After another cool drink, we made the transfer stage back to our Enna hotel.

This time dinner was from the sea.



We were invited to sit at a table of Sicilian drivers, one of them being Pietro, the driver of the yellow T2. No doubt fuelled by the local grape, he and I struck up an instant bonhomie.

On the first night stage, Johnny and I had gawked at their yellow bus, as it passed us at full revs, on the wrong side of the road, overtaking flashing Palermo traffic and disappearing into the distance.
Tonight he revealed that he'd been invited to run in the Giro only days before the event, had not looked at the rules,and had started out under the belief that this was to be a full on, first person past the post event!

This guy also has an orange 914/6, left to him by his father in law, and laid up in a Marsala underground car park for years...

(Johnny's photo)

There was a light rain through Saturday night. It had stopped by 7am, but for most of the morning the roads would be greasy as it dried off.

(Johnny's photo)



(Johnny's photo)



(Johnny's photo)

We headed north east and up into the hills, to join the long version of the circuit - the Grande Circuito Madonie.




This layout was used 1906 to 1911, was 92 miles long and had over 2000 corners, mixed with countless climbs and descents.



By late morning we were to join the circuit and complete its second half, following it all the way to finish the event about 2pm at the pits area before Cerda.

(Johnny's photo):


We had 150 minutes to do it. Half the circuit is about 1000 corners, so we'd need to average a corner every 8 seconds then!? How many gear changes and brake pushes:shock:



(Johnny's photo):

We made a hairpin descent down to the sea. Cefalu is a tourist town, which boasts a cathedral built by the Normans.



The cobbled streets are narrow, and led us down to the town's short beach:

All this photography and the stopping for ice cream had put us behind schedule.

From Cefalu there were just 25 miles left to cover, taking us to the finish at the site of the old pits before Cerda.



Mike and Brendan were there already, watching the other competitors roll in...

(Brendan's photo)





Mike and Brendan found us, and we smuggled them into the final gala lunch and the awards ceremony, held at a local hotel:

(Brendan's photo)


Having paid no heed to any of the rules, and having lost a full 90 minutes on Sunday morning, circling Enna looking in vain for a checkpoint (which later we learned had actually been cancelled), Johnny and I have no idea how we did not finish dead last...

(Brendan's photo)


But we were not going to turn down the trophy they presented us with!

(Brendan's photo)


Wine flowed fast as we excitedly recounted our tales of the past few days apart:
Johnny and I wax-ing about the Giro, while Mike and Brendan recounted their attempts to lap the Piccolo Madonie, along with their success in visiting some significant Palermo locations.

(Brendan's photo)


Tomorrow was to be our last day and with both cars reunited the 4 of us had a packed schedule to look forward to...

this might be an old Ferrari Testarossa

I wonder if this is a Lancia with special body ...?

A 1957 250 Testarossa. Yes, a real one too

And a Lancia Appia, Zagato bodied... drop dead gorgeous

That's an MG "A" Roadster. Built somewhere between '59-63.

Fun cars, friend of mine's dad had one during my HS days. His MGA was a LHD hard top, don't know if they were rare. We had a lot of fun driving that car on our local winding roads.

So much so that one morning after driving the card hard in the wee hours, I asked my friend to drive me to work. We pulled up to the very first stop sign leaving the house, my friend applied the brakes, and one of the hub knock offs came loose and fell off. Right rear tire rolled right past me into the empty street in front of us...

Knowing how hard we had been driving the car the night before, we just looked at each other and said a whispery "oh s#¡t," at the same time, as we thought about where we might have been (likely wrapped around a tree off the side of some little used road) if that wheel had come off six hours earlier.

Good Times...

-- Whit