Mille miglia jitters

Today is the day we leave our nice home at Lago d’Iseo for our monster road adventure. We will head for Brescia this afternoon to see all the Mille miglia cars going through inspection, display and then start of the rally (at about 7pm tonite). Yesterday we visited a collection of vintage cars for sale. First we all got lost many times and many ways in getting there. Tamara and some of the ladies decided a bus ride to brescia sounded better than getting lost on the way to view dusty old cars. I kept getting separated from the herd on the way to the luzaggo collection. Finally I met most of them coming the opposite direction. We all stopped as all of the gps systems were saying this was the location. It wasn’t. It was comical though. The actual location was about 1 mile further down the road.

After viewing the collection we headed for Brescia. The ladies were not making any better time then we were… And arrived in Brescia at the same time. So much for a head start on shopping. Too bad! I was told to head strait for the t-shirt concessions but quickly realized we we so late there that I had to return to e’ve hotel to make a work call. Nuts! So today we’ll get eye full brescia tour… With the other 200.000 people. Yikes.

The whole family cleaning our car! They did a very nice job.

A beautiful alfa 6c in for a restoration at luzaggo.

A room of fiat 500’s and a stunning bianchi moped.

The dinner table set for our fabulous pizza night. Another fun night with a bit too much alcohol. Lunch has arrived so must go. Next report from the mile miglia!

Settling in to lago d’iseo

We’ve arrived at our base camp in italy for the next few days.

In Lorrach germany we met up with the scandinavian contingent. They took the car train down. Quite a sight to see so many alfas roll off the train, most sporting the rally graphics i designed.

We had a great run through Switzerland with 35+ alfas from all over europe. Closed passes forced us to us the gotthard tunnel instead. We stopped for gas, bio break and shopping before the tunnel. As i stood at the atm i heard a familiar voice yelling from an unusual location. Tamara was driving by in the car telling me to jump in as everyone suddenly left! I think she just wanted an excuse to drive! I lost my favorite hat in the middle of this 17km beast. Definitely no going back. 😦

Here I’m following our drinks to the table. Ya! We had a wonderful lunch in the italian part of Switzerland. One waitress spoke to us in German, the other in Italian. We were all confused but no one went hungry, of course.

Our group is organized by a rabid alfisti from Sweden, so, many of the cars here are from Sweden. Also represented is Denmark, Germany, Netherlands, Guernsey, Italy and the USA. The default language is English which is lucky for us. Still if you get seated at a place with a large contingent from one country you sometimes find yourself counting the tiles on the ceiling for a bit 😉

Dinners here at the lake are on the veranda of our hotel underneath a covering of wisteria. The size of these plants is amazing and makes for a great atmosphere.

It’s cocktail time so I must finish up quick! We went for a test drive today up to a mountain top. The climb had 20+ very tight switchbacks and portions at 17% grade. At the top was a nice (though hazy) view… And a coffee. A couple of cars had issues which is why we do the drive apparently. At this point it looks as though all will be back on the road tomorrow am for the next drive.

School bus of kids going crazy as we all passed on a very narrow road.

Ciao!

Cutting the corner

A quick dash across Germany and France yesterday to Lorrach (near Basel Switzerland). We had planned a fast but boring autobahn route after some google mapping made that look decent. The gps came up with a fast (and importantly) no toll road route which ran across Alsace on a very quiet Sunday morning. Last year we battled the Hal (the gps) across Europe. This year we seemed to have come to an arrangement (and an important “discovery”). We have decided to let Hal speak ( and switched to an easier-to-hear-in-a-noisy-car female voice. In the us we found the voice prompts annoying but here they are critical. We haven’t named our new friend yet but she took us on a rally nice run on two lane roads and highways across beautiful Alsatian territory.

Beautiful empty roads for Tamara to speed on. Go speed racer go!

W stopped in Phalsbourg which has a fabulous old center, very well preserved. Here is the city hall.

It was even warm enough for a cafe creme on the square.

Dad giving the kids a class on classic convertibles we think… There also happened to be Porsche and bmw convertibles nearby.

