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My buddy Ivan from the Italian BBT distributor Mago Maggiolino shop mailed me these pictures out of the old box.

Somewhere 22 years ago we did an exhibit to together, on a real fancy fair in Torino Italy… geez where’s all my hair gone…

After the fair we drove to a small VW show in Ventimiglia, very close to the French border and even hit the newspapers with this picture! Can you spot me???

Still miss that old VW LT van, I just loved that baby!

Souvenirs of times long gone, but fond memories forever!!!

We started our way back the monday after the show….  driving extremely nice Chianti roads….

We passed many little towns, known and unknown, with beautiful Italian names…

Views to die for…

Until we reached Florence… a magic city with more public art as any other city in the world I suppose…

David did some shopping…:)

Buildings are very impressive… Florence did not get its name as top attraction for nothing, that’s for sure…

Ponte Vecchio, ubercool!

From Florence we drove to Bologna, more culture…

unfortunately the city center and most beautiful things to see was kind of construction area as it seems… not a lot we could see this way…:(

So let’s grab some local foods, wawh, this was real good… and the local beer too!

the little streets let us dream away… temperature was above 40°C we’ve been almost melted…:(

Streets were empty, maybe because of the heat?

So went on the road again… as of the temperatures  we decided to drive to the Lago di Garda, (the Garda lake) and cool down a little…

Tomorrow we show You the Garda lake pictures… stay tuned!

So we did arrive in Tuscany and we had lunch (Pranzo) in Mensano, see blog from last Saturday, after lunch we checked in our hotel, very wonderful old restored monastery…. the both buses liked it  a lot sitting between all beautiful flowers…

After a “plunge” in the pool (it was around 38° here!) and a shower later it was time to go to the show grounds and enjoyed what we came for, Volkswagens…:)

The line up was very well done this year, way better as all behind the big marquee in previous years….

cool oval ragtop with a real Hot Rod engine, a blast for the freeways…

I thought this was a cool bus…

They ordered parachute jumpers to bring a special message…. we hauled them in….

all VW’s been watching this!

Parachute jumpers came down with a big flag… Grazie Giovanni, for 30 editions of your ubercool VW show!

and a couple of other flags too…:)

Darrell had to pose a lot all over the show… here we see him with Domenico from Maggilino Service, a very good friend and BBT distributor in Pescara….

Darrell discussed with Giovanni his last invention, a bolt on wishbone suspension with rack and pinion steering and disc brakes for a bus, they have it for splitties and bay windows… pretty impressive…

Food time again… Darrell taste things he never had before, and man did he liked it…. watch his face…

Atmosphere was all ok, like always, everybody was singing laughing and eating!

Anna from Dei Käferservice, David and yours truly…. all very happy, we made it! With no less as two 58 buses was BBT in Tuscany!

and with Giovani Dei, the man himself, yes we had to sing… all of us… in Italian….:)

Darrell liked it a lot and was all ready for desert…

But first we had to listen to radio Bruno’s famous three-man walking band… they’re hilarious!

So desert was even better… hey Darrell, that was your second piece of pie….:)  Darrell,  Italian pie is good for you! Small advise from uncle Bob…/:)

and an “obligato digestivo”, in Italy that calls Limoncello! Giovanni brought us the big bottle….:)

The Great Queen Rats, was a real Queen tribute band, and they performed actually pretty well!

…. with our samba on the Back ground… BBT was here!

Next day sunday morning, we gave Darrell a visit of the Dei premises… and saw these banners in the Dei shop, with BBT as the official sponsor! We’re proud to sponsor a top event like this….

so the last pictures been taking… Darrell had to leave (partially against his will I suppose) a cab was waiting to bring him to Pisa airport for his flight to London Heathrow…  Darrell had almost four weeks traveled all over Europe, I brought him back to Switzerland and Italy, countries he didn’t visit anymore since 1963!!!

Giovanni, Alba and Anna and the whole GAM and Dei team thank You so much  for the reception and hospitality…

Darrell thanks so much for travel with me, I learned so much over all kind of practical things in the early days of VW parts, a source of information that I would not have got without You. It was fun to spend that much time together and Darrell if You like to go on a road trip again, just let me know… We always have reasons and places to go, and we can take any of our Volkswagens or Porsches, you’re always welcome!

And we? We had to continue our road trip, as for us, holiday begun about here!