Now that we are so close to departure we thought that it might be important to take a look at the ambulance and work out what we might need to do before we collect it later this week. We wanted to know answers to practical questions like: where on earth does the diesel go?
Well, we found where the nozzle goes and Daniel thought he’d open the fuel cap just because … well, just to show that he could. It’s a lockable one and the barrel of the lock came out on the key leaving the filler cap in place. Well that shouldn’t happen – should it? Answers on a postcard please (we’ve not got too much experience of Ford Transit filler caps – what have we been doing with our lives?!). Anyway, Daniel thinks that he’s found the trick to unlocking the filler cap so hopefully that’s one nightmare half way across Western Europe averted!
As for inside the ambulance Leo and Daniel think that we’ve worked everything out (famous last words …). We have identified are a few things that we’re going to need (e.g. a converter so that we can charge our phones from the cigarette lighter, stickers for the headlights so that we can drive on the “wrong side of the road” without dazzling oncoming traffic, spare lightbulbs (apparently a requirement in France along with a dayglo jacket, triangle etc)). There is still space in the back if anyone has anything that they’d like us to take out there?
In addition we’ve still got to sort out insurance, work out the formalities for transferring a vehicle to foreign ownership and book where we’re going to stay en route. Happily we have learned that Eurotunnel is offering free tickets for humanitarian aid to Ukraine so that’s an expense that we won’t need to cover …
We plan to pick up the ambulance from Aliya’s house later this week, have a little drive around Wimbledon to get used to it- oh yes, and we’ve got to try to find out what on earth the tire pressure should be (any clues? There is no owner’s manual and no sticker showing ideal pressures …). We’ve booked our flights back from Kraków on the Tuesday night – so it’s all getting very real.
The fundraising has been going incredibly well – at the time of writing we’ve raised £3,495 on the GoFundMe page alone which is wonderful generosity! Please do keep sharing our adventure on social media channels and don’t forget, if you would like to try doing this yourself do get in touch …
