What's this all about?

Last time Duncan Mortimer drove round the world in his Mini, he had problems with his maps. In an average car, folded sheet maps are awkward enough to handle, but in a 10 foot, 1978 Mini Clubman 1275 GT, jammed with everything that Duncan and his Thai wife needed for a round the world trip, vast crumply sheets maps were enough to make them swear. And for his 1996 trip, he needed a boot full of them. 1999 will see the 40th anniversary of the Mini, and, sadly, its last year of production. To celebrate this marvellous car, and to raise money and awareness for cancer charities, Duncan, from Chichester, West Sussex, is to drive his Mini Clubman round the world again. This seven-month drive will take in many more countries than his last trip, including some of Australia's harshest terrain. This time, in place of folded paper maps, Duncan will be using a Geographical Information System. Using MapInfo Professional V5.0 with a GisDATA digital map of the world on a laptop computer, linked to a Global Positioning Satellite system, he will know where he is at all times. Sponsorship is helping Duncan in this task, with a Compaq supplied laptop, a Magellan GPS system, and to save filling his boot with maps, GDC's GisDATA world maps series running in MapInfo Professional.