jaysmotorcycleadventure: Postscript: More outrageous experiences

After Josh and Hank left for the states, I hung around with Carol and the kids from GaTech in Gorizia. It was very relaxing and, as always, fun to hang with the kids (even though I could not possibly keep up with their rigorous "social" schedule, every evening at the Aenigma bar). A week after I returned, Carol and I took off for a 3-day weekend of touring north central Italy with a rental car. Our destination was the wine growing region around Asolo and Bassano, two ancient and venerated northern Italy cityies. We had a recommendation for a very quaint and romantic B&B, the Maso de Villa, from which to launch our daytrips. The Maso De Villa was in a beautifully converted old farmhouse atop a small mountain and surrounded by acres of grape wine, some 100,000 plants from which they produce thier own red.

The renovated farmhouse of Maso de Villa

View towards the vineyard

We first visited the old mountaintop of Asolo, a city of narrow winding streets now oriented to upscale tourism. And as always, we found the food and wine delightful.

The pretty but narrow streets of old Asolo

The Giro d' Italia bike race had visited Asolo in May

Our next venue was Bassano, home of the beloved Italian aperitif, Grappa, and high end ceramics. Again, we enjoyed a wonderful lunch highlighted by a pork and cheese pizza made with locally produced Asiago cheese.

Never anything less than a wonderful meal in Italy

We dropped by the information bureau to get the location of the Grappa 'museum', a must-visit after our wonderful experience at the similar Scotch whiskey museum in Edinburgh.

Exhibit of a grappa still at Grappa Museum

Unfortunately, a heavy rain moved in that afternoon. limiting our walk-around options. However, at the information bureau, I had picked up a brochure about another historic car rally that was in the area, 'Le Mitiche Sport a Bassano' - "the Mythic Sport (event) of Bassano- and annual gathering of 'barchettas', the Italian term for small roadsters.

The rally brochure

So we decided to get back into the warm dry car and push on to Asiago itself to catch the cars as they were scheduled to arrive there late that afternoon. And what a scene it was! Asiago itself was a trip as it was at the tiop of an alpine pass at about 1700m, which we had to climb in the rain and keep on a schedule! Carol was wonderfully game, despite her touch of vertigo and general fear of my vehicular antics.

The scene in Asiago was truly unbelievable (and I know I'm in danger of overusing that phrase). For where else can one see a gathering of over rare and exquisite 100 "old timer" sports cars, meaning mainly from the pre-1950s (see below for the list from the brochure). Most surprising was the quality and rarity of the cars, given how hard they were being driven, in the rain no less! The usual Ferrari and Alfas were in attendance, of course, but they were dramatically outnumbered by more exotic, super low volume cars like Riley, Amilcar, Osca, Cisitalia, Siata and nameplates even more obscure and utterly unfamiliar to me: Paganelli, Ortolani, Deleval.

Cars arriving in the rain

There were so many cars, each so special and beautiful that I ran up and doen the street, unable to spend any time on just one for fear of missing another, better one. The star, in my mind, at least, was the Maserati 150S "Tipo 53", the predecessor of the later (and more famous) "Tipo 61", but made in even smaller volume (27 in all) and introducing the ground-breaking "birdcage" design. This car carried badging indicating it had participating in numerous Italian roadraces, including the 24 Hours of LeMans and a dozen Mille Miglias since 1958!! (FYI, my latest issue of Sports Car Market Newsletter pegs the Maser value at $1 to 1.4million; the majority of the cars had values between $350k and 750k - you do the math!). Wow, what an experience...