Thursday, March 16, 2006

Less Than Fumes

We’re white folk from the Northeast. If that weren’t enough, the last names Tyler and Wheat should give us away as descendants of Puritan immigrants from England. Our blood is well stocked with the virtues of hard work, efficiency, and frugality.

It’s that last one that can get you into trouble.

From the moment we climbed into our New Zealand Toyota Rav4 rental car we were scheming a brilliant way to save money. We pre-paid for a tank of petrol at the discounted rate Avis offers, knowing that we could return it with an empty tank and save some bucks. It seemed like a good idea at the time.

We left Masterton, 84 kilometres away from Wellington airport, with the fuel light already on. But we’d done the math: even with the fuel light lit our fuel-efficient little SUV should be able to get us 100 km easy. We drove to Wellington, parked in a public garage, had a wonderful carbo-loading lunch at Zico’s Italian restaurant, then wandered for a couple hours in Te Papa, Wellington’s children- (and Emrys-) friendly museum of New Zealand people and culture. Then we hopped back into our little silver bullet and began to navigate the Friday afternoon St. Patrick’s Day traffic toward the airport at 3:00 pm. Right on time.

Halfway from centre city to the airport the Rav4 coughed for the first time. With 89 km on the trip odometer since the empty light came on, it was quite premature. Then the engine hummed back into contented internal combustion for another two kilometers.

Then, with four coughs, three hiccups, and two lurches the Rav4 sucked the last drops of petrol out of its 57-litre tank and died.

In a roundabout.

Now I want you to know that I’ve gotten quite deft at navigating New Zealand roundabouts when there’s ample gas in the car. I find them to be a refreshing alternative to the usual traffic lights and stop signs back home. I like them. But a roundabout is the last place I want to be stuck in a vehicle that’s run out of fuel, especially when it’s rush hour traffic in the city and we’ve got a plane to catch.

All those jokes about pushing the car into the Avis parking lot to get our money’s worth suddenly seemed a little less funny as I twice attempted to let the tank settle and restart the car. (If I could just get it over that next hill . . . .) But when there’s nothing to settle in the tank, the effort is futile. So I hopped out of the car, dodged speeding cars and trucks, and headed down the footpath.

Our calculations had stranded us on the only roundabout in Wellington with no buildings or businesses nearby. I had to run two blocks to find the nearest structures that might have helpful humans or a telephone. Praise God, at the next wharf I ran into a man who didn’t have a cell phone but was willing to drive me the next two blocks to the nearest petrol station.

The Shell station didn’t have a gas canister for me to use. (Well, I think I’ve bought my last gallon of Shell gas for a very long time.) The BP station next door did have a canister. (Geo, you can go ahead and work for them.) The attendant held my credit card as collateral as I borrowed the red plastic jug and filled it with five litres of petrol. Five litres? Yeah—you can only take so many chances in a day! My good Samaritan friend drove me back to our car; I offered him thanks and a blessing, then dumped the most precious five litres of petrol ever into our thirsty Rav4. The hum of a car starting never sounded so good. And those jokes about pushing the car became downright hilarious.

We picked up my credit card and made for the airport—again. Sara calculated that even with five extra—actually, four and a half extra—litres of petrol purchased we still made money on the pre-paid deal. And we’ve got another little adventure out of it all. To boot, we arrived at the airport in time to turn in the car with no extra charges—only twenty minutes late.

~emrys

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