Tagestrip nach Kroatien

Da ich auf meinem Trip die Italiener besucht habe, ist der Text in Englisch. Trotzdem viel Spass beim lesen:

Optaija Meeting

It all started on Thursday 15th August 2013 when I was sitting at the office and reading my Facebook and Roberto Rizzo posted his presence in Venezia. As I was in the middle of a proper IT crisis and nothing went as planned, escalations were necessary and the shit was hitting the fan - I read Roberto's post and wrote back: "I am jealous". He answered I should visit him and I said, it's only 6 hours from Zürich and I remember doing it once with my Elise over Easter some years ago. That time I took the way via Julier and Berniapass along the lago d’Iseo to Verona and then the highway to Venezia. As I could not leave my IT crisis unmanaged and alone, I stated, I could only come Saturday / Sunday and of course Patrick Gerber should join me.

Patrick did not think it's a joke and wrote back he could only attend Sunday, but the room for me and Shayne at Hotel Morgana would be ready. I checked google maps and realized, it is 5.5 hours from Mendriso, so about 9 hours from my place and 9 hours back. After Shayne heard, we would go to Mendrisio she was excited and as she did not have to be back in business on Monday, she did not care about sleeping a little less over the weekend. When we already agreed with Roberto, Misa and Patrick so meet in Opatija, Shayne got the confirmation for a job Interview in Zürich on Monday morning. We discussed and considered for quite some time, if we should cancel this trip, but we decided to be "young once" and do it, so we can tell one day our grandchildren how stupid we were. We already knew, this trip would probably be one we would enjoy more in retrospective than while doing it.

I announced on Friday I might be a little late on Monday morning and my coworkers confirmed, it would not be an issue to be late. I stayed long at the office on Friday, so all action items are done and I would not be disturbed over the weekend. When I finally closed all open tasks it was already 19.30 and I hurried home for dinner and discussing the details of the trip. A big question was, if we would need a cat-sitter, as our cat would stay home alone from Saturday afternoon until Sunday night. As we have a very understanding cat, we decided to leave her plenty of food and let her have the house alone until we come back. I made my luggage ready Friday night and went to sleep early, as I was exhausted from the week.

Saturday morning I woke up at 09.00 and took the Esprit and drove it for washing in the nearby village, made sure the whole car is in perfect condition and drove via highway like in a sweatbox to Schötz. I have an air-condition in the Esprit, but as it is over 23 years old and I refilled it just last year, it still does not bring any effect for the car and passengers. Since I had my Esprit for service and inspection at the garage, the whole car behaves differently. Before I drove it with too wide tires and a slightly loose steering. Since this is fixed, the car glides like never before and offers a smooth ride with a fantastic corner feeling. What is missing on warm days is the acceleration. Due to the old design of the turbo, the car is really nice to drive at cold temperature with nice weather, as then the engine embraces power and let you feel acceleration and a smile on your face.

After an agonizing hour of annoying driving in heavy traffic, I finally arrived at Schötz, where my Evora was already standing ready for me. Elisabeth offered me drinks and cake, while I was talking to some other Lotus enthusiasts and looking at some other treasures. By example was a nice Roadsport 175 Se7en smiling at me in a shiny black color. This would definitely be a good car for Sir Roger Kleiner, as the Exige alone is not enough.

After a while I put the plates on my Evora and took off to come back home. It was a quite different feeling to drive in a 20 years younger car. The sitting position was much higher and it did not feel as sitting in a sports car, compared with the Esprit. On the other hand, the steering went much lighter and the pedals were somehow more comfortable. The Evora has 20 horses more than the Esprit – but in the highway entrance I missed some more horses, as it did not accelerate as my other cars do. I backed off and drove in behind the Mercedes ML next to me, as I was not up for a fight. I pushed the “sports” button which I usually anyway forget at my Evora and “floored” my pedal to drive back home.

Shayne was still in the city and called me to ask about my status. I told her to take the bus home, and we would meet there, so we can pack and leave. My Evora is the 6 gear version with the long gearbox. All journalists wrote about the Evora, the gearbox is “too long” and it would not feel right to race the car. I agree, it does not feel right for Nürnburgring or Hockenheim, but it is really nice at the street. In 6th gear the car rides smoothly along the highway and transforms to a fantastic travelling car, still with enough torque to overtake, but not wasting fuel with reasonable 1800 rpm at around 120 km/h.

