Trevor had really done so well for so long and even after
all the horrible fuel we fed him with and the constant harshness of the roads
for so much of this trip we so almost made it all the way with our original set
of tyres. Perhaps if we hadn’t taken so many little detours such as the 2,500
km round trip to take in Astana when we were in Kazakhstan, or the extra 2,000
km we drove to see Shiraz and Esfahan in Iran, or the huge amount of doubling
back we did in Europe by making it to Germany then backtracking all the way
through Romania, Moldova and Ukraine, then we could have completed the trip
without needing any new tyres. But if we use that logic then we could have just
flown the whole way and then we wouldn’t even have needed a car.
When we had the problems with our tyres in Romania (Blog Day 289 – Threatening to spontaneouslycombust) we took a gamble and decided just to buy two new tyres costing us €220
as opposed to four for €360, hoping that two of our remaining three would hold up
for the remainder of the journey. Well they survived the many potholed and
unmade roads that we traversed through Romania, Moldova, Transnistria, Ukraine
and Poland but decided, minutes after reaching Germany and getting on the
perfectly made, impeccably maintained, void of speed limits but incredibly
controlled in terms of other safety precautions, autobahn, the familiar clunk
and wobble resounded from Trevor’s back side. Fortunately we were on the 200 m
stretch between two tunnels so we hobbled onto the emergency lane and hastily
removed the shredded old tyre and replaced it with the completely bald spare
tyre. Knowing that part of the beauty of the autobahn is how controlled they
are, making it possible to drive at insane speeds for minimal danger, and we
didn’t have any of the things that made changing a tyre on the emergency lane
legal. We didn’t have that reflective hazard triangle thing, or reflective
vests, or road worthy tyres, or any of the safety kit that’s compulsory for
driving on German roads. All we could do was hope that the tyre change would
happen before we were spotted by anyone who cared, and fortunately we displayed
exceptional team work and were back on the road less than 10 minutes after the
tyre blew. (Thanks Denner.)
The spare which we were now driving on was beyond un-road worthy,
it was only there as an absolute emergency and there was no way we could make
it to Scotland on it. We had our doubts actually that we’d make it to Berlin
without it wearing away, and then we really would be stuck. So we exited the
autobahn at the next opportunity in an attempt to begin the search for new
tyres, but very quickly realised that it was in fact Sunday and not a single
thing was open. Well we’d just have to drive very carefully for now and take care
of it during our stay in Berlin.
Edgar pointed us in the direction of some mechanics and car
yards so we used that as a starting point. The first shop we found was able to
get us a tyre, but it would be ordered in especially for us so would take a couple
of days and cost almost €200. We were glad to have an option, but desperately hoped
that we would find somewhere that could beat the price and preferably give it
to us straight away. There were several other places on the same block, a lot
of them selling second hand tyres, but there aren’t many cars on European roads
with Trevor’s specifications so the ones that were able to get it (most of them
couldn’t) were all ordering it in so it was the same story with the price and
the wait.
Someone gave us directions to a shop that would surely have
our tyre, so filled with both hope and dread we set off to find this place. On
the way we stopped in a couple more car yards and second hand tyre shops and
were given more directions to this other place. We weren’t exactly sure what we
were looking for, but as soon as we got there we knew that was it. We had been
sent to a large complex with service centres, a car park and a sizeable shop,
all of which was obviously part of a chain called Auto Teile Unger (ATV). Inside
the shop there was an entire display of shiny new tyres, but despite searching
through each one, we couldn’t find Trevor’s size. We were very impressed with
the outstanding service we received when we asked at the counter though, and
the friendly young gentleman offered to ring their other stores in Berlin and
find out if anyone else had a tyre for us. While he waited on the phone we
assuaged his curiosity by describing our trip to him, making him all the more
determined to find us a tyre. With great excitement and much to our relief he
jotted down some details and gave us the good news that another Berlin branch
had two tyres that would fit Trevor’s needs. He’d asked for them both to be set
aside for us, even though we only wanted one, though to be honest it did seem
fairly unlikely that the one other guy in the whole of Europe that had a
vehicle with this size tyre would attempt to purchase it in the next half hour
or so. The shop assistant kindly printed us a map, wrote down the address, gave
us verbal directions and wished us well as we went on our way.
It was about half past three by now and we had a booking to
see the Reichstag Building at quarter past five, so we considered whether we
had time to do this right now, but decided just to hurry up and get on with it.
Denner began driving in the general direction while I looked up the address on
the map of Berlin that Denner had on his phone, but I realised pretty quickly
that the map the very helpful shop assistant had printed out didn’t match up
with the map I was looking at. We tried looking for nearby streets and
searching for landmarks, but nothing was matching up so we exited the autobahn to
try and figure out what was going on. Realising that we weren’t far from
Edgar’s house we decided just to go home and check the internet, at which point
we discovered that whilst his intentions were pure and his effort surmount ,
our friend at the shop had printed us a map for a Bismarckstraß in
a different city. Fortunately his verbal directions had been correct so we had
been heading the right way, and with a new map in hand we found the place
easily.
The tyres were sitting there waiting for us when we arrived
and we waited the 20 minutes or so it took to have our ancient, mangled tyre replaced
by the crisp, clean new one. €159.25 later and we still had enough
time to drive into town and see the Reichstag Building at our allotted time.
For any mathematicians out there you may have realised our
folly: had we just paid €360 to begin with we would have had four new, matching
tyres, but by trying to save a bit of money we not only cost ourselves a lot of
extra effort, but ended up spending €379.25 – an extra €19.25
– on one less tyre. Well that’s the benefit of hindsight isn’t it, and were we
to do it all again we’d do it the same anyway.
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