Aussies In Spain - Day 1

Lee Mitchener filed the following report from Spain about how he and the other members of Team Australia are travelling at the IAME International Challenge. More pics and a link to Live Timing are on the Leopardengine website HERE.

We all met at the airport at approximately 3pm on the Tuesday. We sorted out our tickets, Remo upgraded himself to Business class after trading in some of his frequent flyer points.

Whilst heading to retrieve some foreign currency from the local bank at the airport, we couldn’t help but notice the presence of police. Turns out there was some un-attended luggage left at the check in terminal. Its amazing how one event has such an influence on the world.
So it didn’t take us long to get through customs and eventually we were sitting down awaiting our boarding call.

Throughout our discussions it was evident that one of us had forgot to bring our international go-kart license, without embarrassing Adam Hughes by mentioning his name, it was quickly arranged that the AKA send his license to Spain immediately, a big thanks to Pam Arnett.

Above: About to depart Singapore

Not only did one of us forget to bring their license, but we forgot to bring some true Aussie spirit, so John Grother and I headed over to the nearest Australian gift store and bought some Australian flags, hats, etc. to hang out the window of our car etc.

It wasn’t long before we were on the plane and airborne on our journey to Spain. First stop, Singapore, 9 hours on the plane wasn’t so bad, as the plane wasn’t booked out. I was even able to chat race strategies to Remo in business class for a top of 5 minutes until being kicked out after playing with the electronic lumbar settings.

It was at Singapore airport that we met up with Brett Fortainer and his wife Brenda. It wasn’t long before we had to cue up to head out onto our second leg of the journey, to Heathrow airport.

It proved to be much more of an alerting trip heading to London, as it turns out, most of the air hostess’ on this stint, were around our age, although this proved to be entertaining for some time, it was probably the most tiring trip to Spain, 12 hours in a cramped airplane proved to take its toll on us all struggling to get comfortable to try and catch at few z’s to get into the Spanish time zone.

Upon arrival in London, the team received their first taste of the weather to be expected. A top of 10 degree’s centigrade made ’Johnny G’ have second thoughts about wearing his thongs and ‘T’ on the trip over. Adam Hughes finally had something to write home about, after setting the metal detector off. Security did the mandatory feel-up to see if he was carrying any “packages” he shouldn’t have. Grant Smith also decided to participate. It wasn’t long after travelling through the enormous Heathrow airport that we were back on another plane for the final leg of the trip to Barcelona.

None of us were able to sleep for the remaining 3 hours of the flight because of the excitement in everyone being so close to Spain.

Above: Finally, in Barcelona

Finally stepping off the plane onto Spanish soil, everyone grinning reclusively, we soon found how laid back customs were. No questions asked, a quick stamp and we were on our way. Hopping into our turbo diesel Fiat and making tracks 200kms west to our final destination Alcaniz, where we were to represent our country at the World IAME Challenge.

Embarrassingly, we reversed out of toll ways three times due to entering the wrong bay. We grew hungry, so we decided to stop off through the town of… BAD IDEA, this place was like a maze, two way roads that only one car could fit down were hard to navigate, especially seeing as though the GPS system couldn’t register half of the streets!

We finally found a place to eat, and we are glad we went there, a small family owned business provided us with an excellent meal and friendly staff with gorgeous waitresses. We learnt that the language barrier was going to really cause us trouble whilst extending our stay here.

Above: Fantastic first meal in Spain in a small family owned restaurant

It didn’t take much longer to reach Alcaniz due to the eventful stories told after our stop off. The streets weren’t as bad as first anticipated, narrowly missing mirrors of parked cars we made it un-scared to the parador de Alcaniz. A castle built in 1763, now turned into a hotel, with excellent views, accommodating staff, and attractive rooms where the team will to stay for the next 4 nights.

It wasn’t long after everyone having showers that curiosity prevailed, and we had to visit the track to see what the European kart racing craze was all about.

Upon arrival to “Motorland”, the best motor racing venue ever seen by any Australian, it was evident that we were in for a treat. 10 meter wide track, 2.4 km long, estimating a top speed of 140km/h along the straight, we could not wait to get out there, so much so that we went for a bash in the hire karts available. 16 Euro gave us 10 minutes of crashing and bashing, ‘the quickest hire karts we had ever seen’. Money worth spending.

It was dark, and the lights from the road works building the new formula one track provided enough conversation to last the trip back to the hotel where we all then sat down for an elegant meal, something to be  experienced - a 3 course meal, steak melting in your mouth, endless bottles of red wine…  we felt like Kings. Except we were all ready for bed in no time due to the day's excitement.

Above: Local talent get into the the swing of things! Is that thing CIK homologated??

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