It did not take long and I arrived at home. The ride in the Evora felt much shorter, most probably as well due to the working Air-Condition and the higher comfort level. I did not drive my Evora for over 4 months and it felt to me like picking up a new car. I was longing to do this drive and missed my Evora badly. As I did not buy, but put a finance plan on this car, I try to keep my driven miles reasonable, so I can sell a car at any time with no implications or interruptions in a financial plan. With the Evora it was a bad planning as I did not think I would like the car that much and so so many miles with it in a year. I try to average my miles over all 5 cars, but that’s quite a challenge yet. Like a girl needing to decide which handbag, clothes or shoes to take, the same question I have to ask myself every morning: which car should I take? Weather, planned meetings, planned route and possible co-drivers always play a role in taking such decisions and of course, I could take the Jag or the Evora every day – but going to work in a Se7en is just nice as well, but usually reserved for Fridays.

At home I used my built in “garage remote” from the Evora, and the car still remembered the settings and the door opened. Unfortunately I was not so lucky at the door to the apartment, I have forgotten my key and Shayne was not home yet, but arrived a few minutes later.

We packed, put our cat a lot of food so she would only suffer from missing company, but not from having not enough food and loaded the Evora. For once there was no challenge to bring all luggage into the car. As the built in navigation system from Alpine is worth nothing, we used our TomTom device and programmed “Mendrisio via Sedrun”.

We followed the highway direction Zürich and after some struggles at Gubrist we arrived Brunnen and enjoyed the beautiful view from Axenstrasse over Urnersee. In Flüelen we stopped at our favorite gasoline station and filled up the Evora and bought Shayne an Icecream. The weather looked nice and so we were happy to plow on and take the nice street up Gotthard. We left the highway at Amsteg and followed the street while overtaking some tourists and Sunday drivers. Shayne remembered the devil’s stone, but unfortunately not the famous story of the locals building the bridge over Reuss and so I had to tell the story again. This time in the short version, as I pulled down the window, pushed the sports button and listened to the sonore sound of my exhaust and got a big smile on my face. I realized again, the Evora is a really under estimated car. It is a grantourismo which is good for travelling far on a high way and at the very same instant a corner monster cutting, eating and biting into corners like only a Se7en would do it.

After Schöllenen we drove into Andermatt where I noticed the first time the big investment project of Andermatt and had to admit: it looks nice. I read just 3 days ago about the most beautiful roads in the world. One of them was “Oberalp” and so I drove uphill with the Evora to agree or disagree. The road is indeed smooth and well built, but for a Lotus I prefer the next upcoming hill climb Lukmanier. Over Oberalp we overtook a couple of cars and then got stocked behind a white Audi RS6 which could not believe his 2t car can be slower than a fancy Evora. We smelled his breaks after the third corner and see his tires suffering, but stayed behind him, as it seemed important to him to drive fast and not be overtaken. For us it was like a nice cruising around the serpentines and so we took the time to change music tracks, take photos and follow the white smoke in front of us.

In Sedrun the Audi turned to a parking, most probably some lights on his dashboard went on, while we turned right direction Curaglias and Lukmanier. In front of us an ambitious local bike driver leaned into corners and tried to break free, but we kept up until we arrived the lake on top and stopped for some bio-breaks and photos. It was quite cold up there, but the air felt fresh and the sun was shining between the clouds. After we passed the restaurant Ospizio we wanted to speed up again, but a bike driver parked his bike into a panel. The police was already there and it did not look well. I can imagine it hurts to get a steel panel on your head, if even you wear a helmet.

The bike drivers slowed down and then drove with 40 km/h down the hill. Something I do not understand: They drive totally unreasonable, and when they get confronted with a bad accident they are shocked and drive slowly. I drive the same speed before and after I see an accident, as I try to drive reasonable all the time.

Lukmanier was passed soon and we drove in Airolo onto the highway and followed the route over Monte Ceneri and arrived for sunset in Mendrisio. We parked the Evora at the VIP Parking next to the capo’s Porsche and checked in. I wear my légère clothes and some sandals, as I spent already a full day in my Sparco shoes, while Shayne dressed up a little. We waited at the bar for Patrick’s friends to arrive, so we can eat dinner all together. We eat a fantastic Fondue Chinoise under palm trees in the garden and enjoyed a very nice bottle… äh… some more than one bottle of wine, which was my disadvantage later. At midnight I started feeling rather dizzy and pushed the table a little too hard, so Mathieu, the friend of Patrick got full of redwine. I apologized and felt very sorry – and decided I am definitely too drunk for more. I asked for an Appenzeller to digest the huge food we just ate and then went to sleep.

