Petrol Station Roulette

After a two-shot penalty in the greenside bunker on the 9^th, I knew we were up against it.

Florian was playing well and running up some steady pars but after a delicate splash out of the bunker caught the lip and rolled back in, he lashed out and slapped the sand with the club. Reluctantly, our playing partners called the penalty and that left us at +4 for the tournament.

The talented Austrian parred his way in through windy conditions but barring a complete collapse by the rest of the field it was an early bath for team Praegant.

On Friday afternoon, I left the club and embarked on the nine-hour journey back to my quaint french ski resort home town of Châtel. The trip out had been done in predominant darkness so I was keen to hit the road and see what the western shores of Italy looked like with the sun dipping down behind the Mediterranean horizon.

Predictably my fuel light beeped almost as soon as I turned the key. tutting and rolling my eyes, I began looking for a petrol station. The satellite navigation unit was directing me back south to Rome but looking at the compass in the bottom left corner of the screen, I took it upon myself to ignore the recommended route and followed my nose northward.

Intentionally avoiding the motorway, I was winding my way up the coast road quite nicely, passing through some delightful little Italian villages. Ancient fortresses and Medieval stone castles lined the bumpy road as sleepy folk closed their shops for the night. 

There are only so many neon signs saying PIZZA you can pass before your taste buds crave a slice of cheese on toast and being the obedient type, I pulled in and ordered a Quattro Formaggi with extra pepperoni. A cold Peroni was consumed in the stark and not quite open yet restaurant whilst Giovani threw my dough in the air far more times than it seemed necessary. Another beer was taken for the road and with PIZZA on the passenger seat I continued my long journey home.

The sun said goodnight and then introduced me to his pink and purple friends. They lit up the darkening sky for half an hour or so, laying on a light display the likes of which I hadn’t seen since watching Jean Michel Jarre in ’81. A couple of small beers and a pizza inside me I was as happy as could be. The disappointment of another week on the bag ending in an early bath had long since left my weary head and my trusty steed and I swallowed up a few miles of tarmac in an Italian haze. 

I need a constant stream of information when driving and am forever glancing at the GPS or the speedo or the rev counter, if not the iPod, phone(s) stereo, map or temp gauge. I was so preoccupied with all of these things that I forgot all about the rather sorry-looking fuel gauge that had alerted me to its thirst nearly an hour ago. Seeing the needle bending against the red zone had me gasping then going straight for the GPS to hunt down the nearest petrol station. 

Thankfully it was only a few miles away so on we chugged. Deep in the heart of a one-horse town with a total population of four, the garage was unsurprisingly unmanned and so it seemed I would have to pay for my fuel through the accompanying machine. I put in my one faithful card and tried to decipher the Italian instructions. Just as I figured out what to do next my Credit Mutuel Gold Card was spat back out hitting me square in the chest and landing in a puddle of dirty old diesel.

I tried it again. This time I caught the slippery card and tried another. Same result. It did accept cash though so I scrambled about for some euros but could only find a fiver in paper and €6.85 in coins. The latter wasn't accepted so I fed the machine the screwed-up five euro note and ‘filled up’ my poor van with three and a third litres of gasolio - barely enough to move the withered needle from its newfound position.

Off I drove into the darkness of the night in the faint hope of finding another station within a few miles. As luck would have it an AGIP garage appeared on the right and I pulled in. The shop looked like it had last been occupied before the war and the pumps hadn’t had an update much after. The automatic or ‘SELF’ machine was a dilapidated excuse for a modern-day teller and naturally didn’t work. On I went.

The next station had similar technology and definitely didn’t accept plastic. Ten miles further another AGIP garage loomed into view and a couple of those old-fashioned humans happened to be inside apparently working. They asked me to wait whilst they took readings from all eight pumps and then proceeded to gesticulate that the station was now ‘clos-ed’. I asked why it was that every station in Italy doesn’t accept my globally recognised cards with plenty of available funds. He replied with one word, ‘Bancomat’. I asked what that meant but I was clearly pushing his linguistic ability now and he walked away showing no further interest.

