Hotel Forty Five Chivasso

The big Push......

The final hurrah...we are going over the top...I'm a little bit frightened sir...wibble!!!
Going over St Bernards pass (if only Mini pooper could cope we got most of the way and took the Tunnel)

The morning did not start well - with Gary at the helm our navigator (Rich) got it wrong and sent us the wrong way up a valley.
By the time Kevin had succesfully managed to mount Doris (he had been trying since we left Basingstoke - ever ...

We awoke in Dijon to find everything back at normal size - apart from the mini which seemed
to have shrunk despite the deminishing food mountain in the car. Much amusement was had in
the showers following the remnents of our new towels, Richard thought he had some life
threatening disese, well, thought a vital part of his anatomy due to bleeding, Kev thought
he was growing a new Goatee on his neather regions ...

... down and watching fools play beach soccer was the best medicine. Sitting down at a front row table, though every seat was basically front row because it was a small stadium, us mushy brained tourists watched this event, sun glasses covering our faces foru 4 straight hours. It was absolutely delightful. Something about trying to control a soccer ball on the sand really makes whatever skill you may have slightly obsolete. The grainy, bumpy surface, it a sense levels ...

... went for a while, past Savonna and he dropped me off at an Autogrill. By that time it was 10pm and I had probably travelled 900kms.

I was waiting there for 10mins when I saw a girl and a guy coming out of the Autogrill. They were waiting in the car so I went to speak to them, there was another girl and guy in the car aswell. I asked the guy where he was going, he asked me if I knew English and where I was from. When I told him ...

... and broken Italian and lack of knowledge of the area.

What puzzles me is their Americanization. Why do they wear clothes from Hollister, Abercrombie, American Eagle? Why do they wear pre-worn baggy jeans? Why do they chug coca-cola, use dirty English slang, obsess over obscure American actors and fill their radio station songlists with contemporary American rock, pop and rap? They have so much to be proud of. I realize we have only been ...

... for the first time; it is a very strong alcohol that I had wanted to try since reading about the characters’ fascination with it in For Whom the Bell Tolls. It was disgusting. I don’t like hard liquor anyway, and this was particularly potent.

We bid adieu to Stephy and Paolo tonight and will see them when they come to visit in September.

... There is so much selfic wiring in the temple, together with our intention of contact, it really was a unique experience for all of us, from many countries and backgrounds. I felt like being in a crop circle...or the pyramid at Giza...but different too..more ...but cant say exactly... I got the feeling we were activating human potential on many levels and dimensions...we can co-create a very different world...with creativity, joy ...and more that cant be expressed into ...

... castle. Ricca's ground mom was very nice to us. We had coffee and chocolate. We looked at pictures and had a small tour of the caste. It's quite impressive. The rooms are very well-decorated. About 6pm we went to San Secondo to shop. Ricca lost his cell phone and left us. Mom bought a bag in Benetton. They wanted to use the toilet ...

... I asked Lorenzo about 3 different shirts and I bought the one
that he liked least. I think he was bored waiting for so long... and at
least he didn't get depressed but I did in the palazzo. We went to some
chocolate shops and I actually ate a lot of chocolate and bought some as
souvenirs. By 6 or 7pm we went for dinner at a very nice bar ...

... may not be the most exciting event as you are watching them do 7 and a half laps and they are enver really racing each other that closely. It's more watching the time clocks to see if the oens skating are keeping up with of beating the times of the last skaters. Racing the clock. But it was still fun to watch. The one Dutch girl Wust or Wurst had a really good time and the Dutch went mad. Actually I think they arrived mad, so whatever is after mad that is what ...