Less than 5 hours later the mobile phone alarmed me, it would be time to get up. Shayne got up fast and showered, while I had my problems getting awake. I still felt the red wine (but was sure I can drive, as it was less than 0.5 promille). After half an hour under the shower I felt a little better and packed my things to go outside and load the Evora. Patricks Porsche was standing there, but no trace of him. After 10 minutes waiting, we called him and he admitted, he just came back home, as he had some “business in Milano”. We both smiled and drove after him and hoped, he could manage with so little sleep. It was great to have Patrick in Front as he “cleaned” the highway with some Italian way of driving on a autostrada. We arrived near Verona soon, where we had a breakfast. Next to a great chocolate croissant I had my first “café” ever in my life. It was for my understanding a restretto and it was boosting, not bitter and nice. I usually do not drink coffee at all.

I still felt the red wine, the large amount of food and now a chocolate croissant, pear juice and a ristretto rumbling in my stomach. With considerable speed we plowed ahead and passed soon Verona, Venezia and Trieste and wanted to enter Slowenia. The Italian border control took us out and asked for “documenti” and wanted to know the horsepower, the price and the speed of the car. They explained, it is boring here, only Ferraris would pass and this Evora would be the first decent car. We took it as a compliment and drove off to the Slowenian border which let us pass with no further controls. The street through Slowenia was crowded with tourists, caravans with boats and other street obstacles. It was not worth overtaking, as the whole street was occupied and I felt as well Patrizio was already a little tired.

After the Croatian border the highway started and just when we entered, a one mile traffic jam has built up and we queued for approximately half an hour. It was burning hot and even the air condition of the Evora was on its limit. Patrick closed his roof and for sure felt the temperature too in his black car. After we paid the fee we drove on and just 5 km later we left the highway and entered Opatija. It was almost 11.40 and Roberto said he would expect us at the port of Volosko. We drove back and forth and did not find the port, but two parking spaces to leave our cars and walk to the port. In a nice bar Misa, Roberto, Misas mother and sister were waiting for us. We joined them for an apéro and told them about our journey here, that Patrick did not sleep at all and Shaynes interview on Sunday. After around an hour we decided to go for lunch together and followed a travel guides recommendation into a dungeon somewhere hidden uphill the village. We all did not like the place and so we walked back to the port where we sit into the restaurant next to the bar we sat before and ordered a nice meal. The restaurant was the kind of letting time pass and their guests enjoy the dolce vita and the slow time. Sometimes I felt like time was not a matter there at all and I think that’s the reason a lot of people like passing Gotthard, which feels like a totally different time zone in the southern part. Even Roberto started now to be a little impatient and ordered the bill with some pressure. I enjoyed myself observing even guests from a country like Italy have a different understanding of time here. When I am in a restaurant in the area of Zuerich and the waiter is not responding after 3 minutes, I leave the restaurant again and if the service is not to my expectation, I do not tip. As a result the restaurants I go are getting more expensive, but the service is improving as well, but still in regards of Service response time, Mac Donald’s is surprisingly leading – isn’t there something wrong with 5 star hotels?

It turned 15.00 when we drove with Misa and Roberto to their hotel, where Misa’s siter was awaiting us was well. I sat in the back of the Evora and realized what (“**#@)-car an Evora is, when you have to sit at the back and are more than 1.5m tall. Roberto seemed to enjoy driving and we parked in a “blue zone” right in front of their hotel, went into the lobby and downstairs. The ship did not make a fancy impression. It looked rather small to the mighty yachts next to it and it did not look comfortable nor fast at all. Further it was painted in an ugly grey which made it look like a war ship. When we visited the shipyard of FB Design some months ago we have seen the ships standing there and I did not really understand the concept. I see these boats are for coast guards and official use, but they did not look nice or fancy to me and this seemed to be the concept. Roberto said, these ships are built for GI’s to come aboard with guns and heavy luggage and spending a 24h operation on the boat.

We went aboard and experienced a spartanic design with some strange looking seats, which did not impress me a lot. As everyone was on board, Roberto parked the ship out of the port. At the back were three rather over-dimensional engines placed which looked quite scary. After we left the port, Roberto told us to stay put in our chairs and speeded up a little. I now started to understand that 60 knots are not just 60 strawberries, but rather 100 km per hour. I was amazed by the speed and at the very same moment really scared. Roberto asked after we hit a huge wave, if the girls are still sitting at the back. Shayne confirmed she can see the legs of one – and Roberto speeded up again. I asked – you have just seen the legs of one? Where is the other one? He said dry: The one still alive would scream quite understandable if one is missing. He pushed down the throttle and we drove in breathtaking speed over the waves further down Istria. As the beach did not look calm and very windy, he asked us where we would like to go and I pointed on Cres – as I joked to Roger before taking off – I could do a daytrip to Cres. Roberto pushed down the throttle and in less than 10 minutes we arrived at a very nice coastline where some other boats were already at anchor.

