Kenyan Airways East African Safari Classic Rally

Wednesday, 25 May 2011 18:42

Written by senthilkumar

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In an announcement this week, Surinder Thatthi, Event Director for the Kenya Airways East African Safari Classic Rally, gave out the details of the night halts for this event that will run towards the end of this year from November 18^th to 29^th.

As is now traditional, the pre-event formalities and the start will be from the Sarova Whitesands Hotel on the Indian Ocean coast just north of Mombasa. The rally will start early on the morning of November 20^th and the day’s activities will finish deep inside the Amboseli National Park at the Kilima Safari Camp. The second day of rallying will take the crews into Tanzania to sample what can be some of the toughest roads on the event. The halt will be at the Mount Meru Hotel in Arusha where the crews will spend two nights, November 21^st and 22^nd. They will spend the day in-between rallying in Tanzania before passing under the shadow of Mount Kilimanjaro and re-entering Kenya.

The arrival on November 23^rd will be at the Ol Tukai Lodge in Amboseli where, after four days of hard rallying, the crews and their cars will get a full day of rest and recuperation. Probably the same cannot be said for the mechanics who will be servicing the cars during the day on November 24^th getting them ready for the last four complete days of the rally.

From Amboseli, the route lies north-west and skirts Nairobi to dive down into the Rift Valley and arrive that evening at the Sopa Lodge on Lake Naivasha. Again, there are two nights spent here – November 25^th and 26^th – with a full day of rallying on traditional Kenyan Safari Rally roads in-between. On the morning of November 27^th, the rally leaves Naivasha and starts the long run back through central Kenya towards Mombasa. There is one more night halt at the Voi Wildlife Lodge that nestles on the edge of the Tsavo East National Park and then it is full steam for the finish back at the Whitesands Hotel on the afternoon of November 28^th. The following day, there will be the gala lunch and prize giving in an outdoor setting overlooking the ocean.

Although the night halts, and thus the general outline of the route, are now known, the detail is being kept much more secret this year. On the last Safari Classic held in 2009, some crews were using the opportunity of receiving the road books in advance to send out recce crews to report back with detailed notes. In the interest of keeping a level playing field for all of the competitors, the road books for each day will now be issued the night before and not earlier.