June 7, 2011.
While in Hungary, we recently discovered our banking skills leave a little to be desired…We needed more Euros so went to an ATM. We requested 100 Euros and out came 100,000 – Wow! Didn’t know we had that much money!!! We’re rich, we’re rich!!! Uh-oh, those aren’t Euros. What are they? How about some Hungarian Forints? Didn’t have a clue how much these were worth; had to go back to the hotel and get online and check with a currency converter. OK, we’re finally ready to spend a little money…
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Maybe “Driving Stories” would be a better title for this page!
Another Road Trip! April 28, 2011.
For the trip back to Pula from Opatija we decided to drive along the coast road instead of driving through the tunnel and across the peninsula. It would only add about 30 minutes to the 2 hour drive. Well, God had a good laugh at this plan!!! About half-way down the coast road, we came upon some temporary road signs and kept driving. But wait, there they are again. Slow down so I can try to read them…Oh, not good news, Steve. The road ahead to Pula is closed and we have to detour. We knew what that meant and sure enough we got what we were expecting...After the first 3 detour signs, we saw no more of them. By this time we were way off any main road and had no idea which way to go. Even the GPS wasn’t any help. We had to turn it off because it kept telling us to turn around and go back -- which was not an option! Then Steve noticed the car ahead of us had a Pula license plate so we were able to follow him for most of the way back. At one point he turned in what we thought was the wrong way. We followed him and after a few miles turned around and went our own way and managed to finally make it back to Pula. We’re not sure where that other car was going but it wasn’t Pula! So, a short 2 ½ hour drive became an extremely stressful 4 hour drive. And, even worse, Steve had to review his 4 hour seminar for tomorrow. We sure were both glad he had it all prepared and “just” had to go over it to be ready for tomorrow!
Parking on the sidewalk and walking in the street are common in Pula, Croatia. To me that’s funny. It also reminds me of driving and parking in Italy. We were in Italy for 2 months back in the spring of 2001. As I entered a public parking lot in the town of Amalfi, I saw a man directing the drivers into parking places. The lot was very crowded, with no lines marking where to park. The man motioned me to a spot – a very small spot to park our rental car. Now, our car was small but not that small. Or so my husband and kids and I thought. So, I’m shaking my head no, no and he’s saying Si, Si and some other words in Italian! Well, the car was small and short so I decided to try to wedge it between these 2 other cars that were parked at different angles, making “my” spot extremely tight. I managed to get the car in the spot indicated by the “parking director” without any scraps or scratches to our car or the other cars. A big relief to my husband and me!
Then the next obstacle was to get out of the car. Good thing we weren’t overweight or we’d never been able to get the doors open far enough to get out. When we finally managed to tumble out of the car, the Italian heard us speaking English and he smiled and paid me the supreme compliment: “You good Italian driver!”
Well, we had a good laugh at this anyway. Hope it made you smile.
Off we went to enjoy the sights of Amalfi and the beach. It was a beautiful sunny day in March and we had a wonderful time there.
And another driving story from Italy:
Remember, this was before GPS and Google maps/driving directions were available. We were trying to figure out how long it would take us to arrive at our destination, Positano on the Amalfi Coast from Paderno del Grappa. We were able to estimate the distance and driving time to Rome but once past that, we couldn’t figure out how much longer to Positano. I don’t remember why we couldn’t figure it out, I just remember we couldn’t. So, I called a hotel in Positano where they spoke English to ask how long it takes to drive from Rome to Positano.
The answer was totally unexpected. “Well, that depends my dear, on how fast you drive.” This line was delivered in perfect English with a lovely Italian accent. And no matter how I asked the question, the answer was always the same. So, we just told the hotel we’d get there when we got there! After all, they were the ones who wanted to know our arrival time.
We spent a week at the Amalfi Coast. And saw marvelous and sad sights: Pompeii, Herculaneum, the isle of Capri, Naples, Amalfi, Positano, Sorrento, and other nearby sites.
Driving along the Amalfi Coast is not for the faint of heart! Driving along a cliff for miles and miles with deadly consequences if you can’t handle the curves correctly. The curves are so bad the buses honk when they approach the curves and oncoming traffic has to stop so the bus can get around the curves. Exciting stuff!
The plus of driving the Amalfi Coast is the views and the towns all along the coast. Nothing like it anywhere else I’ve been. So very beautiful.
Okay. Now for a Croatian driving story!
We arrived in Pula on March1, 2011 and the next day we had to drive to Zagreb, the capital of Croatia. Steve had to attend some meetings there. Once we got a little east and north of Pula, the country got hilly and then we were in the mountains. It began to snow on top of wet roads so it was also icy underneath the several inches of snow that were coming down fast. And the wind was blowing even harder than before.
Once we got to the superhighway, we noticed only 2 other cars were on the road ahead of us. We could see their tire tracks but never did catch up to the cars. Steve was driving and it’s a good thing he had so much experience driving in bad weather. A couple of times we weren’t sure we’d make it up some of the hills but the thought of being stuck in the freezing cold, without a cell phone, on what appeared to be a deserted highway got us through this part of the journey.
Whew. We finally made it to Zagreb and the hotel. That’s when they told us we’d driven on a closed highway! Guess we need to learn to read Croatian! The people at the hotel were impressed that we made it all the way through to Zagreb. And so were we once we learned the highway had been designated too dangerous to drive!
An Australia Driving Story
Steve, the kids, and I were in Australia from Aug. through Dec. of 2001. Yes, we were there on September 11th. But that is not a humorous story…
We had so much luggage that we had to rent a larger vehicle than we planned on when it was time to leave. We tried and tried to get all the luggage in the first vehicle. It would have fit if we left the kids behind… But, in the end, we got a bigger vehicle!
We left Armidale quite a bit later than anticipated and had to drive about 7 hours to the Blue Mountains near Sydney. This was our last Australian adventure for this trip: repelling down a cliff into a cave to crawl around with miner’s hats, etc. I still can’t believe I really did that!
It was a Saturday and things closed early back then (restaurants, petrol stations, etc.) We finally stopped about 2:30 for gas and as Steve had the pump in his hand an attendant came out to pump the gas for us – common practice at that time in Australia. Well, she (yes, it was a young woman) was almost done filling the tank when she saw the sign for diesel only for our vehicle. And of course, she was putting unleaded in it!
Well, that’s just what we needed to make our day complete!!! We didn’t know what to do; we just knew we couldn’t turn the car on. Fortunately, the young woman knew exactly what to do. She crawled under the car and began to drain the tank. There was a car dealer across the road from this petrol station that was closed of course. But she knew the head of the Repair Shop and called him. He stopped in the middle of his soccer game, came over to the station and put some stuff in the gas tank to clean it out once it was empty. Finally, it was safe to fill the tank with diesel gas.
How amazing is that? And to top it all off, this young woman had just had her nails done (very fancy) for a wedding and ruined them without any complaint or attitude and wouldn’t let us pay for the gas either!
We love Australia and Australians!
