Nowy Sącz, we have a problem.

I thought that today would be a good day to write a little about yesterday - yesterday being only slightly eventful. We expected today to be rather uneventful - just fixing the last, few, minor issues with the car and drive down to Budapest. We expected the evening consist of checking into the hotel and to go out and get a nice dinner and relax. Boy, oh, boy was I wrong. I inserted a nice picture of Per - being all smug and confident.

But first - let me tell you about yesterday. We drove from Krakow to Nowy Sącz. where we got our car washed (and caused a small scene when they realized what we where all about). And most important we put stickers on the car. The race number, 152 - the official race sponsor stickers - our only official sponsors stickers (greetings to all the great people at Best Practical) - and a big sticker for the mechanics that have been working on our car (a huge thanks to you guys for making all this possible for us!). A rather dull day really. We had dinner at a rather nice restaurant attached to a BP station. Rather awesome food compared to what one can expect from a restaurant at a gas station. The hotel was. Um. Cozy. It was clean. And. It had two stars. Our toilet however could not flush, but we had a bucket we could flush it with. The shower was really just a hose, but the shower was really just a hose.

Today we got up early. Got all the minor issues with the car fixed and got underway towards Budapest - just a little later then planned. We got about 50m from the mechanics when the car broke down. Well, to say broke down is rather harsh - it was only the accelerator wire who had fallen out of its little thingy. We fixed this quickly ourselves, but still - this counts as the first break down. Yes. First.

The second came 28km later - we where going up hill and I said something like “Oh, look, the temperature gauge for the car actually works!” the next thing was loud pop from under the hood and our windshield was covered in white foamy water. We pulled over and much as expected found our radiator hose burst like an over boiled wiener sausage. We installed a new radiator hose - no problem - we have several spare. Filled up on water and were on our merry way.

Straight into break down number three. Well technically we could count nr 2 and nr 3 together as we really just rolled backward back onto the road just to figure out that our gear box would not engage any gear in drive, and reverse did not work and. Well actually we could not engage any gear at all. So. We called our mechanics. They came along to save the day - and that they did. Well, at least that part of the day. The gear leaver thingy was kind of out of alignment and they helped us venting the air out of the cooling system and some other small bits and pieces and sent us on towards our fourth break down.

The fourth break down came some 20-30km later as a interesting new noise. It was quite obvious that there was something wrong with our exhaust system. And sure enough, so it was. The exhaust pipe is rather corroded, and it had separated from the muffler, so… Our quick fix was to put the exhaust pipe close to the muffler with a piece of wire. Close as in under the same car… I only got slightly poisoned from the exhaust in the process and I am now having an excellent headache!

We have not broken down again as of when I write this at 23:00hours, but we have had problems with our gearbox. It has problems engaging the high gear, we will have to have this looked at in Budapest as well as getting a new exhaust system. The car is also having overheating problems.

The optimistic (we need to stay optimistic right?) story for the rest of the evening/night is to boringly and uneventfully drive to Budapest and check into our hotel. Where I can post this little entry - though perhaps without pictures.

Sure enough we are in Budapest - 2AM - no major breakdowns. We experienced just a bit of overheating - this will work out much better once we get down to Africa. I am sure! Pictures will be up some time tomorrow.