Today we’re driving back to Switzerland! Or so we think. Because an hour after setting off, a tyre pressure warning suddenly appears for the rear left tyre. Only 1.7 bar and soon 1.6 bar – something is wrong. We take the next exit and stop at the next opportunity. Pumping it up again doesn’t help… the air just won’t stay in. With 1.3 bar we drive slowly to the next petrol station. I would rather be stranded there than in nowhere.

So I call our car insurance company, which also includes roadside assistance. And actually everything seems to work out fine. The employee notes our location at the petrol station and confirms my mobile phone number for the towing service. Then I set off to find a wheelchair-accessible toilet. It might take a while here.

And indeed it does. When the towing service still hasn’t shown up after two hours, I call the insurance again. They are on their way, the employee tells me. But two hours later we are still waiting. When I call the car insurance company again, a different employee explains that the towing service had reported back that they had been to the address and had also tried to call, but could not reach anyone. This seems weird.

As I look around again for a tow truck, I spot one far down the road. And sure enough, it’s the one we’re waiting for. He’s been here for two hours, he says, but just couldn’t find us anywhere. When he shows me the info he had received from the insurance company, everything becomes clear: Allianz24 sent him an unclear address instead of the petrol station’s name, and instead of my mobile phone number, our LANDLINE PHONE NUMBER IN SWITZERLAND! No wonder he couldn’t reach me that way! So our car insurance company not only wasted our time, but also his. And not only that. If this guy had looked at the tyre two hours ago, he would have known then that the hole was too big to repair and that we needed a new one. And he could have found one for us. Now, a few minutes before 4 pm, that is unfortunately not possible anymore, because all shops close at 4 pm on Sundays. That means we have to spend the night again. Well bravo.

Derrick, our friendly breakdown mechanic, drives us to his garage and suggests two Premier Inn hotels nearby. We almost always stay in this hotel chain anyway. It’s good that the first one still has a wheelchair-accessible room available. Derrick drives us there, unloads the car briefly so we can take everything we need, and then loads it up again. But of course only after he helps us to bring the baggage to the hotel. He wants to get a new tyre first thing tomorrow morning and bring the car to the hotel by 10 am at the latest. Fingers crossed!

So we make the best of the bad situation and order something from Wagamama for dinner, via Deliveroo. The courier service for every conceivable restaurant has simply become huge in recent years. And sure enough, half an hour later the courier hands me a bag with a ramen noodle soup for me, katsu curry for Gabi and a load of edamane to share. Exhausted, we soon fall into bed and hope that the return journey will be more of a success tomorrow. We don’t have to go back to work until Tuesday, but our relaxing day off at home on Monday is cancelled.