I had my bathing trousers with me and after some convincing arguments of my companions I changed and climbed into the water over a fancy leather Roberto found somewhere hidden in the ship. I was swimming towards Cres, touched it and headed back to the boat. It was fantastic to swim here and I just realized, it is about 17.00 and we are in “half time” of our trip. As this was the summit. Touching Cres would be it – here was the returning point.

MIsa’s sister and I climbed back on the boat and after a while fighting with some bee’s and drinking some frozen cola’s we headed back to the coast. Roberto pushed again full speed and we arrived shortly later at the port. I asked if we shouldn’t help cleaning or tidy up something as for sure Misa’s father would be picky about a clean boat. They laughed and said, he would not care about it being clean, but it must do 60 knots. It would rather be Roberto to keep everything clean and he would take care of it. I was able to take a nice sweetwater shower at the marina and get into some other clothing. As it was late already we sat down for a nice drink at the balustrade. After drinks the time for breaking up was here. Patrick proposed to stay in a hotel room until midnight and drive then – but the TomTom said 9.5 hours to get home – and if we would start driving at midnight, a small traffic jam could already bring Shaynes interview into jeopardy.

We both got a fine from the parking in the blue zone, as we did not pay enough. As the fine is only 12 EUR I am even considering of paying it.

We loaded the car, I put my Sparco shoes on and we went off under the warm sunlight of the sunset towards home. So we would not encounter another traffic jam, we avoided the highways and followed the main streets until Triest. A lot less tourists were on the streets than this morning, but still the streets were crowded from Italians going home from weekend trips or bike drivers from a tour. With the sun ahead of us sinking in the sea or over the trees we followed the road until we arrived at the junction to take the highway to Italy. Full speed ahead we plowed on the highway and followed the tarmac until we finally found a 24 hours open resting area. The concept was interesting: when you would like to have a pizza, you need to go to the pizza counter and order the pizza. You get a ticket with which you go to the cashier and pay it. Then you go back to the pizza counter to pick up your pizza. The other way round it is with your Panini. If you would like to have one, you need to pay it first and then you pick it up at the counter, but if you like to have a coffee too, you go to that counter as well and get I there. The queue was about 20 people long and instead of 2 cashiers, there was only one and it was operated by the most incompetent and slow working employee they found in the whole area. After we ate, I wanted to buy some Mountain Dew’s, Redbulls and other boosters, to keep me awake, but the shop cashier was closed and so even these goods needed to be paid at the counter. To piss them off totally and may be show them their system is worth nothing, I paid by credit card, which made the queue 10 people longer. With a satisfied smile we walked back to the cars and drove on. Patrick ahead we followed with considerable speed. After 3 hours more we finally arrived in Chiasso, where the border control reminded me about the “plaquetta” – I did not think they would check for “Autobahnvignette” at this hour. So I went in to buy one and we drove ahead and stopped in Colderio, the last gasoline station before Mendrisio. We spend another 20 minutes there, I bought some more drinks and boosters, Shayne used the toilet and we reflected on the last 17 hours with a big smile on our faces. Yes – it was worth it – that’s what Patrick said – I still had San Gottardo in front of me and I was not that awake anymore.

We said goodbye and agreed to see us soon again and drove off with the maximally allowed speed of 120 km/h and the autopilot activated. After less than an hour we arrived in Quinto, where I drove off, went to make a bush wet, walk a little in the cold evening air and relax, before sitting behind the wheel again and stick through the tunnel. On the other side it was wet, but not raining anymore. In Amsteg I left the highway and stopped at the parking to do a little powernapping. I slept about 20 minutes, woke up and felt healthy and fit again. Shayne slept tight. The rest was not taking a lot of efforts anmore and we arrived savely at home. We unloaded the car, went upstairs and after a shower slept deep, intense, short and relaxt.

It is crazy to do a daytrip to Croatia in one day, but we knew that before and it is possible. The hours we spent at the seashore relaxing and the nice lunch we had with Misa and Roberto were worth every mile we drove. The boating adventure was breathtaking like nothing else and I wouldn’t want to miss any second of this adventure. Thank you at this place to Misa and her family, Roberto and of course Patrick and Shayne – it was awesome… and I am sure it was not my last crazy trip…