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Dashing from Chamonix to Lyon

Headshot of Geoffrey Thomas
Geoffrey ThomasThe West Australian
Lyon in France.
Camera IconLyon in France. Credit: Stephen Scourfield/The West Australian

It was always going to be a tough ask — the mountain fields surrounding Chamonix in the French Alps to an awards dinner in Paris in just 10 hours.

This was going to be an episode of Top Gear and I had planned this with military precision but everything had to work!

Easy you think?

But this was June 2007, before iPhones with GPS and Apps that can do everything and hire cars with built in Sat Nav.

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In fact the first iPhone came out down under in 2008.

At the timeI used had hobble together a makeshift system with a portable GPS tracker device for my Nokia mobile phone which did have maps.

Getting from Chamonix to the outskirts of Lyon was easy and I didn’t want to run down the batteries of the phone or GPS tracker so I had them both off.

As we approached Lyon, which is a nightmare of small streets from the middle ages, I turned the phone, with the critical life-saving maps on as well as the GPS locator.

Instead of bursting into life giving me vital directions, there was silence from my mobile phone which was not picking up the GPS signal from the tracker.

Panic started to set in as we had limited time to find the station, return the car and board the TGV.

We stopped at several garages to ask directions but alas nobody spoke English.

I was really sweating as our train departure was critical to get me to an media awards night.

We just couldn’t fathom what was wrong with our, up till then, faultless GPS.

You know the feeling with unresponsive technology. Is everything on? What have I missed? What have I done to deserve this?

As I was searching for answers and a bit of divine help I looked down at the GPS tracker which I placed, as usual, in the centre console and up at the roof of the car.

Suddenly, it hit me like a bolt of lighting.

In my car back home, the centre console is a great spot for the GPS tracker because my car at the time had a huge sunroof. Habit had me doing the same with the hire car but it didn’t have a sunroof and thus the signal was blocked.

I grabbed the GPS and thrust it on the dash and almost instantly a lovely female voice burst into life on my phone and said: “At the first opportunity make a U-Turn”.

Thank you, Thank you.

We were back in business.

Next it was a race to Lyon station to locate the car depot and board the train.

I hadn’t researched the exact location of the AVIS depot and there was virtually nowhere to park.

Suddenly Christine sported that red sign and I grab a no parking spot.

We bolted with bags and thrust the keys onto the counter with the briefest of explanations and fled to the platform.

We made it with literally seconds to spare and spent the rest of the journey trying to recover our composure.

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