Day 6, We are done

Well, shit. I'm sitting in my car, on the back of a tow truck, in the middle of Mongolia.  Again. This country kicks my ass.

The front left steering knuckle is twisted up, the wheel is sitting at an odd angle, the driver door won't open, and the roof is smashed in.

The first stage of the day was pretty good.  I haven't seen any other times, but mine shouldn't have been awful.

The second stage was a problem. About 3k from the start, we found ourselves quickly approaching a hidden ditch large enough to swallow most of the car. The ditch entry was somewhat gradual; the far side, steep. A long, sharp V dug into the ground. Head on, the front end would probably have been stuffed into the far side.

I was beginning to set up to go left, but Hayden said to go right. In retrospect, it was too late to change direction. As I swung right, I lost the backend to the left. I was "hazard fixating" us straight to the ditch.  We lost a bunch of speed traveling sideways before the left wheels hit the ditch. The car rolled over on to the side, continued uphill on to the roof, and then rolled back downhill on to the wheels. We were rubber-side down, firmly strapped into our seats with 5 point harnesses, apparently uninjured,  our left wheels in the ditch; the rear of which, was hissing out air rapidly. Amazingly, we were able to drive out of the ditch before the wheel went flat.

That's the end of the story. A bunch of other events occured over the next 12 hours, but they are boring and irrelevant. It doesn't matter how long we waited for the truck. It doesn't matter that the valley was green and beautifully lit in the waning sun. We were out of the competition.  Done. Kaput.

So now my car and I are heading back to Ulan Butar to find a ride home.