As I stomped back to the van in a huff his colleague said, “Cash only.”

“Do you have a cash machine?” I asked.

“No.”

“Cheers.”

So on I went. 

The needle and my confidence were wilting rapidly. There was nothing between these petrol stations other than a long dark dead-straight road. The moon was lighting up the coastline and the stars were glistening behind in the jet-black sky of the October night. Under any normal circumstances, it was a perfect night for a drive through the unknown.

The twelfth station I visited looked like it might have some form of life emanating from its dull din but as I rolled in, the drivers returned the nozzles after filling up their grateful vehicles and sped off into the night. I pointlessly tried to use my Mastercard in the machine but once again failed to generate any interest from the software within.

I was screwed.

I’d had the van for several months by now and had come dangerously close to running out of fuel before. Friends who know me will be familiar with the perpetual game of petrol station roulette I am prone to playing week in, week out and have often insinuated that I am a fool. This time I was about to prove them right.

Moving down the list of petrol stations on the TomTom I clicked on the next station and continued on to the next one five kilometres down the road. Sadly I never made it. I could see the next AGIP some kilometre away but my poor van just couldn’t go on. He spluttered to a halt and pulling it out of gear we rolled as far as we could before putting on the hazard lights and head-butting the steering wheel. Exasperation, disappointment, frustration, despair and a touch of self-loathing were just some of the emotions running through me.

I didn’t dwell on it too long though. If worst came to worst I could just pop in the back, pull out the bed and sleep under the warmth of my duvet until the sun came up and with any luck, one of those old-fashioned humans would unlock the doors of the nearby petrol station shop and allow me to use my credit card.

In hindsight, I wish I had.

I grabbed my phone, wallet and torch, locked up the van and wearing only a white hoodie, shorts and trainers headed out into the night. It was a lot colder than I thought. The gentle on-shore Mediterranean breeze had morphed into a fairly strong hurricane that was bringing with it every chilly autumn molecule of sea air it could find. I’ve never had a problem with hitching and have made it through circumstances like this before with consummate ease, so I stuck a thumb out and waited for a passing Italian with a big heart.

The first vehicle that passed was a 7.5tonne truck and it pulled over immediately. Result! I hopped in and without asking anything about me the driver put it in gear and pulled away. I asked if he spoke any English to which he replied that he knew a little. I then asked if he could take me to a petrol station. after a few minutes, we passed one on the left and I motioned towards it. As I watched it disappear behind us, I turned and asked where he was headed. He told me that the garage I was heading towards that we had just passed was closed. I told him that it wasn’t. He said it was. I reiterated that it wasn’t to which he seemed adamant that it was… this went on for a few minutes until I conceded. I was in his country and his wagon after all.

So I asked where we were going. It was warm in his truck and I wasn't in any particular hurry to get back out into the freezing tornado.

He said, “There is a petrol station up here somewhere…”

“Any idea where?” I pondered.

“No.”

“Monte Argentario is only a fifteen or twenty Ks up here isn’t it?” I informed the driver.

He looked at me like I was mad. “No, that’s the other way.” Motioning with his thumb behind him.

“Eh?”

“This is road to Roma.” He informed his passenger.

“Um… no. I think you’ll find that’s where I have just come from.” I patronisingly suggested back.

“Well I go Roma and it this way.” he said pointing straight ahead. 

I was so confused. I had driven straight out of Rome and along the coast north. I’d watched the sun go down in the west, which was on my left making north ahead of me - give or take a degree or two here and there. The Med was on my left all the way up and as far as I was aware I had pulled over on the right-hand side of the road with the van pointing in the direction of France - loosely speaking.

We battled on relentlessly arguing about our current direction of travel until a sign loomed up enlightening me that we were indeed going towards Rome again. How had that happened? I was mystified.

Ten kilometres rolled by and I asked once again where we were going. He said a petrol station had to be up here somewhere to which I couldn’t help but bring up that the last one would have done nicely. He said it was closed. I said it wasn't... I asked him to find one on his Garmin SatNav unit, to which he complied. There was one in 8km.

