It’s been an eventful couple of days since the last post.
When I locked Madge up following that excellent meal I noticed the key fob was a bit recalcitrant and it was the same in the morning.
Not wishing to find myself with a completely dead fob battery and unable to start the car found a Mazda dealer Butz & Muhlbach in Mayern about 1/2 an hour away who kindly fitted a new fob battery and supplied a spare for less the €5.
Getting to the dealer proved eventful as Waze sent me on a little excursion to Ardenau and back for no particular reason.
When I tried to enter my destination Gutshof zum Schluxen in Pinswang, Austria I got a message that Waze was off line and it was the same on Google Maps.
This was a frequent occurrence in my ambulancing days and usually a drive a mile or two down the road away from tall buildings usually got me back on line.
In this instance not much happened when I tried again so I thought I’d head for Koblenz which was vaguely east knowing I’d run into an Autobahn that headed south.
When I got to the Autobahnkreuz I could make no sense of the available options at all and realised my German geography is not what it was so carried on to Koblenz and pulled over at the next rest stop and a chap in a big white Mercedes kindly looked up the destination on his Sat Nav and gave me the order of the cities and towns I should be aiming at.
After a 15 mile diversion I found myself heading south in teaming rain. At the next services I managed to pick up a Europe Atlas for €10 and tried getting my phone to work again without any luck.
Fortunately I got in touch with my network provider and they said they would send a text. Instead of waiting for it to arrive I tootled on down to the next services.
When I got there still no text, so I dialled the provider again and found myself waiting to speak to a technical adviser.
Rather than hang around for someone to speak to I carried on down the autobahn with the phone on the in car hands free.
Eventually I spoke to a tech told him where I was, and what was not happening and he said he could help me with that but 1st had to ask some security questions.
Was I the bill payer for the account 
Yes. First line of address and post code No problem. First, fifth and eighth letter of my password I burst out laughing explaining how I had no idea as it was written down in my password book locked securely in a drawer 600 miles away 
We got around that issue with the answer to another question eventually and it came out that my provider had erroneously pulled the plug on my connection because I was abroad despite my having been with the same provider for 20 plus years and always paying for European Roaming. He apologised and said he would send a text with further instructions and that I should turn the phone off and on before the text arrived.
I did this and while waiting for the text with instructions headed another 20 miles down the road to the next services where I followed the text instructions which restored the maps and the blue dots indicating where I was but I still couldn’t enter a destination.
So waited in another queue to speak to a tech and carried on down the road with the call on speaker phone.
While going through an autobahn road works the next chap came on and despite acknowledging this was the same problem I had when I spoke to his colleague not more than an hour earlier we had the security pantomime all over again !
I pulled over at the next services went into untold phone menus to switch various toggles and was eventually sent four more texts with instructions and luckily the instructions on the first worked 
By now I had covered about 100 of the journeys 365 miles, I had started an hour late to get the battery sorted, had a half hour diversion because I did not know how to get where I was going and been stationary for another hour and a half talking to network provider techs.
With maps now operational I decided to press on and not stop until I had covered at least another 150 miles.
The rain was torrential most of the way, a black NB2 passed me at one point and just vanished into the haze created by all the spray glad I had the US style side lights fitted I switched on the rear fog too as I did not fancy getting rear ended on a motorway where the speed limit was 85 ish mph.
The 1st services after I had covered 150 miles was preceded by a monster tail back so rather than stop I carried on and eventually pulled up after covering 200 miles, at least 30 of which was crawling through traffic jams, in 4 hours.
Grabbed a ridiculously strong coffee and a frikadela , delicious pork and onion patty in a bun jumped back in the car and made for the autobahn, just as I leaving the services I noticed the fuel gauge was on the last mark before empty and being on the apron to join the autobahn I was way past the point of backing up to the fuel pumps which in Germany are positioned before the usual service facilities not after.
Three junctions down I found what looked like a promising location for a petrol station, plenty of warehouse factory type buildings loads of houses and a big church.
When I got there I found there was no petrol station but I did stumble across a chap who said he would guide me to an Aral garage 5 miles up the road.
Filled up to find there was still 10 litres in the tank probably just enough to get to my destination on fumes.
The Gutshof zum Schluxen was just what I needed comfy with a proper size bath and an amazing view from my room in the morning.
Hope I have not bored the pants off you. TBC
Work …[Love ‘Pegasus’ and Madge name on her Bonnet]
