Change a flat tire with your translation app
To get you in the holiday mood!
Last week I received a holiday story from a couple of loyal Adrem customers: Pauline and Jac. They have been renting a van every summer for years to travel in Europe. I would like to share Jac's story with you.
'Last year we went for a ride from the campsite in Corrèze on Sunday. It was a sunny day and we enjoyed our holiday.
As we drove through a village, Pauline noticed that steering was becoming a bit more difficult. She decided to drive to the parking lot to see if there was anything wrong with the van.
Ouch, a flat tire! We didn't fancy mounting the spare tire ourselves, never done it before.
Don't panic. There was a café with a terrace. Let's have a drink first.
Then it started to dawn on us that we had a problem.
No garage in the area. We could call Adrem – we always have the number with us in case of emergency. But we had the idea that they couldn't do much for us there in the South of France.
Called the campsite – they were more than willing to help guests. They would call a towing service. But wait: we had a flat tire and we were at least 100 kilometers away from the campsite. Adrem never makes a fuss, but this seemed a bit excessively expensive for a flat tire.
I decided to go inside (into the bar) to see if they could come up with a solution. The whole village (already a bit tipsy, it was about 3 in the afternoon) gave advice in the local dialect (which I didn't understand at all).
The girl behind the bar spoke the most understandable French. She even seemed to know a solution: her friends (6 boys of about 18, 20) were sitting on the terrace and they maintained their own fleet of cars. They would like to help.
The barmaid walked me to their table. I could tell from the looks in their eyes that they would do anything for this barmaid. I decided to let her do the talking.
Yes, they wanted to help. If they could first eat their fries and drink their glass.
But of course! After all, we were sitting nicely on the terrace. I decided to get the accompanying booklet from the car.
Laughing, they said they really couldn't read Dutch. No worries, one of them just looked up the French version on his mobile phone.
Soon one of them was under the car and another came to ask if the jack and key were somewhere else in the car other than under the seat.
I asked, astonished: 'Does it have to be under the seat?' Yes, they had seen that on their mobile phone.
The jack was also under the seat, but one part was missing, making it unusable.
No, there was no other place where the missing part was located.
No worries, one of the boys conjured up almost half a workshop of car tools from his own car, including a jack. In fifteen minutes they had changed the wheel.
Apparently they didn't have much confidence in us as 'car experts' (and rightly so), because they repeatedly urged us to go to a garage as soon as possible, because we were now driving around with a flat spare tire and something still had to be done. With a translation app we found out that it had to be 'aligned'.
They assured us that we could drive back to the campsite safely. Overjoyed that they had helped us so well, I offered to pay for their fries and drinks. They didn't want to hear about it.
In the end they were willing to accept the €50 I offered. If you want to get in touch with the locals, my advice is: get something for your car and it will be done in no time.
So this year again a bestelauto from Adrem for our camping holiday!'
Jac and Pauline have already reserved their van for this summer.
There are a few other (delivery) vans available.
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