An Ironically Slow Trip on the Autobahn: Weekend in Berlin, part 1

July 10
It's been a goal and dream of mine for some time now to drive on the Autobahn, preferably in a BMW. Thankfully Linden shared this dream. So, the four of us rented a car to drive over to Berlin as it was actually cheaper than taking a train. Rob made a reservation for a sporty little BMW 1-series, but unfortunately when we went to pick it up, they were out (typical car rental experience, right?), but they did have an Audi A3, which is an equally fine example of German auto engineering...for the first couple hours of the trip.

Icey Hot Stuntin'

Before we had troubles with the car, it was really fun to drive, having a six-speed transmission and a diesel engine offering lots of power and great handling. I won't go into the details of how fast we drove for the sake of my mother!

Linden taking a turn at the wheel

With the help of the navigation system, we took an hour+ scenic detour around some backed up traffic and really enjoyed the German countryside. There are so many small, charming towns scattered throughout the country, many featuring a castle overlooking the town, that it was really fun to drive through.


At about three hours into the drive, the dash suddenly displayed a warning and the acceleration was moderated. The car could no longer accelerate as before, so passing slower cars and quickly getting out of the way of the really fast cars was problematic. We called the rental agency and they instructed us to pull over and wait for someone to come out and take care of the situation. Long story short, the four of us became caught up in battle between Audi, the rental agency, and the towers that lasted from 10:30-2:30 a.m.! We were stuck waiting forever for the companies to agree on the arrangements before we could take our new rental car, which was ready and waiting for us the whole time; we just couldn't drive off with it until the paperwork was correct. We finally arrived at Rob's mom's house around 4 a.m.--nine hours after we left.

Thankfully the rest of the weekend went great, and we'll write more on that soon...