Rather Stuck.....any help/advice greatly received

Thanks for all emails of support, much appreciated. Had a second garage look at car and basically they said the same, engine completely knackered. Can be fixed but will cost around 2500E plus take 4 days or so, depending on part needed and where it has to come from. Trying to just scrap the car and buy a new one seemed to have its own difficulties, can't buy a car in Italy as a non-Italian and would take couple of days minimum anyway, can't just leave car for garage to scrap, municipality has to approve it, costs a few hundred Euros, might cause problems with paperwork back in Bulgaria for car.....looked to hire but nothing locally as far as I could find out, maybe something from La Spezia but need something big for dogs and all luggage and then still what to do with car here - leave and come back for it in a week? scrap?........

So did not appear to have much choice but to max credit card and tell them to fix it as quick as they can (even though costing more than car worth), stay in hotel over road that were happy for dogs to come in with me....going to be a long 4 days.....dogs stressed enough as it is with long journey. Still at least hotel room has terrace so they are outside in their cages and can watch the world, or mainly traffic below, go by.

I know this is rather late as I've only just seen your posting, but it looks like you have blown the head gasket. I know it sounds rather strange, but cracking a couple of eggs into your radiator does the job of sealing small leaks in an emergency, and could get you to your destination. It's an old trick and it doesn't do your pipework any favours, but it does work temporarily.

Good luck!.. Peter