An Australian Strava artist found himself in a messy situation after heading to a beach in Wilsons Promontory National Park to GPS-sketch a portrait of football legend Lionel Messi, only to return and find his red Toyota Yaris parked in the ocean.
Peter Mitchell spent five hours and ran roughly 15 kilometres back and forth on the beach to bring his Strava art to life. But when he finished his creative run and returned to the parking lot, his focus quickly shifted—from collecting kudos to figuring out how to rescue his car, which was now partially underwater.
The 50-year-old told news.com.au that he hadn’t anticipated the unusually high tide. “I wasn’t expecting king tide and had no idea the water even came in that far, let alone three feet high,” he said. “I just parked beside another car.”
“I came around the corner and saw it, and instantly thought, ‘How am I going to get out of here? How am I going to get home?’” he recalled.
Mitchell says he reached out to a local mechanic, who connected him with someone willing to tow the car out with a tractor—for $500. Still unsure of the car’s condition, Mitchell explored other options, even rallying friends from Melbourne to help tow the soggy Yaris home.
But with the tide receding and the seats soaked, he decided to give the engine a try. “I thought, there’s no way in hell. I literally closed my eyes and prayed. It started. Then I thought, this thing isn’t going to move—but it did. And I drove straight off the beach.”
Against all odds, Mitchell managed to drive the car 155 kilometres back to his home in Melbourne’s Mornington Peninsula. But the saltwater damage had taken its toll. A friend has since set up a GoFundMe to help replace the vehicle. They’ve raised AUD$1,200 of their $5,000 goal.
Mitchell hopes the story somehow reaches Messi himself, so he can keep chasing his passion for turning GPS running routes into viral works of art.
