The US ambassador is set swap a chauffeured BMW for the driver's seat of beat-up Ford Falcon to take on some of Australia's most formidable roads.
Caroline Kennedy might become the first person to complete the charity S...box Rally with a blacked out, armoured SUV in tow.
America's top envoy to Australia will drive from Adelaide to Perth in April in a car worth less than $1500, raising money for cancer research.
Her Falcon dubbed Moonshot has been named in honour of President Joe Biden's Cancer Moonshot, which aims to eradicate the disease, and as a homage to her father's ambition to reach the moon in the 1960s.
"We do these things because they're hard," said Ms Kennedy, channelling words spoken in 1962 by her father, former US president John F Kennedy.
"I've met so many inspiring scientists here in Australia, who are working to cure cancer and have a lot going on with colleagues in the United States ... (and) having met the people I've met, I could not be more hopeful."
Getting on the tongs outside a Bunnings store in Canberra on Sunday morning, the ambassador and her team sizzled hundreds of sausages and kilos of onions to raise money for the Cancer Council.
The rally in April will take drivers from Adelaide to Roxby Downs, onto Yulara in central Australia, west into Warburton, Laverton, Southern Cross and finally into Perth.
It will be far from the glamour of the marble-lined ambassador's residence at the US embassy in Canberra, with participants packing their own tents, swags, sleeping bags and mattresses to camp overnight at each stop.
Each two-person team needs to raise a minimum of $5000 to participate.
