Bubblegum Bangers Rally, day 2, south of Antwerp

Sunday, 3.20pm, Motorway Service Station 100km south of Antwerp

TODAY is another glorious day.

Myself and Nick have just crossed the Belgium border and are having a lunch baguette in a service station.

There's not a cloud in the sky and as Noel Coward would say 'It's been most enjoyable'.

We're heading for Amsterdam where we're staying tonight but we have the worry of not knowing where our hotel is.

When we set off this morning from Rouen we were given our day's task which is to solve a number of clues to reveal the name of the hotel.

In the course of this so far we've had to have our picture taken in front of Rouen cathedral, find out who was burnt at the stake on 30 May 1431 in the Old Market Square (Joan of Arc quiz fans!) and count the number of angels on the front of the gigantic Gothic cathedral in Amiens, plus have our picture taken in front of it wearing sunglasses and a hi-viz jacket for some reason.

And we're now on our way into Antwerp to discover the names of the figurines on the city's House of Guilds and to buy some chocolate from a specific sweet shop down a side alley to solve the mystery of our hotel.

After which we've then got to make our way up to Amsterdam.

I reckon we'll be getting there after 10pm at this rate...

But we're healthy and in good spirits, while the day's start was a bit of a challenge for a few of our fellow rally drivers.

It turns out that the Red Eyed Racers team of Simon Coutanche and Lee Allez have a fully working beer pump complete with two kegs of lager, a chiller and an immense sound system in the back of their refurbished Guernsey Gas van.

Needless to say the party went on late into the night in the car park.

I felt like I was in an 80's American high school movie.

All that was missing was a fire we were all dancing round, some sport jocks and cheerleaders and a little bloke in a basketball vest who turns into a werewolf.

Someone also must have been in mischievous spirits as when James Bentley went out to his car this morning, the Island FM DJ discovered that it had been covered in bubble wrap.

It was also confirmed early that four cars broke down yesterday.

Team 18's Ssangyoung Mosso died and they are now continuing around Europe in a swanky BMW X3 hire car.

While Rusty Bullitt's Vauxhall Omega, Knightriders' BMW and Penelope Pit Stop's Rover 620 are also all heading to St Malo on the back of a AA lorry or are heading to a crusher and the big multi-storey car park in the sky.

These teams are now scrounging lifts from other competitors.

I wouldn't like to say who else is going to be eating the dust by tonight...