Only my third Intercontinental Astra trip, but one thing is clear – when it all goes wrong, it’s not all as bad as you might fear – most things are fixable – either because you’ve got some engineers on the trip, or because you’re quick to get some help in.

Setting off on this trip and my car was in great shape. A service, various new parts including new cambelt and whole new exhaust, and I was very confident.
But, not far out of Montgomery and there was a bit of a noise which varied with the revs of the engine.

Sort of a whirring noise.

Jim and I talked about what it might be whilst we drove down to Folkestone. But I think we both knew what it was already, we just didn’t want to admit it, until we had to.

A wheel bearing was failing.

As we drove through France, Luxembourg, Lichtenstein and Italy we convinced ourselves that it wasn’t getting any worse, and genuinely I think there were some drives where it got better, but it wasn’t, and we knew it.

As we went through Slovenia and into Croatia, it was getting so noisy that there wasn’t much point in putting music on or talking, and the thought of many more days of the woo-woo-woo of the failing bearing was not pleasant.

We decided to take it to a garage when we got to our digs in Croatia. Amazingly, even though we arrived at 8:30pm, the hosts told us to take the car to a garage down the road straight away, and sure enough we arrived at the garage at 9pm to find a really friendly bunch of guys working flat out. They immediately got the car up on a four-post ramp and confirmed our suspicions – front near-side bearing was knackered.

Balls.

But, they would order 3 bearings to make sure they get the right size, and could get the whole thing done by lunchtime the day after next.
Luckily, we had a “day in the bag” as Nick calls it, so we adjusted the plan a bit, and had an extra day in Croatia doing some sightseeing, which after quite a lot of miles in a short time was a welcome break.

Wednesday lunchtime came around and true to their word the garage had the car ready, we set off driving through Croatia and Bosnia on beautiful sweeping roads, the car seeming to float noiselessly. It was a dream drive through stunning country in a fantastic car.

There were moments a couple of days before that I thought we would have to turnaround and come home, but making the call to get it sorted when we did, combined with some good luck and very helpful local mechanics saved the day.

… And this is only one of the things that we’ve had to sort out on the trip – power steering, flat tyres, and much else has given us plenty to tackle and overcome.