Cranky the ex-Townace.
At last it's time for us to come clean with the full story: the sad, sad tale of what happened to the little Townace van that couldn't (and didn't).
This tale also includes a giant yellow bear, a service station carpark and—mothers please skip this bit—not doing the washing up.
Cranky the Townace (aka Townie) was no stranger to not-working. Lights, exhaust, spare tires; at least three things not working (or entirely detached) was just everyday humdrum for our Toyota Townace. His door open light was unrelated to the status of doors and more an indication to his mood. And it was almost always in red nag mode.
On day ten, exactly one-tenth into the planned hilarity, Cranky out-did himself and completely - in mechanical terms - crapped himself on the E40 motor-way whilst driving towards Stockholm. He could drive up and down mountains and the world's longest underground traffic tunnel, but a flat motor-way was proving to be just too much and Cranky needed to shed a piston.
Or, as Swedish mechanics seem to refer to them, one of the "small wheels in engine".
As we pulled over on the E40 a small puddle of orange liquid started pooling under the car. This was particularly worrying as were unaware that Townie contained any orange liquids (we checked our orange juice supplies and were equal parts reassured and concerned to discover they were intact).
Trying to locate the source of the ominous gurgling noises we checked the engine, conveniently located under the passenger seat, Townie added some hissing to the gurgling. Townie clearly wanted some me-time, so we left him on the side of the motorway and walked 2km along the side of the road to the service station at the next exit. I was nominated to wear the EU-required reflective yellow safety vest for the trip. Apparently I was disproportionally excited about this.
After a leisurely lunch of service-station-approved hamburgers Si and I wondered back down (Simon having managed to wrestle the day-glo vest off myself) to see if Townie had concluded the wetting of himself.
He had.
We stepped over the puddles of Townace fluids to find that Cranky had concluded doing other things as well. Like having any oil or water in the engine. And not smelling like "broken". Mot and Ness purchased and lugged down some replacement oil and watnd lugged down some replacement oil "
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