30th May 2005
It was around Christmas last that my early summer holiday was planned and I agreed to it. I must have had drink taken or else May just seemed so far away.
Well, May arrived and I had promised to drive by Tatraplan across Europe to Dresden. I knew Dresden was this side of the Urals but was not quite clear how far this side. In reach of bomber planes from Britain at any rate at the end of World War II. The Tatraplan is fifty three years old and was made in the former Czechoslovakia. We had driven it back from Cologne last summer, an epic trip which I recounted before.
The Tatraplan had no seat belts, no need legally I was told, but what about one to prevent full frontal attacks from the dashboard in an emergency stop? My pleas did little good but when the son who is to pull the plug on the life support machines when he feels we've had enough said he wouldn't have to make any decisions about us in case of an accident because we'd both die instantaneously, they were installed.
D for departure day approached and I suggested a test run a few days before, so car and pilot set off for Mullingar after lunch. A few hours later just as I was about to wonder where he'd gone there was a phone call from the Navan bus. The car had expired on the way back on the Dublin side of Navan.
The kindness, courtesy and interest of all those in the Tara Service Station will not be forgotten nor that of the young architect on the bus who lent his phone and a sympathetic ear about the crisis.
Was it a valve blow-out? Surely not, I said callously, reminding "him" of what he had spent on a complete engine overhaul when the pilot eventually touched base. We went through all the possibilities over dinner but, what a relief, even if that car could not go on the trip, the younger and less interesting (and as far as I was concerned marginally more reliable) fifteen year old Tatra could take us. Oh joy!
Phone calls to Germany next morning and differential diagnoses were put forward. I'd become more sympathetic and offered to drive the pilot to the Tara Service Station with a huge tool box.
Within an hour he had it fixed. Two plugs and the carburettor were the problem. Off we set in appalling traffic for Dublin, me saying I'd drive behind in case of any problems. Within about one hundred metres there nearly was a problem. I nearly ran up its beautiful, big, shiny, dark green rear end where the air cooled engine lives. It had no brake lights! The traffic was so bad we were able to do tests on the Navan-Dublin main road without causing anyone inconvenience. It gave interest to those on the way to the Meath-Monaghan match.
We got home safely and over two hours lying in and under the car were required to find the fault with the lights (a fuse) and fix it.
Then it was decided that the wires to said lights looked a bit ropey so a rewire to the rear end of the car was required. A friend of mine arrived when the proud owner was under the car and made the mistake of saying she thought part of the fun in having old cars was dealing with the breakdowns. She has been banned from the house and grounds for a substantial period.
Off we set the next morning but did we have lift off? No, we did not. The car broke down again in Kilmacanogue. Here another angel arrived in the person of one of the owners of Avoca Handweavers. He organised a tow truck and gave my disconsolate husband a lift to a taxi so that he could go home and collect the spare Tatra! I cannot thank Avoca Handweavers enough for ensuring I got on my way to the ferry.
We crossed Normandy avec vitesse and were approaching a small town near Rheims when drama developed with the replacement car. Suffice it to say I got to know the little town of Ste. Menéhould very well. I got to walk around it for quite some time and had a delicious lunch in Le Cheval Rouge. It was in the this hotel that according to the signs in the restaurant "Louis XVI en fuite etait reconnu" and dragged back to Paris and the guillotine. I was able to read much of the history of the time but do not know if he ate "Pieds Cochon Ancienne Recette Locale" which were being pushed that day. Even though I come from crubeen country I didn't partake, and was glad later in the week that I hadn't because pig meat appeared on all menus in Germany. The car was declared sort of 'ok' and off we set across Germany. The Greens have had a huge influence in German politics and changed the landscape. The country is one giant wind farm, with many windmills of different delightful shapes. The landscape was covered with bright yellow fields of rape and the trees were covered with blossom. It was Christi Himmelfahrt, so in honour of the religious holiday there were no trucks on the road. I listened to the church bells and prayed for a safe journey.
The second son, the one who does not have to pull plugs, later told me when he heard that the car had had brake problems that I was a lunatic to get into it, but I did, and we made it to a town on the Polish, Czech, German border where the master cylinder was replaced by another saint called Tommy.
Sixty of us Tatra enthusiasts gathered in freezing cold, snow one day, to admire each others cars. Tatra fans are very nice people and appear to be without jealousy. Americans had come without cars because they were so keen to take part. They call these outings "meets" rather than "rallies" which sound much more upper-class. One retired surgeon from New York told me he had come at very short notice. "I just said to Betsy (his wife) I've got to go, I can't miss a Tatra meet". Betsy had the sense to stay home herself. Maybe I should take note and do the same myself.
After the trip I said we could have gone to the Bahamas for two weeks for the same amount of money as the trip cost - tow trucks come very expensive. "Ah yes," I was told, "But you wouldn't have enjoyed yourself so much!"
Senator Mary Henry, MD
