Wrong Fuel Ooops!!!!

It would be nice to say we had an undisturbed night, but after getting to sleep about 10.30 pm at 11.15pm we had a visit from the Romanian Border Police. They weren't bothered about us stopping there, just wanted to know who & why we were there & needed to check our passports. (perhaps they thought our van had evaded passport control on the bridge and swam across the huge Danube river!!?)

In the morning the plan was a steady 200km drive up to Timisoara, 24hr car parking in the city centre & time to look around & a meal out for a change.

The fuel tank was getting low, not enough to get all the way so we pulled into a large fuel station. Usually someone will be there to do the filling but I had to do it myself. 4 pumps 1, Green hose, 3 Black all different Euro 5 grade fuel. I am thinking ordinary Diesel, Super Diesel, Tractor Diesel & Unleaded. Put 66 litres in & drove off. 5 miles down the road the engine stopped and we rolled to a halt. No power but electrics still working but engine wouldn't restart. We were in a dangerous spot on a 2 lane main road up hill near a bend with lot's of heavy traffic. Here we started to use all the compulsory items you need to travel in Europe. Warning triangles front & rear & Yellow jackets whilst putting them out. Checked under the bonnet, nothing obviously wrong so time to call Safeguard for the European breakdown service. Just then a Yellow Mercedes Romanian van pulled up to see if he could help. He had seen our GB sticker & spoke English. Checking battery terminals & obvious things I said I had just refilled & showed him my receipt, he said “Oh my Jesus” you have put in Benzine instead of Motorina, which is what Romanians call Diesel. Firstly what we needed to do was get to a safer place off the highway & here another previously unused item, a tow rope came in handy once I had fitted the towing eye. Mikel got us safely up the hill to a wider area to stop then got on his phone calling up various contacts he knew & explaining what these stupid people had done! . He reckoned if we called our breakdown we probably would be stuck there a couple of days & no one in the village would help us as they didn't speak English. At this point if you are like us, you start to think is he trying to set up some rip off deal, but we felt he was being genuinely helpful. About 15 minutes later a car appears with 2 men & an assortment of plastic containers & tubes. We now had to try to remove 80 litres of fuel from our tank which was done firstly by the mechanic sucking the fuel through the hose until it flowed, and then filling up the containers. It flowed on & off & once he got a mouthful of Diesel & came close to throwing up, but he persevered. 

Being in the centre of the village everyone had to know what was going on & there was a constant referral to Benzine & Motorina (and probably stupid foreigners but those were the only words we understood). About 60 litres had been removed by the gravity method but the final bit was proving difficult. Then they worked out it could be pumped out by attaching a pipe to the diesel pump & turning the ignition on & off to pump it through. One of the by-standers was roped in to keep turning the key on and off for the next 15 mins or so. Eventually it was calculated almost all the fuel was out & they then drove off & brought back what they said was 50 litres of Motorina which was filtered into the tank through a stocking into a funnel. Then they carried on the pumping method and after about one more litre the Diesel started coming through. Starting the engine it fired up first time, no sooty exhaust or anything. In 3 hours from conking out it was all sorted & the total cost was 100Euros, 60 of which was the fuel! We were so relieved & grateful, everyone had been so helpful & friendly & we felt they weren't out to take advantage of us. They said drive steadily & fill the tank (ONLY with Motorina!) at the next fuel station, when we did we only had to put in 30 litres so the 50 litres they had brought was correct. This whole occurrence just confirmed what we had felt about our experiences in Romania that the people were genuinely friendly & helpful & it is a wonderful country to visit.

Arriving later than planned we found the city centre Parking Cu Taxa where we we directed to a coach parking space (40 Lei for 24 hours) & went out for an explore & a meal. They were busy setting up cabins for the Christmas markets & we quickly took in the sights & then found some great food in the Pinguin Lebanese Restaurant, were another helpful Romanian, lady advised us which dishes were good for vegetarians and stopped us over ordering! 

After a traumatic day we were ready for a good sleep & getting back to the van found we had company, a tiny Police car with a Blue light on top & a sign on the bonnet saying Jandarmerie was parked hiding away behind us. The car park has about 100 spaces, they were directly next to us & all night was coming & going, chatting & laughing, doors slamming & the engine running to get some heat. A few other Blue vehicles appeared through the night all parked up close to us. We think the next 2 days were national holidays which perhaps explained the extra security going on.