Well I guess it was my turn to screw something up. Here’s my story… sad but true. I have always rented diesel cars in Europe. For 10 years I’ve been doing that… one gets a little paranoid when you rent a diesel because you have to put DIESEL in DIESEL cars. So we rent this VW. It sounds like a diesel. It drives like a diesel – a gutless wonder, especially in the mountains. So, as we are down to 1/8 of a tank on our freeway trip to Salzburg, we pull off at a freeway gas station. No problem, fill it with diesel. 60 Euros worth. Cool… right? No problem. 2.5 klics up the road… putter, putter, putter… she dies. Pull over at truck rest area (trucks do not travel on Sunday… they are all parked). What’s wrong… temp is ok, check the oil… it’s OK. We put diesel in it, right. That’s right… that’s what it calls for. We flip open the gas tank door… “Use unleaded gas 90 Octane”. Oh fuck.
The sign says “Rest stop – 500 meters ahead”. Well, that’s ½ mile. Let’s go back. Half way back we realize it’s a lot longer than 500 meters to the gas station. Oh well, we’ve come this far. 2,500 meters later we arrive at the gas station. As we approach the telephones, we see a silver Audi station on the right. We think nothing of it. Out of the driver door steps a woman (28 ish) and she begins to speak German to me. On her left shoulder is a funny looking patch that says “POLEZIA”. Uh oh. On her right hip is a Glock 9mm pistol. A dude is riding shotgun… he steps out and approaches us. At that moment, an old man in a Benz overshoots the exit for the gas station, hits the freeway entry point and begins to back up the freeway entrance ramp. The dude wanders off to write the old man a ticket. The woman speaks enough English to explain to us that we should have walked forward on the freeway, not backward. Yeah, we knew that. She asks for my passport and asks it we are on holiday. Yes. She said it was very dangerous walking on the freeway (yeah it was… a foot sometimes separated us from the cars going 70). She told us to make our phone call and she would give us a ride back to the car, where my sister was waiting with the car (hood up). Dave called Hertz. As frantic as my brother can be sometimes, he was cool, calm and collected. Yeah, we need a tow. Highway 8, marker 124. Bad gas. The police drove us back to the car… they were very kind. They explained that we were still in Germany… just over the hill was Austria. In Germany, on the freeways, use the SOS phones.
30 minutes pass. The tow truck arrives. The dude speaks ZERO English. Nada. Zippo. Dave rides in the tow truck. Rosanne and I ride in the car, which is mounted on one of those AAA type tow trucks. We say Salzburg… no, he says. Wrong country. Have to keep it in Germany. It’s like breaking down in Vancouver and wanting to go to Portland, only the tow truck guy says you have to be towed to Camas. Ah shit.
So we arrive in a little town called I dunno. A kid in the office has enuf English to explain that he will call us a cab. He figures 70 Euro to Salzburg. Ugh. Or a train to a small town in Germany, near Salzburg. Freisling or something like that. 15 mins later the cab arrives. A wonderful man with white hair and a white mustache says “Hello”. I say… “we have a problem”. He says… “yes, you have a problem, but I do not”. We all laugh. He explains that it will cost 15 Euro to Freisling, but for another 15-20 E, he can take us directly to our hotel in Salzburg. All right ! I coulda kissed the guy.
So, now we’re in Salzburg. I’m more depressed that Vincent Van Gogh on a bad ear day. Only one thing will fix this… BEER. We walk 15 mins into old town and find a bar and sit next to an open window to avoid the smoke. Two (2) 500 ml beers later, the pain have vanished and we’re feeling better. Rosanne, hating anything with fizz, opts for Baileys on ice. We realize that it could have been a lot worse. It’s gonna cost me some $$$, but no one was hurt, no one died, no one is in the hospital.
The lesson learned is this: PAY ATTENTION. If you talking on the phone, don’t be chopping carrots with your kitchen knife… chances are you will cut yourself. If you are unsure of what to do in a situation, STOP, take a look around and apply a dash of reason. LIVE IN THE NOW. Don’t have your head somewhere into tomorrow, while you’re driving down Belmont St. BE on Belmont Street. Enuf said. I’m sure we’ll be laughing about this six months from now, but right now, I’m feeling pretty stupid. Ciao
No comments:
Post a Comment