Flying down to Fano
Fri 12th September 2014
Not much to report today. Fog, gloom, brief sunshine then heavy rain for the 400 miles across France, Belgium, Luxembourg and into Germany. No photos.
I arrive at Charly's at 6pm, well drenched. Charly, his wife Christina and I have dinner at a local restaurant. I was last here to celebrate Charly's 70th birthday with family and the MFU gang. I have Kurbissuppe (pumpkin) and ox thigh in a cream sauce. It melts in the mouth like good Aberdeen Angus.
And so to bed, exhausted.
Sat 13th Sept
After 7 hours of deep, unbroken sleep
I'm up at 5am to start my preparations for the day. Charly's coffee
machine works overtime.
With Germanic precision we are a all set at 6:30 as planned. We are meeting Karl-Heinz at the services on the A6 at 7am. When we arrive he is already there accompanied by Manni, the president of the MFU (Motorradfreunde Unterheimbach), who has come to see us off.
Manni gives each of us an old German penny, a symbol of good luck for the journey.
And they we are off on a mad dash of over 1000 kilometres across Southern Germany, through Austria, and down along the east coast of Italy.
The journey begins in dank gloom, mist and rain. Not an auspicious start. I get my head down and concentrate as the autobahn gets busy. I'm Tail End Charlie with the real Charly in the lead and K-H in the middle so all I have to do is keep them in sight.
We are running at 130-140 kph and eat up the kilometres down into Bavaria, past Ulm and on to Munich. It's remains overcast with occasional rain. At a petrol stop east of Munich we buy Austrian autobahn vignettes (€4.90/10 days) along with petrol and coffee.
No time to hang about though, we still have 700 km to go.
The
rain comes down hard as we enter Austria and is unrelenting as we fly
past Innsbruck and head for the Brenner Pass. The autobahn swoops high
above the lovely old road that I rode with Charly seven years ago. There
is an extra toll of €9.50 to use the motorway on the Austrian side.
K-H has promised better weather once we top the Brenner and head down off the Alps into Italy. And so it proves. The southern slopes are bathed in sunlight, the temperature rises by over 10 degrees as we take a ticket and head onto the autostrada.
It's all a bit of a blur now. We ride fast, dodging in and out of Italian Sunday traffic. Italian drivers seem to think that the inside lane is toxic, for trucks only. I'm not sure if it is legal but we take advantage of this and undertake lines of traffic in the outer lanes.
The run down the Adige valley is beautiful but there is no time for sight-seeing. We pass Through Bolzano and Trento, fly past Lake Garda. From here it's all new to me, just names from stories and news items. Verona, Mantua, Modena and Bologna.
Now it's almost 7 o'clock and time to think about a place to stay. We stop in an emergency layby and I check the satnav. There is a B&B near the route at a small town called Fano. We head for there.
The B&B Arzillo is beautiful. An old farmhouse set in a designer garden. We are greeted with cake and sign language. None of us speak Italian and our hosts have no English, German of French. No matter, we sort it out with rudimentary Latin and hand gestures!
We ride into town for pizza. It is quaint and interesting but we are all too tired to think of exploring. Back to the digs we drink a bottle of the local vino and collapse into bed.
Tomorrow is another day and we have a ferry to catch.
Not much to report today. Fog, gloom, brief sunshine then heavy rain for the 400 miles across France, Belgium, Luxembourg and into Germany. No photos.
I arrive at Charly's at 6pm, well drenched. Charly, his wife Christina and I have dinner at a local restaurant. I was last here to celebrate Charly's 70th birthday with family and the MFU gang. I have Kurbissuppe (pumpkin) and ox thigh in a cream sauce. It melts in the mouth like good Aberdeen Angus.
And so to bed, exhausted.
Sat 13th Sept
 |
| Early morning meet |
With Germanic precision we are a all set at 6:30 as planned. We are meeting Karl-Heinz at the services on the A6 at 7am. When we arrive he is already there accompanied by Manni, the president of the MFU (Motorradfreunde Unterheimbach), who has come to see us off.
Manni gives each of us an old German penny, a symbol of good luck for the journey.
 |
| Lucky pfennig |
And they we are off on a mad dash of over 1000 kilometres across Southern Germany, through Austria, and down along the east coast of Italy.
The journey begins in dank gloom, mist and rain. Not an auspicious start. I get my head down and concentrate as the autobahn gets busy. I'm Tail End Charlie with the real Charly in the lead and K-H in the middle so all I have to do is keep them in sight.
We are running at 130-140 kph and eat up the kilometres down into Bavaria, past Ulm and on to Munich. It's remains overcast with occasional rain. At a petrol stop east of Munich we buy Austrian autobahn vignettes (€4.90/10 days) along with petrol and coffee.
No time to hang about though, we still have 700 km to go.
 |
| Finally the sun comes out in Italy |
K-H has promised better weather once we top the Brenner and head down off the Alps into Italy. And so it proves. The southern slopes are bathed in sunlight, the temperature rises by over 10 degrees as we take a ticket and head onto the autostrada.
It's all a bit of a blur now. We ride fast, dodging in and out of Italian Sunday traffic. Italian drivers seem to think that the inside lane is toxic, for trucks only. I'm not sure if it is legal but we take advantage of this and undertake lines of traffic in the outer lanes.
The run down the Adige valley is beautiful but there is no time for sight-seeing. We pass Through Bolzano and Trento, fly past Lake Garda. From here it's all new to me, just names from stories and news items. Verona, Mantua, Modena and Bologna.
 |
| B&B Arzillo |
Now it's almost 7 o'clock and time to think about a place to stay. We stop in an emergency layby and I check the satnav. There is a B&B near the route at a small town called Fano. We head for there.
The B&B Arzillo is beautiful. An old farmhouse set in a designer garden. We are greeted with cake and sign language. None of us speak Italian and our hosts have no English, German of French. No matter, we sort it out with rudimentary Latin and hand gestures!
 |
| Fano nightlife |
We ride into town for pizza. It is quaint and interesting but we are all too tired to think of exploring. Back to the digs we drink a bottle of the local vino and collapse into bed.
Tomorrow is another day and we have a ferry to catch.
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