It was again a beautiful day and we were soon up on the deck with cold beverages in our hands, waiting to enter the Scandinavian buffet dinner at 1800.
FOR ALL INTENTS AND PURPOSES...WE HAD ARRIVED!
Monday, 2 August 2010
Ferry to Finland
We were delighted to find ourselves in Värtahamnen, the harbour for some of the many ferries to Finland, on time. Our vessel, the Silja Serenade is quite a big ship. A floating major hotel really. To be sure we'd find the car from the depths of the various car decks I took a photo of the door that we got out through.
It was again a beautiful day and we were soon up on the deck with cold beverages in our hands, waiting to enter the Scandinavian buffet dinner at 1800.
FOR ALL INTENTS AND PURPOSES...WE HAD ARRIVED!
It was again a beautiful day and we were soon up on the deck with cold beverages in our hands, waiting to enter the Scandinavian buffet dinner at 1800.
FOR ALL INTENTS AND PURPOSES...WE HAD ARRIVED!
Looking for tyres...this time for real!
Fresh after a cup of coffee we again hit the Swedish motorway. The roads are really very good in Sweden and although the speed limit is set at 120 kmh at the highest, the Swedish Police did not actively seek to enforce that, where we passed through anyway. Quite a few cars drove quite a bit faster than 120 kmh, which of course was no excuse to break the law for us. We of course drove at 120 watching in bewilderment as other cars passed us by.....not : )
Kilometres and kilometres of Swedish motorway with few people in sight...
What then happened must have been the inevitable consequence of our own premonition. We needed tyres, we had thought. Well, soon enough we indeed needed at least one: unbeknownst to us a sharp piece of gravel must have jumped off the road, perhaps when leaving the petrol station, as we had not got very far from there at all when there was a bang of sorts an soon we realised that a tyre was flat. You do realise that when driving at 160 kmh (not that we were) and one tyre goes completely flat very fast.
Took the car on the roadside and started changing the tyre. The 'space saver' temporary spare wheel for speeds of 50 mph was dislodged from its compartment under the bonnet. The jack was found to be in place there too, as was the spanner and the wheel bolt lock nut - all these were of course checked before the trip. The wheel nuts were loosened, the car was jacked up and after the space saver had been pumped up with the electric tyre inflator, it was put in place. Putting it there we noticed a sharp piece of gravel on a support structure of the wheel arch lining. There was also an indentation in the lining close to it. One of our theories was that the piece of gravel had lodged itself in the indentation and jammed against the tyre, tearing a gap on the inside wall of it - that's where the clearly visible holes lie. In fact we could think of no other thing that could have happened.
Soon it was time to carry on. The front passenger was only too happy to have the massive 17inch wheel with a flat 255/40 tyre on his lap, after a mat was placed in between. It was a summer Saturday and we had a fairly particular tyre to change, unless we wanted to drive for over 400 kms with the skimpy spare tyre at 50 mph. Time-wise we might just have been able to do that and make it to the ferry for 1700 hrs, but what if the spare burst? Or another one?
Needless to say, we weren't too exited about the prospect of driving at 50mph so we needed to find a tyre shop quickly! Sometimes you get lucky, sometimes you don't. Well, this was a day we ought to have filled a couple of lottery coupons: we had only driven a few minutes on the spare wheel as we realised that we were approaching a fairly major city of Jönköping. The first visible sign, rather that the city sign itself, was an industrial area on the right side of the road, where we saw another sign: EUROMASTER. And, Saturday or not, underneath a big pair of double doors seemed to be open! Over there and quickly...sorry, at 50 mph!
As it happened, the Euromaster was supposed to be closed, but someone belonging to the Swedish Automobile association had had a flat tyre like us and had had to call in a tow truck, who had alerted the Euromaster to open for the occasion. We actually arrived a few minutes before the tow truck and our Swedish-Bosnian tyre master thought we had called him in. We told we had not but he promised to deal with our problem too.