Not sure whether to trust this guy, I decided to interrogate him over the next 8km. I asked him where he had come from and where he was going; what he was doing and what he was carrying. He was from Romania and was delivering a piano to Rome. I didn’t buy it. I’d watched too many movies about dodgy eastern European guys trafficking young girls to capital cities and then the film ‘Hostel’ came into my head. I wish it hadn’t.

The ESSO garage came into view just in the nick of time and I hopped out whilst the truck was still moving. In the chilly howling wind I staggered up to the pump machine and saw the same familiar useless piece of shit I’d seen over a dozen times now. I turned in despair to the Romanian and told him how many times I’d seen this machine and how many times I’d spat and kicked the thing in frustration. He just shrugged and told me I needed to put cash in. Thanks.

“Do you have any?” I pleaded.

“Yes.” He said smugly.

“Can I borrow some?”

“No.”

“I have a tenner in my van which I can give you once you drop me back there.” I lied.

“I no go back to van.”

“Eh?”

“I give you fuel can then I go Roma.” He then went to the rear of his van and I’m sure a thin, pale young girl handed him a huge green Jerry can. He handed it to me and then returned to the warmth of the cabin. I stared in disbelief at the guy and then hopped back in.

“Can you take me back to my van, please?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“I have only fuel for Roma.”

Looking at the pump next to me I said, “Well put some more in then!”

“I can’t.”

“Why not?”

“I go to Roma.”

“I know! But you can’t just abandon me here!” I was getting a little short with him.

“I no take you to van.”

“What?”

He pointed to his fuel gauge which looked decidedly healthier than mine and told me he had just enough for the remaining 123km to Rome. He wasn't prepared to put any more in and that was that.

“You take can and ask.” He pointed across the high concrete central reservation barrier to the other side of the road.

“There’s no one out there, mate! It’s dark, desolate, cold and everyone is in bed! No one is going to pick me up and now my van/home is 22km away!”

He looked thoroughly disinterested.

I tried the softly softly approach and asked him in my best calm and collected tone, “Please, my friend can you take me back to my van and I’ll give you every cent I can find.”

“No.”

You can only imagine the expletives I uttered after that.

I slammed the door and kicked and punched the side of his van until an Albanian girl asked me to keep the noise down as I was waking her nine sisters.

I walked away from the useless petrol station and clambered over the barrier to the other side. I wasn't even sure whether it was the right way to go but I looked both ways and saw nothing in either direction. Streetlights hadn’t made it to this part of the world yet and thus left the illumination responsibility to the full moon above.

I started to walk back from whence I came in the faint hope that it was the right way. I still hadn’t fathomed how I’d managed to get the van facing the wrong way and wasn't sure if going back was right or not.

Then the severity of my plight hit me: No one knew where I was; I didn’t know where I was; it was really cold; I was vastly underdressed for a midnight trek along the Italian coast; all I had on me was an iPhone with about an hour’s worth of battery life but no signal, a torch with fading batteries, a credit card that didn’t seem to work and about 60cents. I was 22km away from the comfort and security of my van and all I wanted to do was get back to him.

Then another horrible thought hit me. I thought about my new Romanian ‘friend’ and his Eastern European ‘Hostel’ gangster connections. I began wondering why he hadn’t stopped at the first garage and proceeded to take me 22km away from my van and then deposit me alone in the desert. Had he dropped me off and then called his mate who by now was hauling my van onto the back of a flatbed truck and taking him away for medical research? Were these despicable foreigners going to smash their way in and nick all I own? Not again surely. Everything of any value to me was in that van and I was nowhere near it.

Visions of arriving blistered and frozen at four in the morning to see a space where my van used to be had me breaking into a gentle and desperate canter.

Half an hour passed until I heard the dull drone of a vehicle some distance behind me. My trusty torch lit my way and I used it to flag down the approaching car. I even waved the beam in my face to show how pitiful and in desperate need of rescuing I was but the driver just blinded me with his full beam and sped past into the night. Bastardo.

