I May Never Get to Belgium

And certainly never with a carshare program. I thought it was a great idea. But after two failed attempts in one week, the second far worse than the first, I am accepting that the Universe does not want me to go to Belgium, so I will stay here.

What happened:

First the ride was three hours late meeting us at this little podunk train station on the opposite side of Munich from where I'm living. I met up with another mitfahrer (rider) early in the wait and we both called several times before finally getting a response that our driver was having car troubles (he said a flat tire), but we ended up having a very enjoyable drink talking about Albania and Portland during our wait.

Then the driver showed up in this Toyota mini bus which he couldn't turn off because it might not start again (refer to the previous claim that the car troubles were to do with a flat tire). Three hours late we were willing to take the ride in front of us. But after picking up a fourth rider from her house (hello, why did I wait for three hours in a distant suburb if you could have picked me up from my house?!) the driver was clearly exhausted, downing three red bulls in the first hour.

Then the car decided, it didn't want to go to Belgium. Nope it wanted to stop working entirely at 3 am on the Autobahn, in a construction zone in the hills, 13 km away from the nearest city.

We waited two hours for a tow which should have taken us to Frankfurt. But... the driver didn't have any insurance so they couldn't tow us to that particular metropolis.

I've forgotten to mention that this uninsured, exhausted, dangerous driver also continuously lied to us. Not just about the flat tire (a.k.a. motor problems!) but also about distance, who he was talking to on the phone, the route we were taking (I think there are probably still two people waiting to be picked up in Stuttgart, who he told to wait and then decided not to pick up and not to tell them at 1 am).

Maybe worst of all is that this was just a job for him, not a friendly "hey, I'm driving to Belgium why don't you come with me?" but a guy who bought a dying car 10 days previously and was using it to caravan people for a 300% mark up on the gas.

From Karlsruhe, where we eventually landed at about 6:30 this morning, I took a train home. I was done. The Universe doesn't want me to go to Belgium, and it must have a reason. I do wish I could see Bruges though.