Colleagues Andrew Murphy and Peter Bennett, who crossed the Sahara Desert in an old banger called Phoebe, have spoken of their hairaising adventures.

The pair, who work for the MoD, took part in the Banjul Challenge banger rally last month which took them 4,000 miles from England to The Gambia in West Africa.

They crossed minefields and passed cars that had been blown up or ambushed.

They waited 28 hours on the Moroccan border and, at times, travelled in convoy under an armed guard.

Last Friday they and their 1987 Audi 100, which cost £100, reached the Gambian capital, raising £1,000. They will split the money between Help For Heroes and Naomi House Children’s Hospice.

Mr Murphy, who lives in Melksham, said: “There were extreme highs and lows of emotion.

“One minute you’re on top of the world, making good progress. The next thing is a real low, driving on a non-existent road, being banged and clanged.”

However there were plenty of highlights along the way.

Mr Murphy said the scenery would stay with him, as would the memories of many local people he met and the cameraderie among the teams that took part.

“We all stuck together and helped each other out,” he said. “It’s as if we’d all known each other for a long, long time.”

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