Ten minutes later another car could be heard so I repeated the same pathetic routine of flashing the light on the road as if to suggest he ought to stop, followed by lighting up the huge Jerry can, then my sad, cold and lonely face. I repeated this pitiful charade to over 30 vehicles for over an hour and a half until I conceded that walking back to my poor van was the only option. The trouble was it was over 20km away. Going back to my Duke of Edinburgh Bronze Award (form an orderly queue, ladies) I recalled that a fit man walks at approximately 4km per hour. The mice in my head whirled around and deduced that I would get back to my van in five hours time – 3am. My hazard lights would have been flashing every other second for over six hours. Anyone who knows anything about running a diesel engine out of fuel knows that you aren’t likely to get it going again anyway but one thing that would help is a fully charged battery.

I let out a little whimper and stuck my thumb out again… an hour and a similar number of rejections later, a little red diesel Opel Corsa pulled over. Hallelujah!

I clambered in and only then did I realise how cold I was. I’d been walking and walking for nearly two hours. Having been a caddy for a few years now - which essentially involves walking for a living carrying something - I considered myself in decent shape but the guy looked at me as if I needed a paramedici - pronto. English was not a language he was familiar with but thankfully the international language of gesticulations afforded him enough info to deduce that I needed fuel. The Jerry can being a fairly obvious clue I guess.

There wasn't much I could say to the off-duty security guard after that so I directed the heating jets away from his fuller figure and towards my frozen parts to thaw out. We drove and drove and only then did I feel thankful that I hadn’t considered walking the rest. It was bloody miles! I tried to tell him my car was at a big yellow AGIP garage up here on the right somewhere. Or was it on the left?

Then he pulled off the highway and onto a road that crossed over towards a blue and orange petrol station. I didn’t know where to start in telling him that it was the wrong garage but he just pointed at my Jerry can and said, “Gasolio?”

“Si.”

The same old rickety machine greeted me along with a strong sense of déjà vu. I explained that my card didn’t work and he said, “Cash.” I pulled out the liners of my pockets indicating I hadn't a bean. I looked like a tramp. He pointed towards the car and we drove off. A minute later we were outside a bank. Good lad! I whipped out €100 in twenties and we headed back to the garage. Courtesy of my new chaperone I popped €20 of diesel into the huge can and retreated to the warmth of the Opel.

He then drove off and after a labyrinth of twisty, turning roads, we found ourselves back on the highway once more. I settled back in the seat for a few minutes of respite. It then dawned on me to question which direction we were going. He had picked me up on the road coming from Rome, right? I honestly didn’t know. The Romanian had baffled me. I thought long and hard for a minute or two then just went with my instincts.

“Signore, Roma…?” I pointed through the rear windscreen.

“Si.”

“Then I think we need to go the other way.”

“Che cosa?" He said in Italian.

“This way – wrong.”

A light bulb flew out of his cranium and he hurled the little car sideways down a gravel track heading into the darkness. He navigated his trusty steed through the backstreets of some sleepy village and then back to the petrol station we had just filled up the can from. I tapped my forehead suggesting he was a clever boy. He looked at me as though I may have recently had sex with his grandmother. A few more turns and we were back on the road again this time going towards Rome where I believed my lonely van might be waiting for me.

How could I lose my car? I began reciting the 2000 American stoner film with Ashton Kucher about two guys who party so hard one night they lose the car, namely Dude, Where’s My Car?

Was it this way or the other? I genuinely had no idea. Could I take up this poor sod’s entire night whilst we drove up and down this godforsaken piece of road looking for a white van with the hazards on? I was in a state of mild panic. I had seen a Carabinieri station a few miles back so if worse came to worse I could go in there and ask them to help me find my van but how stupid would I look?

“Oh… hi... um… ciao, I…um ran out of diesel a couple of hours ago and got into some Romanian fella’s truck who took me out into the middle of nowhere and dropped me off. Then I walked for two hours until Guiseppe here picked me up and furnished me with fuel and now I can’t find my van. Can you help, Signore...?”

