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Published: August 30th 2006
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On Wednesday morning with a little help from Jim i was able to track down a replacement MP3 player and headphones and nick out and buy them while they stayed to finish some last minute work (!). ill get insurance for the player so in the end itll only be a $250 loss. Jim and Wayne were sweating with all sorts of packing and weight related blowouts but we headed out early and comfortably got through Heathrow to gate 28 with time to spare.
i thought i heard someone in the queue get told they were at the wrong gate so we jumped out of the queue only for Jim to say it must be right because they were wearing BA uniforms and give me a bollocking, but i must have heard right because when we got to the front we were told it was the wrong gate and we should be at 18! Queue a short sprint, much hilarity and i was not to be trusted with gate reading again. We had a nice flight sipping on Gin and Juice and got a taxi to our hotel in Helsinki before heading out for a walk to get some food.
We found an overpriced Tex Mex restaurant just before closing and Jim and Wayne enjoyed a beef related substitute meat burrrrito while i had nachos drizzled in fake cheese flavoured glue. Mmmmm.
Next morning we went for a site seeing tour of Helsinki, checked out the cool waterfront markets with lots of elk related tourist junk, walked through some parks on the way to collecting our booked and paid for rental car which they had kindly given away! Queue much discussion about the difference between taking and keeping bookings before we got a car that was an upgrade. Then it was on to Jyvaskyla which was a pleasent 3hr drive away through the countryside.
The Finnish countryside is basically forests and lakes and quite flat but it is beautiful. When we arrived we picked up our passes from Rally HQ and went to the flat we had rented for the weekend. i twas very close to town and clearly owned by midgets, there wasnt a day that went by that i didnt hit my head at least twice on the extra low light fittings.
That night was the first Super Special Stage so i guzzled a kebab
wrap with fried potatoe and sausage pieces on the way to catching the bus there. It was there that we met Wayne Junior, just another friendly Finnish lad, and watched the cars pitted against each other one on one.
Friday was an early start to head out and get some good spots for the days stages, the opening stage (SS4) was a real highlight, probably best stage of the weekend in fact, im even pretty sure that i saw one of the cars wheels leave the ground. Exciting stuff. We moved on to bigger and better things for the second stage of the day which was run twice (SS6/8) allowing us to get two different and excellent vantage points. i got up on a homemade platform for the first run and had a perfect view and we went to the end of the straight which allowed you to see three jumps and the final hard right corner.
Friday night i was keen to party so left the old boys at home and went for a dance at what i was to find out was the worst club in town. Still i was invited in by a blonde 18year
old Finnish girl so who am i to complain? They played cheesy dance music and i met a group of girls, one of whoms 18th birthday it was, they were well impressed to have met a kiwi guy and we danced the night away. i got a couple of hours sleep before another early start for Rally Day Two.
We went to a popular viewing spot first up on SS11 then to the Yellow House jump in the mid afternoon. This was awesome and incredibly popular because it is the longest jump in the WRC, the cars jump about 40m (the record is about 55m) and get some serious air. That afternon we went to another popular spot and there were so many people it was crazy. i snoozed in the car on the way home and had a nap so i could go out again that night.
Jim is weak when it comes to partying so again i had to go it alone, it was incredibly busy everywhere that night and i chose the most popular club which had a queue that went forever. i met a couple of Finnish lads in the queue and we left
his girlfiend to gaurd our spot while we went back to their flat close by for a drink. We managed to repeat this 3 times before we even got close to the front of the queue! in all it took 2.5hrs to get into the club, it had 5 main rooms each playing different music, the most popluar of which was the Finnish rock/metal room, those crazy Finns love their crazy heavy metal. i met heaps of people in the short hour we had before the club closed, the Finns really are a friendly bunch and are always quite happy to chat. i was a little peckish so went for a late snack/early breakfast of fried potatoe and sausage pieces before getting a little sleep before the final day of the rally.
Gronholm had stamped his home advantage on the rally by this stage and after Loeb hit a rock on day two the fight was really over but all the cars were still going hard. We had a pretty relaxed last day watching the cars at full speed down a long straight away into a long right hander, for which some of the drivers kept it flat the
whole way through. We ate gravel at that point and also met an Aussie and irish couple. We stayed at the same stage but moved spot for our final leg of the rally then packed up and headed back to Helsinki to our hotel near the airport. i slept but they tell me it bucketed down at one point 😊
We had a nice meal and a rally round up discussion before i had a sauna and we hit the sack all pretty worn out after a big weekend.
i have to send out a big thank you to the boys for making the rally tour as awesome as it was, and an extra tip of the hat to Wayne for organising everything for me when i was in the throes of planning the rest of my trip back home. Cheers guys it was fantastic, cant wait for the next one.
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Co-incidence
I was standing right beside the Finnish geezer with the Radar Gun. You know Beth and I know Beth but we've never met yet stand next to each other watching Rally Finland ..... another small bit of useless information !!!! Great Rally though.