A few years ago when my mate who we were travelling with had a problem with his brakes, we pulled into a rest area on the motorway and called red pennant. They arranged everything, shortly a tow truck arrived, loaded car onto back hitched caravan up and left the motorway at the next exit for police and these people. We had to go to the next official exit and with instructions from his wife found the garage. He sorted the brake problem and we were back on the road in a couple of hours. No money changed hands, so obviously he(the mechanic) is on retention with red pennant.
Post last edited on 08/05/2016 18:04:29
------------- 74,going on 25
Beauty is in the eye of the beerholder
Don't forget to leave a review of the French and other European campsites you have visited!
Thank you for posting this, as it's a timely reminder for anyone travelling in France - ourselves included.
I'm so pleased you have received your reimbursement and marital entente cordiale reigns once more.
We had a bit of an experience on my OH's first French camping trip (with me) a few years back. We stopeed at a service station on the autoroute near Abbeville and, to cut a long story short, he overfilled the tank with diesel. It leaked, as the car was heavier than usual with all the gear. Because he'd bumped into the kerb trying to reverse, OH assumed he'd cracked the fuel tank...
Cue a rather pained explanation in my extremely fractured French to the service station staff. We phoned our breakdown company (on the service station's phone...) only to be told they didn't have a record of our cover!
The service station called a local breakdown firm - as is the custom - which also advises the police apparently. Anyway, by the time it arrived, we had deduced it was the over-filling that had caused a problem (with some advice from fellow travellers with a mechanical background), so tried to persuade the breakdown company it was ce n'est pas depannage.... No way. Once the breakdown/police process is in place, that's it, we had to be taken off the motorway to the garage. By that time, it was dark and quite late. We had no option but to pay the garage and hope to claim it back later. We had no idea where we were and had to find out way to Calais in the dark, on the D roads (advised not to go on the autoroute due to the police alert who might insist we stay overnight to get car checked the next day). I kept singing Bonnie Tyler's hit song for some reason.... about 3 hours later, we arrived at Calais and, fortunately, had managed to also call my sister to rearrange our crossing.
On our return, we contacted the breakdown firm with our confirmation details and the receipt for what we'd paid: the recovery fee was reimbursed - despite it being 'our fault' in effect.
A stressful experience, so I empathise with you Lidds.
Would you believe he did it again another time!
Oh, and I was responsible for turning up a day late at the ferry port... and having to pay admin fee. He still doesn't know that.
And the next year, our passport travel case fell out of our car at the overnight stop due to some marital dischord, the absence of which wasn't discovered until actually at Calais port. Lovely campsite (Beaumont sur Sarthe) sent them on.
So, moral of the story - expect the unexpected but try and pre-empt with appropriate cover and read the small print. (Note to self.)
------------- Camping - emotional resilience in action, a triumph of hope over adversity and antidote to virtual reality.
A day of all things motorhome and campervan. The show is held both in the main indoor arena and across the grounds. Catering, hot drinks and food options are available. Easy access to the site and free parking included. Win one of five pairs of day tickets
Topic: ADAC would not recover from Autoroute!
