DATE: Sunday, September 14, 1997            TAG: 9709140192

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B1   EDITION: FINAL 

TYPE: Column  

SOURCE: Paul South  

DATELINE: CHARLOTTESVILLE, VA.              LENGTH:   63 lines

FAITHFUL AUTO SPUTTERS ITS LAST BREATH ON ROAD TRIP

Tucked away in the majesty of the Blue Ridge, this is one of America's great university towns. Thomas Jefferson served as resident genius, dabbling in everything from botany to winemaking to the mechanics of rock-solid representative government.

Robert Kennedy went to law school at the nearby University of Virginia, using it as his training ground for his very public political life.

And, in Charlottesville, you can find more than a handful of great restaurants and bookstores.

It is also the place where my car, christened ``The Champagnemobile'' by my Alabama co-workers seven years ago, gave up the ghost. After 117,000-plus miles, in the parking lot of the Ramada Inn-Monticello, the faithful machine breathed its last.

Ironically, it was en route to the Auburn-Virginia football game. On the corner of its windshield was an Auburn alumni sticker. Inside, on one of its visors, was a button that read, ``Touchdown Auburn!''

This was truly a great car. But it had a lousy sense of timing, passing away hours before the game, and more than 200 miles from home.

Tooling up I-64 to the game, a former boss and dear friend who was along for the ride remarked how smooth the ride was, what great time we were making, how great the gas mileage was.

As it turned out, it was sort of like a relative who, at death's door, becomes suddenly lucid, seemingly his old self. Robert E. Lee's passing was like that. As his heart gave way, he ordered, ``Strike the tent,'' and was gone.

My dear Mazda's last words were uttered by my old boss. ``What great time! What great mileage! It's riding pretty smooth.''

We arrived in the parking lot of the Ramada, threw our bags in the room. We got back in the car, pumped up for the trip to Scott Field. I turned the key and the engine responded with a smooth purr. I put it in gear, and it wouldn't move.

Suddenly, I realized this car had all the future of Al Gore in a macarena marathon. It was going nowhere fast.

For the Mazda, strike the tent.

What ensued was one of those adult adventures. The next day, when the mechanic at a nearby Mazda place told me that repairing the car would cost as much as the beloved clunker was worth, I uttered words I had dreaded for months:

``I need to see a salesman.''

Surrounded by smiling car peddlers, there I was. A car with no transmission, in a strange town. It was like a Detroit version of the Little Big Horn, and I was General Custer. I figured my chances of getting out of this spot were as good as those of Hillary Clinton and Paula Jones becoming lunch buddies.

Miraculously, four hours later, I emerged with a new car, an as-yet-unnamed cranberry-colored Mazda, a granddaughter of the beloved Champagnemobile. And I was relatively unscathed. Just five years of car payments. Five years.

Now, I undoubtedly hold the record for the most expensive football road trip ever taken. The amount will remain secret, but let's just say I attended four years of college at Auburn for about the same money as the car cost.

Auburn, by the by, won the game. A great car was lost. And a new one took its place.

Strike the checkbook!

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