It started off harmlessly enough with a 4:00 am rising to ship the kids off to the airport in Marseilles. This is clearly an unGodly hour for man or beast, but we actually got everybody and everything packed into the car and we were off by 4:45.
We were walking into the airport by 6:00 and got boarding passes and checked Jessie & Chris in first as they were set to depart for Paris at 8:00. We then sought out breakfast.
Getting them behind security, we then set off to do the same touristic circuit of Marseilles that we did with Jessie and Chris when they arrived before Amber and Aaron. The sun was just rising over Marseilles as we drove the 25 kilometres into town and it was quite delightful with zero traffic.
As we were starting the drive along the coast southwest of the city, we started to hear a sound coming from the car that made us think that we'd picked up a stone in a tire. When we stopped for the next photo op, Aaron checked the tires and discovered a fairly sizable, what appeared to be a screw or bolt, embedded in the front passenger tire. We checked for a spare tire and there was none. Instructing us not to remove the bolt, we decided it might be prudent to get back to the airport, if we could make it.
We got well out of the city before the clackity-clack from the tire disappeared. This meant the foreign item had dislodged and we were probably now minutes away from being abandoned by the side of the road, early on a Sunday morning and still kilometres from the airport.
Miraculously, the car made it to the airport, showing no signs of a flat tire. We pulled into the parking lot, found a spot, got out and watched as the tire entirely deflated. We couldn't believe it! It was like the car knew it had to get us to the airport and after it had achieved that goal, it could feel the pain.
We were still pretty early for Aaron & Amber's check in and the ADA rental agency from whom we got the car, which by the way was parked 50 metres from the office, wasn't open until 9:00, so we headed into the terminal for some food.
When the office finally opened, we met Alice the employee, who thought we were trying to rent a car. She informed us they had none. We told her of our plight and asked her to get us some assistance, since our French wasn't likely to suffice and she warmed up a little. She made phone call after phone call, only to discover that because it was Sunday, we weren't going to get the tire repaired today because nobody worked on Sunday. She found it both amazing and frustrating that there were no simple solutions for us, other than to get a tow truck and ship the car off and take a taxi back to Cairanne - one hundred and some odd kilometres, I might add. At this point we finally bid Aaron and Amber adieu.
Following her advice, she helped us get the car towed and find a taxi. We commented to her that we weren't sure how the fellow at the agency in Orange where we rented the car, was going to feel, when we told him that we could bring back the extra seat we'd removed and left in our Cairanne garage, but weren't quite sure about the rest of the car. After a little giggle from all of us, she assured us that she would intervene tomorrow on the phone and explain the situation.
Since we'd set of so early this morning, the Mercedes taxi ride back was actually quite delightful because I could sit back and relax. We had a nice driver who spoke a little English, so with that and our little French, we explained what had happened and he simply said, "Incroyable! C'est la France!" He said if you have a car problem anywhere in France on a Sunday you will get nothing repaired until Monday. He also said that most cars in France now do not have spare tires because there is no room for them. If you wanted one, it was an option and you kept it in your trunk. BMW apparently now provides their cars with the inflation repair spray stuff, so you can make it to a garage for repair, but there is no room for a spare tire. Once again, "Incroyable!".
We actually got back to Cairanne not much later than if we'd driven, but a little poorer. The rest of the day was fairly mundane, with cleanup, laundry and of course the mandatory afternoon nap after the early morning. We felt content that the important objective of getting everybody safely to the airport had been achieved and we weren't really too worried about returning a car seat only, tomorrow.
Once again, "C'est la vie!" and more importantly, "C'est la France!".
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