Stunning wood-timbered town we stopped off in for a quick picnic. Ive completely forgotten the name already. Nuts.

Off to Italy through Switzerland today. We met some of our rally mates last nit. More arrive on the autozug train today. It’s going to be madness with 38 cars in the group. More later!

Day one Gent to Perl

We just can’t win with the weather. Day one started like day one last September: cool and cloudy. After 30 minutes it started raining so up went the top. Stopped for lunch with duetto amicis Steven, Leen and Tobias. We had a great visit and a fabulous lunch. I willingly ate eggplant for the first time ever and it was good! Steven showed us the scenic way out of Leuven. It was great to have our two white Duettos on the road together finally. Sorry it couldn’t be for several days. Made a run for Luxembourg and cheaper gas. Yep. It is about $1/gallon cheaper there. Crossed over into Germany for the night. The countryside is beautiful here with the fields in full storm. The fields of rapeseed are particularly stunning.

Phase 2 of Giro dell Alfa begins!

We’re about to take off on the second lap of our tour. If you care to follow along, you’ll see different things this time as the focus of this trip is a rally with 40+ other Alfa Romeos intertwined with the historic Mille Miglias rally http://www.1000miglia.eu/. We’re heading toward Basel Switzerland to meet up with the other cars. Thanks to Geert, Patricia and Ilana for helping to get us ready!

And after a bit of car repair? Great friends, food and drink. Patricia, Geert and Tamara pose with some incredible beers

The Duetto rolls out into daylight for the first time since September

Crazy dance club in Belgium has a huge plane in the parking lot. I’ve ridden my bike by here many times… Couldn’t resist the photo op.

Scenery near Damme, Belgium from our shakedown cruise near Brugge.

Tamara takes the wheel along the canal road between Damme and Brugge

vintage car meets vintage Bosch headlight aiming tool. VERY cool! Thanks Geert and Lucien!

The home stretch

The state of (open/free) wifi access in Europe is still pretty weak so updates have been spotty plus we’ve been too busy to write much anyway!

Back in Gent to rest from our driving “vacation” and get ready to return to the real world. Having a coffee at a cafe on the vridagmarkt while the laundry spins. A most delightful way to do laundry.

Speaking of spins, we did one last spin in the alfa on saturday, running down to Poperinge (a chance to taste hommelbier at the source)

and Ypres before washing the car and heading to geert’s in muelebeke where the duetto will slumber for several months alongside geert’s mustang and vette. Geert showed us all the sights of muelebeke… we had grand meals (stofvlees van josianne is the best!), met some local celebs and hung out with the local cycling team post ride. The Morgenvrienden really have the club cycling thing down pat. Four groups of different abilities head off each Sunday am and all converge back at their local bar for beers and storytelling. Someday I’ll get the chance to ride with them. But will have to make sure not to drink so much the night before!

Our last day of the actual grand tour took us from Chausee sur Marne (not as exotic as it sounds) back to Belgium. Still had one or two fun excursions planned along the way. First was a stop at the old Reims Grand Prix course. I’ve always wanted to stop here to see the remains of the track. As the track used existing roads (which are still open roads) the stands, pits, etc are right at hand. It was exciting to see the stands and officials tower looking in the distance. We pulled in and a jag xk 150 from the uk had also stopped to pay tribute. We took a bunch of photos of course, walked the pit lane and then sped off for a fast lap 😉 sadly no souvenir vendors. Might be my next business.

We next set our sights on lunch. At Chimay. Another of those things we’ve longed to do for years but have never been able to pull off. The end of our trip has been blessed with unseasonably sunny and warm weather all the way into Belgium (here they’re breaking hi temp records set in the 1920’s) so it was extra special to sit outside to enjoy the special beers and cheeses produced here. We even had a view of the dairy cows likely responsible for the milk in the chimay cheeses and butter.

Race courses visited/driven on:
Spa Francorchamps (ended up on a part of the old course now lopped off since it no longer uses public roads as part of it’s track)

Nurburgring (lap of the nordschleife… Also possible to lap the modern F1 track but figured this was enough!)

