanging from it, which encouraged me no end to go even faster! Pauline never said a word because, as far as she was concerned, we were completely lost. She couldn’t believe it when we arrived at the control, and neither could the marshals because they asked me how I had got there. I said we had recced the section and knew exactly where we were going, but Pauline knew that wasn’t true; we hadn’t been within 100 miles of the area on our recce. It was extraordinary and I felt then, and still do today, that something or somebody was looking after us.
Conditions on the second leg improved slightly. There were no mudslides, but in the middle of the night we came across a flood or, as I thought, a river with no bridge. After looking at the water for some minutes, I decided that we could not attempt to go on until we knew exactly how deep it was. There was only one thing for it and I instructed Pauline to get out and take a stick and walk into the dark and murky waters that lay before us. For all I knew, there could have been crocodiles lurking in the black depths, but Pauline did as she was asked and walked through the water with a stick to check the depth. Between us, we decided we could make it through, although we took the precaution of having the windows tightly closed, just in case.
Due to all the delays we were running late in the rally, but all controls remained open for us as the bush telegraph had told the marshals that we were on our way. The tiredness was overwhelming as we went for days with very little sleep. It got so bad at one point that I started to see pink elephants walking across the track in front of us. I came to a grinding halt and Pauline asked why I had stopped. I said, ‘Elephants,’ and she assured me there were no elephants. This happened twice, and then on the third occasion I was not to be fooled again so I drove straight on, only to have Pauline yelling, ‘Stop! Elephant!’ I had been hallucinating before but this time the elephant was real and it was pink because it was covered in gumbo mud. That was a relief, but still my eyelids kept drooping as I fought to stay alert. I had lost one of my false eyelashes, which were my remedy for staying awake. Pauline had to rummage in the footwell of the car to find it.
On one section of the rally we had to drive through a valley, which was bordered by escarpments to the east and west. When Pauline directed me to drive up what looked like a very steep goat track, I argued with her and said that she must be wrong as there was no way the car could get up the steep incline. Some of our fellow competitors were attempting to get up. I took a chance and in the dark it was yet another challenge, which I am happy to say we successfully overcame. When we got to the summit we saw an arc of lights cascading down and discovered afterwards that it was a car falling backwards off the track.
Pauline and I were exhausted and very hot when in the middle of the desert the wheel got stuck in a very deep pothole. We knew we were the last car still running and this was probably going to mean that we were out of the rally, for which, for once, I said, thank heavens. Away in the distance I saw a man herding goats, and again my wonderful Pauline did as I asked and ran after him, shouting for help. The faster she ran, the faster the goatherd ran, and he just went further and further away. How long would it be before we were found and could get moving again? I looked up and saw a small plane overhead flying low and, miracle of miracles, it landed and two men got out and lifted us back on the road. Luck was on our side.
I will never forget those final miles driving to the finish in Nairobi. The route was lined with hundreds of people, stopping the car and cheering us on. The Kenyan women were giving us baskets of fruit; it was all very emotional and I certainly had a few tears when we reached the finish. We were the last car home, and at the final control several of our fellow competitors were waiting to escort us into the finish at Nairobi Town Hall.
It is the custom for each winning crew to have their national anthem played as they go up to the podium. We went up to collect the Ladies’ Prize to the tune of ‘It’s a Long Way to Tipperary’. The organisers obviously didn’t know about the Irish national anthem and this was the best they could do. We didn’t mind at all, we were just happy to be there. Out of 99 starters only 16 crews survived to finish. It was a great achievement and one of the most exciting events of my career.
That evening we telephoned our families to tell them that the rally was over and we were both safe and well. There was no telephone in our room at the hotel and we went down to reception to make the calls. When we returned to the room, all my jewellery and money had been stolen. This would have been a disaster but I had become very friendly with Sidia Desai and he came to my rescue. He insisted on getting a dress especially made for me to wear to the ball. The gown was incredible; it was a dark chocolate colour, silk, with embroidery and gold beading. We went shopping together and he wanted to buy me everything I admired. I was reluctant to take advantage of his generosity, even though I knew he was a very wealthy man. Sidia was charming and very persuasive. I admired a beautiful wooden carved chest, but I knew I couldn’t bring that (or him!) home with me.
About six weeks after the Safari Rally I got a message from the North Wall docks in Dublin to say there was a delivery for me that I would have to collect. Intrigued, I drove to the docks and they very nearly didn’t hand it over as I had no identification with me. One of the officials recognised me and said I could take it. The men put the huge package into the boot of my car. When I got home and unpacked it, you can imagine my delight when I saw the chest I had admired so much, brass fastenings and all.
The rallies all around the world were wonderful experiences and I loved every minute of them. As I said before, racing was where it was at if you wanted to prove yourself with the men. I always loved the thrill of racing and competed whenever I could.