On 19 July 2015 we’re going to set off from Goodwood Motor Circuit and drive 10,000 miles to Mongolia in a 2001 Ligier Ambra. A car so crap the French disowned it.

It’s part of the Mongol Rally, an annual adventure where hundreds of teams try their darndest not to kill themselves on the way to Mongolia. We have no backup plan, no support, no real route, very little skill and frankly no idea how we’re going to do it. But we will!

We’re doing it to raise money for Dementia UK and Cool Earth.

Dementia UK improves the quality of life for all people affected by dementia. The number of cases of dementia is growing 163,000 each year - they need our support now more than ever.

Cool Earth works to halt rainforest destruction. They give local people the control and resources they need so they aren’t forced to sell their biggest resource - their forests.

James, 25, is a web developer in East Sussex. Aaron, 24, is a VoIP engineer in Northampton. They met at university 6 years ago and have since travelled across Europe and South-East Asia - all preparing for the Adventure for Dementia.

The car is a 505cc 2 cylinder automatic Ligier Ambra GLX. It cost £100 and had 2 previous owners - they’re both now dead. The GLX model has all the mod-cons, including wind up windows and a string-based boot opening mechanism. If you press the roof, it wobbles like jelly and to move the seats you have to unscrew them. The car has a top speed of 50mph and a blistering 0-62mph time of… never. If you want to listen to the radio, you can use the cassette deck or listen to French radio. We’re not sure how it even picks up French radio. That’s probably the most advanced feature in it.

We’re currently organising the paperwork, routes and gearing the car up with roof racks, spare tyres and doing everything we can to make sure it gets us there in one piece. The prognosis is still unclear.

But regardless of how the car holds up, we’ll get to Mongolia one way or another.

Throughout the adventure we’ll be posting regularly irregular updates here on adventurefordementia.com, so keep an eye out!

We’re asking for donations of £10, £20 or more on our Virgin Money Giving page which will be split 50:50 between Dementia UK and Cool Earth.

Any single donation of over £200 gets to set a challenge for us (within reason!) that we have to record and post on the blog as soon as possible. So if you want to see James wear a Borat mankini in Kazakhstan or Aaron get a tattoo on his arse, now is your chance.

If you can help us out with any corporate sponsorship or equipment for our trip then please email us. Here’s what we’re looking for…

• Spare wheels + tyres
• Fuel
• Jerry cans
• Water containers
• Tool kit
• Engine fluids
• Sump guard
• Ligier spare parts
• Video equipment

So get donating now and we’ll get this thing going!

Cheers!

James and Aaron