Monaco grand prix course (missed the tunnel but did some minor parts of the course down by the waterfront… Not really a planned visit)

Reims gp course (lap and a half)
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Had we wanted to go nutty with race tracks there is also the mugello track near Florence, a track very near Pont du gard (we did also drive on part of the Chimay road course on our way out of chimay).

In the interests of domestic harmony I figured these four were enough!

Will they to do a bit of a wrap up upon our return to the USA. Tanks for coming along on the ride.

Petite villages of France

Tuesday am we left Vers Pont du gard (un plus petite village) with a bit of sadness for we are now heading north away from the sun and on the last leg of the trip. A pretty unremarkable day for the most part. The scenery changed from typical Provence to ‘blah.’ Could have been any gritty stretch of hwy 99 in California. We finally turned east up into the Jura mountains and the scenery improved. I had booked an interesting room for the night. I only told Tamara that it was special. I actually didn’t know that much about it either. We let hal do the navigating as our destination was not on any of our maps. Hal did a fine job for once. Coming around a bend in the road we suddenly saw cliffs and down below a gorgeous little village. We both got a bit excited at this surprise especially after the humdrum drive. Down a steep descent with some switchbacks and we were in a storybook little village. We pulled in to the parking lot for the abbey (built between the 12th and 16th centuries) and proceeded to try and find our room. Everything was closed up… Not unusual since it is post august. Eventually we found the proprietor, ghislain, and he showed us up to our room (via a spiral stone staircase in a turret). As we were the only guests he showed us every room, floors and doors creaking as we went… A great place for ghosts. Each was fabulous, each had a grand view of the town and cliffs. We chose the first room, which was nearly the size of our house. Huge wood beams, never-ending draperies, quirky but effective design details everywhere. Tamara wanted to move in permanently. Even though the bathroom (itself wonderfully decorated) was across the breakfast room and back down the spiral stone staircase the room was a winner and only 90 euros Inc breakfast!

The town, baume les messieurs, thrives so much on July august business that none of the town’s restaurants was open for dinner. Had we known we’d have packed in our own picnic for dinner.

The next morning we toured the tiny valley and visited the grotto. This place had everything! Definitely on our list of favorites.

On the route du sol

We’ve arrived in France after a few curly-q’s around Monaco. Monaco was a zoo. There was a yacht expo in town and the place was packed. Saw lots of the rich and beautiful on our laps around. Hit at least some small sections of the f1 course as well.

Trivia.
In order, the list of countries we’ve hit (without going out of our way too much):

Netherlands
Belgium
Luxembourg
Germany
Switzerland
Austria
Lichtenstein
Italy
France
Monaco

With another week we could easily have knocked off three or four more… But that’s not what it’s all about.

Our replacement california plate has finally caught up with us! The paper plate has worked so well i’m not sure I want to put the real one back on.

We’ve spent two days on the cote d’azur in a very sleepy little beach town (agay). Not much going on there but they had a nice beach and the prices were decent. Hot beach car (apparently for 40 years running) is the citroen mehari. We saw at least 8 in one day. Besides the early fiat 500’s in Italy these are the most prolific classics. And the coolest.

This guy is giving us the thumbs up… While we do the same to him.

And just when you think you’re pretty eccentric you run across a group more eccentric yet… On the way to the gorge du verdon we crossed paths with the velo solex touring club.

Le picnic is our lunch favorite. The French are very accommodating with lunch stops along the way… Or just pull over at a wide spot.

On the way to le rive gauche of the gorge du verdon we were stopped by a (somewhat vintage) car rally using the road for a time staged. Merde! If only I had slathered some graphics on the duetto. The backtrack to the other side cost a lot of time. Nuts.

Finally arrived at our bed and breakfast In Vers Pont du Gard. Great little place run by a little blue citroen 2CV and its two owners, Martin and Monique. Martin insisted I drive le deuche. I did not refuse. What a gas! Would make a great trans-Europa car too.

The owners and family took us to play petanque (along with the other guests). Awesome fun.

Here’s Tamara bowling a strike.

We had probably our best picnic today. Hit the market in mazan

and bedoin for supplies (and a little wine degustation in Mazan)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bring your own jug!!!!