To make a long story of waiting for the others to be served and then finding a full set of fairly rare tyres shorter - yes, a full set was now required, as the front ones needed changed and the rear ones needed to be a matching pair - I'll simply conclude that we did find a set of very good tyres, not at the bargain prices we had been hunting for but at this point we were not in a position to start arguing. Altogether this took a little over two hours of our time and when I suggested to the tyre guy that we might actually now struggle to make it to the ferry on time, he smiled and, pointing at the car, said 'Not in this one'.
He was right of course and soon enough we were eating miles again on the road like never before.
'No, you will not be late from the ferry in this one', the Swedish-Bosnian tyre master said
Deflating the space saver to be able to fit it back into its space after use.
Another stretch of Swedish motorway...not unlike the earlier.
Kilometres and kilometres of Swedish motorway with few people in sight...
What then happened must have been the inevitable consequence of our own premonition. We needed tyres, we had thought. Well, soon enough we indeed needed at least one: unbeknownst to us a sharp piece of gravel must have jumped off the road, perhaps when leaving the petrol station, as we had not got very far from there at all when there was a bang of sorts an soon we realised that a tyre was flat. You do realise that when driving at 160 kmh (not that we were) and one tyre goes completely flat very fast.
Took the car on the roadside and started changing the tyre. The 'space saver' temporary spare wheel for speeds of 50 mph was dislodged from its compartment under the bonnet. The jack was found to be in place there too, as was the spanner and the wheel bolt lock nut - all these were of course checked before the trip. The wheel nuts were loosened, the car was jacked up and after the space saver had been pumped up with the electric tyre inflator, it was put in place. Putting it there we noticed a sharp piece of gravel on a support structure of the wheel arch lining. There was also an indentation in the lining close to it. One of our theories was that the piece of gravel had lodged itself in the indentation and jammed against the tyre, tearing a gap on the inside wall of it - that's where the clearly visible holes lie. In fact we could think of no other thing that could have happened.
Soon it was time to carry on. The front passenger was only too happy to have the massive 17inch wheel with a flat 255/40 tyre on his lap, after a mat was placed in between. It was a summer Saturday and we had a fairly particular tyre to change, unless we wanted to drive for over 400 kms with the skimpy spare tyre at 50 mph. Time-wise we might just have been able to do that and make it to the ferry for 1700 hrs, but what if the spare burst? Or another one?
Needless to say, we weren't too exited about the prospect of driving at 50mph so we needed to find a tyre shop quickly! Sometimes you get lucky, sometimes you don't. Well, this was a day we ought to have filled a couple of lottery coupons: we had only driven a few minutes on the spare wheel as we realised that we were approaching a fairly major city of Jönköping. The first visible sign, rather that the city sign itself, was an industrial area on the right side of the road, where we saw another sign: EUROMASTER. And, Saturday or not, underneath a big pair of double doors seemed to be open! Over there and quickly...sorry, at 50 mph!
As it happened, the Euromaster was supposed to be closed, but someone belonging to the Swedish Automobile association had had a flat tyre like us and had had to call in a tow truck, who had alerted the Euromaster to open for the occasion. We actually arrived a few minutes before the tow truck and our Swedish-Bosnian tyre master thought we had called him in. We told we had not but he promised to deal with our problem too.
To make a long story of waiting for the others to be served and then finding a full set of fairly rare tyres shorter - yes, a full set was now required, as the front ones needed changed and the rear ones needed to be a matching pair - I'll simply conclude that we did find a set of very good tyres, not at the bargain prices we had been hunting for but at this point we were not in a position to start arguing. Altogether this took a little over two hours of our time and when I suggested to the tyre guy that we might actually now struggle to make it to the ferry on time, he smiled and, pointing at the car, said 'Not in this one'.
He was right of course and soon enough we were eating miles again on the road like never before.
'No, you will not be late from the ferry in this one', the Swedish-Bosnian tyre master said
Deflating the space saver to be able to fit it back into its space after use.
Another stretch of Swedish motorway...not unlike the earlier.
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