My patient chauffeur continued up the highway for a further ten or so kilometres until a big yellow AGIP came into view. I cheered and said, “That’s it! That’s it!”

He pulled into the garage but I had to explain that it was further up the road. I was taking the piss now and knew it. The guy was clearly wishing he had never picked up this English idiot and now he wanted another kilometre up the road? Cheek.

I pleaded with him to continue up the road a little further to my van. He reluctantly put it in first and pulled back out. Nothing looked familiar to me at all. It was an AGIP for sure – no mistaking - but everything around it looked new to me. We drove on for a few kilometres further than my van could possibly have been until I came to the conclusion that not only was it the wrong AGIP but we had gone the wrong way and that I was indeed an idiot.

I motioned to Guiseppe that we ought to get off the highway at this junction and try the other way. He looked at me as though the boys and I gang-raping his sister would have been better news. I gave the international symbol of sorry, put my warming hands between my knees to indicate some level of humbleness and kept schtum.

He let out a big sigh and pulled back out onto the highway again proceeding down the road he had gone down at least twice already that night. Some 25km later I saw the big red ESSO garage but it was on the other side of the road. That’s right! Isn’t it? I kept quiet and hoped to hell that somewhere up here was a big yellow AGIP with a withering white van patiently waiting for its master and food.

Ten anxious and tense minutes later I began to recognise a few buildings on my right. “Yeah, this looks right!” I exclaimed. He didn’t look convinced. He just wanted me out now.

All I could do was encourage my driver that all was well. I genuinely did recognise the sights around me but my mind was so scrambled now I didn’t know when I might have seen them. Was it on the way to running out of fuel or when the mad Romanian had driven past them? As we drove on I honestly felt as though my AGIP and my van were just around the corner. I just didn’t have a clue which side of the highway.

Two minutes later we banked around a long sweeping left-hander and I saw yellow. Then I could make out it was a garage. Then, definitely an AGIP. Then I recognised the trees across the road – the ones I’d cowered under when I realised how cold it was. I screamed, “We’re here! We’re here! We’ve found him!” Just up ahead the surprisingly strong blink of my van’s hazard lights was clear to see. I let out a little sigh of relief and patted my new chauffeur on the thigh. A look of, ‘Do that again, sunshine and we’ll fall out.’ was all I got in return.

He pulled off at the next junction and sweeping around the complicated overpass we stopped behind my van. I lagged the fifteen litres of fuel out of the footwell and ran up to the side. I unlocked the fuel cap and then I realised I didn’t have a funnel. I looked sheepishly at Guiseppe and he said, “Imbuto?”

All I could say was, “Si, grazie.”

Like an episode out of Bush Tucker Man, he poured out his freshly purchased two-litre bottle of agua minerale onto the street and whipping out his trusty penknife fabricated a perfect funnel for me. He held it without a word as I poured in the fifteen litres of diesel – some made it into the van, the rest all over his hand.

I kept suggesting to him that he could go and that I would be fine now but he motioned that he would wait until the van had fired up – if at all. I returned the fuel cap and ran around to the driver’s side. I waited patiently for the glow plug light to extinguish before turning the key. Normally he fires into life immediately but he wasn't having any of it. Guiseppe then banged on the passenger window and shouted through the glass, “Lentamente!” I took that to mean slowly. I tried it again and the old beast chugged into life spitting out various fumes and black clouds of diesel onto the bonnet of my poor suffering chauffeur’s Opel.

Needless to say the feeling of relief was immense. I hopped down from the cab and ran around to give Guiseppe a big hug but thought better of it. He was retreating back into his car now, shaking his head and muttering to himself. He looked pleased with his night’s work but refused the €20 note I was begging him to take. “Prego.” I said. After several refusals, I rolled up the note and tucked it in his top pocket. I motioned that he buy himself a drink. “Grazie.” He said and disappeared into the night.

===================

A few minutes ago, just before writing this, I popped down to my local supermarket to buy a few groceries for the evening’s dinner. I opened my passport wallet to retrieve a credit card and a €50 note fell out.

Porco Dio

CK