Well its been an interesting few days! Not quite what we had planned! We got off to a good start on Wed (seems so long ago!) short drive to the ferry where we drove straight on to an earlier ferry, didn’t even get time to put the headlamp deflectors on. Said our farewells to England as the ferry left Dover, then had our last English Breakfast for a while, so made it a big one! Good crossing and no customs/Immigration at French end! Picked up the motorway to Paris and set off.
Made good time and decided to stop and fill up with diesel just outside Paris so we wouldn’t have to worry when we left. Pulled into service station and due to our height had to go to the lorry pumps. Found the ones marked Diesel and worked out how to operate the pump. It only put in 1/3 of a litre so we planned to move it to another pump. I began to move the van whilst Lynn went into the kiosk to explain. Big mistake! I pulled forward and the van coughed and died! Now between the pumps exit and their favourite parking places! We the found out the diesel was an organic version or something for some lorries! The garage staff were very helpful and called a mechanic who they said would suck out the wrong stuff and get us on our way. After 30mins a large recovery arrived and we explained the problem. Long story short, he did nothing for an hour and a half said someone else was coming to fix us. Then wanted 400 euros before rushing off to an accident! French lorry drivers getting really “peed off” with the stupid English blocking there route!
After a few mins another recovery truck arrived who spoke some English, we again explained the problem, he said it was very bad, couldn’t be fixed here and needed to go to a garage. He towed us, very slowly to his yard where we had trouble getting the van in, due to the low ground clearance! The owner agreed we would not have to pay for the first recovery driver, but charged us 500 euros for the second! We did argue but to no avail and speaking to the AA this is the going rate for anything our size! The AA aren’t allowed to operate on the motorways or service areas it’s only those garages authorised by the police!!!! They wouldn’t let us stay in the van in their yard so towed us back out and into a lorry park next door, where we spent the night.
Managed to get through to the AA who were great, but couldn’t do anything until the morning. Updates from them the following morning suggested we may have to wait two days for a specialist recovery truck! But in the afternoon the “competent” recovery driver returned and explained the AA had asked them to move us to the garage. Which he did again very slowly, but got us there in one piece. Relief!
The garage was a large IVECO dealership that specialises in Fiats and is authorised to work on motorhomes, great they know what they are doing! Really really helpful and friendly, but couldn’t do anything until Monday when the technician returns from holiday! Apparently the stuff we put in is “very bad” and all the injectors etc have to be checked! A French couple in there having their motorhome serviced offered to take us to a local hotel. They even called their daughter who teaches English. She interpreted for us and after grabbing a few things from the van we went in search of a hotel. The daughter found us a nice but cheap one! They couldn’t have been more helpful.
We decided that, as we were here, we would try and make the best of it and see Paris as planned, plus when we pick up the van and leave we want to head into the country for some peace and quiet ! The next instalment will be by Sarah about PARIS, and should be a more positive one and may even have some pictures!
No comments:
Post a Comment