Chris's Mini adventure (From Stroud News and Journal)

Chris's Mini adventure

MINI enthusiast Chris Capener set off on a 4,000 mile trip in his little motor to escape Christmas. But the stress of the festive season back home paled into insignificance as his journey turned into a swashbuckling adventure.

His own Indiana Jones style escapade took in floods, blizzards, breakdowns, smashes, culture and language differences ... oh, and a complete absence of Moroccan cash.

The solo caper sounded too ridiculous to be true but Chris, 53, returned this week to tell the tale of his Saharan Odyssey to Ben Falconer where his own personal story emerged of triumph against all the odds.

CHRIS was just getting the hang of gingerly steering his Mini round the winding, potholed roads of Morocco's Atlas Mountains when there, straight ahead, was an unavoidable, enormous crater in the tarmac. With a sickening bump, the engine stopped dead.

Although Minis have only rudimentary suspension and little ground clearance, they are legendarily robust, so Chris turned the ignition key, expecting the motor to leap back to life.

But there was only silence. Repeated key turning, each time more frantic, met with the same stomach churning response.

Chris wanted an adventure but at this moment, his jaunt took a turn for the worst and the best all at once.

Unable to face Christmas and the freezing British weather Chris decided to really get away from it all. On Friday, December 21 he jumped in his P-registered Mini Cooper and headed for Dover.

The car was still stickered up with sponsors of his autumn 'Italian Job' charity jaunt to Rome which he done to raise money for National Children's Homes.

He and his trusty companion Alexander the bear boarded a ferry then headed through France to Spain, caught another ferry from Gibraltar to Algeciras and finished up in the Atlas Mountains - where his Mini expired after dropping in to that pothole on Christmas Day.

"The roads were terrible," he told the News & Journal. "There were more potholes than road surface.

"I drove in to the small village of Souk El Kolla and out the other side but then it broke down.

"A four-wheel drive vehicle towed me back to the village and by speaking English to the only person who understood me they got me a taxi to tow me back to the main town, Larache."

But Chris did not fancy another hairy ride back down through the mountains on the end of a tow rope, so once he had learned the French for recovery lorry, he was on his way in the taxi to town.

But his troubles were only just starting. Chris could not speak French and had no Moroccan currency on him in a town far removed from Western influence. It is illegal to bring Dirhams to and from Morocco.

"I was like a drowning man hanging on to a life boat," he said.

He spent the first night in his Mini in the village of Souk El Kolla and returned to Larache the following day where his luck took a brief upward turn.

A friendly policeman who spoke perfect English located a recovery lorry for him.

But in the time it took to take Chris to the bank to help him exchange some travellers' cheques, the lorry vanished.

"Then a man with one leg came up to me," recalled Chris, who was by then growing a little panicky. "He was the father of the low loader driver!"

Arrangements were made for his Mini to be taken back to town from the village and Chris was invited by three strangers to join them in a taxi.

"It was one of those now or never moments but I got in," he said. He spent the next five days living with an extended Moroccan family who treated him with respect and honour.

And it was a cultural eye-opener for the carpenter from Nailsworth who had little experience of the Muslim faith.

The family named him Abdullah and they and Chris began to teach each other elementary French and English.

He wore slippers inside the home and ate food with one hand, shared only by the head of the family. At night they made him up a small bed where they gave Alexander the bear pride of place.

For more on this story and more, see this week's Stroud News & Journal