Two Hours Later...One Clean Car!

So, today, it was my main goal to get my car washed. Not do-it-myself car wash (you are not allowed in Germany to wash your car in "your yard" because it isn't good for the environment), but just take my car through an automatic car wash. There is one on the Mainz Kastel base and I have been driving by there for the past two weeks, but the line has been so long, I have gone "Nope, not today!" many times, but today, I was determined to wash my car no matter how long the line was! You could no longer tell it was a steel gray color.

I got in the back of the line, which had six cars ahead of me. Thomas was at school and I had an hour and a half until I had to pick him up. I turned my car off and rolled down the windows like any good person living in Germany should do (because it is against the law to let your car run while parked--bad for the environment, you know!) Let me tell you, nearly 80 degrees in an almost black car gets pretty hot! I waited 45 minutes until it was my turn. I bought my car wash card and drove the car in...and nothing happened...I drove back and forth to engage the car wash and still nothing. By this time, two of the patrons immediately behind me were trying to help but we couldn't figure anything out. I was out of $1's and $5's which is all the car wash card machine will take so I couldn't buy another card. The line was getting longer so I had no choice...I had to drive out of the line with a still-dirty car.

I went to the gas station to get a refund. The gas station attendant didn't know that they could give refunds so he sent me to the Auto Parts store. I hauled Toby in there and the Auto Parts guy said, "Oh, you have to go to gas station for that." I told him, "OK, the only problem is that guy just sent me over here." He was nice enough to get on the phone and tell him what to do. So, we walked back across the parking lot and got my new car wash card. Unfortunately, by this time, I had twenty minutes until I had to pick up Thomas. No time to sit in that line again!

We drove over and picked up Thomas. Then, we headed back to Mainz Kastel to try again. Luckily, by this time of the day, while it was still quite warm, there was a shadow cast by the building nearby so it was shady. When we arrived, there were five cars ahead of us. There was a vending machine with cold drinks so I bought three cold drinks for us and we waited. Finally, it was my turn to drive in the car wash and about five minutes later, I had a sparkling clean car! The whole process took two hours!

It's calling for rain tomorrow.

Until later,

Emily