Today we again enjoyed the advantages of the environmentally friendly Zafira HydroGen3: it was another sunny day. At the starting ceremony we had a very special spectator: Carl-Peter Foster, Vice President of GM Europe and Chairman and Managing Director of Adam Opel AG. He was in Brussels and started us off with a flag when we went on the road for 350 km.

The seventh leg was split in two parts, a Belgian/French one and a British one. Our first goal was Calais in France. We had to cross the Channel to England by ferry because, with our gas tank under the floor, we were not allowed to use the tunnel. The truck from hydrogen supplier Linde was not shipped together with us. It went on the five o’clock boat by order of the ferry company. During the continental part we felt like Bertha Benz when she drove her husband’s project, the first car ever. She had to keep a close eye on the fuel consumption because there was no filling station-infrastructure like today. So her route depended on the availability of petrol at local chemists.

We also drove a vehicle ahead of its time. Similar to Bertha’s experience, we could not rely on a refuelling infrastructure. We also had to mind the fuel consumption because the distance Brussels-Calais was 210 km and the range of the HydroGen3 about 230. If we ran out of hydrogen, we had a serious problem because the Linde truck was already on the big island at the other side of the North Sea. So with the cruise control switched on we drove in the slip streams of trucks and vans towards Calais. After two and a half hours we made it: we arrived at the docks while there was just enough hydrogen left for another 30 km. We were lucky the Belgian landscape was flat.

After eating a large portion of delicious fish and chips in the restaurant on the ferry the white cliffs of Dover appeared and a quarter of an hour later we parked the HydroGen3 beside the hydrogen supply-truck. In four minutes the Zafira was filled up and we could continue our route trough county Kent to London. We had enough fuel to reach this leg’s finish so, compared to the continental part of the trip, we could drive with a higher speed. The motorway went up and down through the hilly landscape with its typical English atmosphere. Nevertheless the Opel (or Vauxhall as they call it in the UK) had no problem to keep its pace.

This in contrast to the Movano bus with camera people which was following us, or better: tried to follow us. At a certain moment they called us because we were too fast for them. The Hydrogen proved its capacities in the hills. This was better than I expected when we drove out of tunnels in The Netherlands.

At the end of motorway M20 we entered London in the rush hour. It was no problem for the HydroGen3 to go with the flow. Our main challenge was to prevent contact with other cars. To most citizens the HydroGen3 looked like an ordinary Vauxhall Zafira equipped with stickers. The reality was the opposite. Our marathon car is much more expensive than most Rolls-Royces, Bentleys and Aston Martins which crossed our path, so we had to be cautious. And we succeeded. After crossing the river Thames we passed the Harrod’s department store and reached our finish for today at Park Lane, without any problem. Mission accomplished!

Now I know the GM people made a big progress since HydroGen1. This car has evaluated to one which is near production standards. O.K., they have to refine some details. The experiences of the past two days were good. I have no regrets I said "Yes" when I was asked to join the Fuel Cell Marathon. The big challenge for the next years is to produce hydrogen on a large scale and to create the accompanying infrastructure.