E4

So last night, real late, I got the call I´d been waiting for; my lady had finally found a hotel. She´d driven from Slovenia up past Maribor into Austria taking the December high road across Europe aiming for Mulhouse, (I bet you don´t know how to pronounce it; Moolooze) France, but somewhere before Salzburg the red light for the alternator came up, and she spent about five hours driving all over the frozen backroads of Austria trying to find a replacement alternator. having started at 5 am, and now on her way again at 5pm, she drove on passing into Germany, where she couldn´t find a hotel room for less than 80 Euros, and crossed again into Austria, (which you have to do, as this landscape is all mouintains) and finally, with 800kms under her wheels, she found a dreadful, smoke-stinking hotel, where she got the last room at $61 Euros, top floor, no lift, DISABLED room, and was able to get to bed by 1am. European regs insist hotels have a disabled facility, yeah right; top floor, no lift.... but next stop is France, where there are ´Formula´ hotels at reasonable prices all over the place, well signposted. (Well, after she´s crossed Switzerland, 200 kms of highways for a compulsory 30+ Euros, with the filthiest toilets.... no toilets, really, which is why they´re such a strage lot; they´re all bustin´....) So if you´d like our opinion of Europe as a destination for a bit of a look around, forget it. If you handle bus touring, we have no experience, I´m sorry, but go and live there? If you plan to be more than three months in any one country you´ll need another car, registered in that country, with a separate insurance cover. Call it what you like, I call it BLACKMAIL, and is the grossest anomaly, and is the underlying reason my lady is driving across Europe to deposit her car back on French soil, and find a bus back, WHICH WILL NOT STOP IN SLOVENIA, AND WILL PASS THROUGH TO CROATIA, NOT EU, WHERE I CAN PICK HER UP. Fucking blackmail. I know, you´ll be saying `Just pay the insurance´ but they have a special package, that costs 1200 Euros a year, bubble car or Rolls Royce. Blackmail. Europe is one unified money making machine. Too much red tape. too much shite for travellers; you know, the ordinary people in cars who have to get something done; I´ve been stuck in some really remote places of this globe; Europe is crowded, and you´d think they´d have learned to get along a bit together, but I want to remind you that this is the home of fascism, and of foreigner´s intervention in their affairs to keep it all from degenerating into chaos, (like Russia). Nuff said.

Blog M2

Very early this morning I sent my partner off on a drive to France, in our venerable R11 Renault, but not before discovering that the recently filled fuel tank, brand new, was leaking from a connector hose between the filler and the tank; when I´d replaced the tank, I´d felt it was wise to replace the tubes and other rubber components, but I kept all the old bits, so I had the original, dated, 1986 connector hose, but the official spare part, not dated, failed in a depressingly short time. I don´t know what your opinion of the motor trade is, but years ago I worked in that business, and I never had a good impression from then on, of the calibre of people thusly employed.... I have just had a call from my lady, out on the motorway system of Austria, five hours into her journey, reporting the alternator light showing bright red in her view. She is close to an Audi garage, and I have just instructed her on the likely time her car has before it fails electrically, and coached her on a suitable approach to the garage for assistance, or preferably, a direction to a nearish friendly auto wrecker who´ll have a suitable alternator to keep her on the road at not too much expense...... I´ll complete this when I get her next call. Which just came in; the Audi garage
couldn´t/wouldn´t help, so she´s nursed the car to Liezen, but the garages are at lunch.... it´s here or nothing, as she can´t move without a whole lot of help.....mind you; a proactive bloke with an auto breakers yard could have her on her way in 20 minutes....  No, the big garage, full of sixteen year olds in training only has a `new bits´ solution, so she´s attempting to get another 5kms to the next garage. Driving across Europe has certain budget limitations.... We do it more than most people, even in a convoy with all our belongings overloading us; a real adventure, and we´ve made it each time. I find the expressway trips in the latest Volvo to be exceedingly boring, with dangerous distractions from the multi level aircon control adjustments, the balance on the 12 speaker soundsystem, and the autopilot saying ´turn left immediately´...... you know the technological crap we are somehow being swamped with.... so, while some of you will be saying `serves her right, in an old car´, we´ll plump for an oldie anyday. And stand the hassles of sourcing older parts, but in zero degrees on an Austrian stretch, I´m fretting for my lady finding that friendly garage man.... Now her third call, totally in tears; all the pricks on earth gravitate to a young woman in distress; they´ve sent her on a wild goose chase for nothing; they don´t know of a wrecker/breaker, or any person helpful; the cost estimates mount, and these shit-for-brains are the same people who fix your new car; the motor trade is a mounting tragedy; buy new; the pathetic bleat of a pathetic industry; I wish the pox on them all. If you drive France-Slovenia, as we do, you´ll see ten times more shiny new cars broken down than older models. There´s a reality check for you; throw money at that one if you fancy, but I won´t line their pockets. I´ve just heard she´s found the wrecker who is now persuading a suitable alternator into place as darkness descends; poor soul, she´s got 600 more kms before France, and its a long lonely road.... Maman phoned just now to say she´d got a text from our valiant voyager; Munich was on the horizon, and she was only €40 lighter for the service by the wrecking yard, and an invitation to come by again, so that is all good, and the Kms are zipping by again. The exception proves the rule, and yeah, we found the nice guy once again, after some effort; Nuff said.