 

 

We then set off for a shady spot on the side of the road… We started up the climb to mont ventoux ( the holy grail of climbs for cyclists) and found a great spot to cheer on the riders heading up. We had an awesome view of mont ventoux, vineyards, two old towns plus the sound of birds and church bells and French music coming out of the 60’s vintage Blaupunkt radio in the duetto. Lunch? Baguette, saucisson, two kinds of cheese (one was goat cheese with shallots), olives, marinated garlic (soooooo good) and of course a bottle of rose. We yelled “allez” at the riders and they yelled back “Bon appetit”. We ate, enjoyed the view and napped. Five star lunch.

That’s about all… Tomorrow we begin the journey north… way from the sun. 😦

Struggling with technology (Hal)

As mentioned before we’ve battled with our gps here. (Hell, we battled with it in the us as well.) Anyway, it seems to work ok as long as you are happy to just follow it’s non-sensical directions. If you’re just doing a simple route via major routes it also works ok. Trying to have it take you to a via point a little out of the way on your main journey? Beware!

We’ve all heard the horror stories of people driving off cliffs in death valley or some such. We programmed in a minor town several kms away and let Hal do the navigating.

Here’s the end result of hal’s wonderful orienteering:

A dead end on a steep narrow road. It was quite a trick to turn around on. Guys further down the road clearing bamboo got a chuckle when we came back down the hill.

Short leash for Hal again.

Backtracking (virtually)

We’ve arrived in France after a day of fighting with Hal 9000 (the gps) but want to play a little catch up. Our room is only so-so here in Agay France but we do have in-room wifi!

After our rainy trip to Florence editions slowly improved until our departure day when it was perfection (that carried over to our next destinations).

Florence. Love the city, despise the hoards of tourists. Really despise hearing/ seeing all the coarse americans tromping around. I suppose one must start somewhere though. To my usa brethren, try to blend in a bit better… Lower your voices. Better to be thought an idiot than to open one’s mouth and remove all doubt.

Our plan has been to stick to less traveled spots. Visiting Florence really drove home that idea. We so prefer to visit the small town next door then the famous big sister. Example (part 1): after walking Florence all day we stopped for an afternoon coffee. We chose a little cafe of the beaten path but still in the heart of Florence. The purest way to do this (but no rest for the feet) is to stand at the bar and just order an espresso. Cheap and quick. So we sat down and order two caffe con pannes. (espresso with a dab of whipped cream). The bill came. 9 euros. $14. Shit. I’d have argued but it wouldn’t have gotten me anywhere. (part 2) Last night we went ot have a drink at a beach cafe on the Italian coast. Open air deck out over the beach, beautiful view of the whole beach and Portofino in the distance. Priceless. I ordered two glasses of wine for us. They took a while to come but this is what we got for 5 euros total ($7):

We returned for dinner too.

Back to Tuscany. We wanted to head down to Siena and San Gemignano. Driving anywhere on the backroads (and getting lost) taes so much time. We quickly scrapped Siena and headed for San G. We got there (after a quick but delightful stop in Greve in chianti) and the place was mobbed (see Florence comments). Tamara and I looked at each other and decided to just drive on. Then we learned another (fairly obvious) lesson. We headed with our picnic supplies to a winery i’d read about online. Great drive in to the winery. Our taste buds tingled with anticipation. Closed? Huh? In the us we go wine tasting any time between about 11am and 5pm. Here, one must go before noon or after 3 pm. A bit depressed we searched out an interesting town to visit here we cow,d buy a bottle of wine and set out our picnic. Certaldo (alto) was nearby and filled the bill nicely. A very small version of San G but with zero crowds. Picnic in the city park with a view of San G in the distance. Works for us!

Tamara takes a pic of Alto Certaldo… Roads so deserted we just stopped in the middle to shoot!

scooters just swarm around obstacles when stopped in bad traffic

romans thoughtful enough to put in emergency exits from the amphitheater

As a wrap up, we loved fiesole. A delightful hill town above Florence that gets it’s share of tourists but still retains it’s dignity. Everyone does not speak english 🙂