Starting high atop the Stelvio Pass, our plan for the coming week was simply to continue east and explore Italy’s world renowned Dolomite mountain range ( “Dolomiti”, to the Italians ), briefly cross southern Austria and then head south down the Adriatic coast with a brief stop as we crossed Slovenia. If that sounds like a lot, it’s actually all very close together ( the beauty of Europe ! ).

The run down the Stelvio Pass was just as exciting as the climb up to it and again we saw plenty of folks out walking, riding, but mostly driving this iconic road. Scenery was at all times breathtaking as was the variety of exotic cars we saw testing out its famous curves. Highlight was a classic Aston Martin DB5, closely followed by an E-type Jag of the same vintage.   I was drooling. More Lamborghini’s and Ferrari’s than we could even count !

After a little bit of rural northern Italy we approached the famous Dolomite mountain range. If we did not underestimate the stunning beauty of the Dolomites ( their reputation is very well deserved ) we most certainly did underestimate how popular they were. The roads were intensely busy, parking ( anything, even small cars ) was a real challenge, and getting access to its more famous hikes ( Seceda, Tre Cime, for example ) proved nigh on impossible. The fact that it was a Saturday again  ( did we not learn anything from last Saturday in Chamonix ? ), one of the last weekends of summer, and probably the most perfect day of the year meant that it was a gong show of people and vehicles. Loved the couple of days, total scenic overload, but could have done without the crowds. 

At this stage we’d had our fill of beautiful mountains, our necks now kinked from constantly twisting 180 degrees to take it all in. Leaving Italy through southern Austria we ended up spending a couple of days in and around a pretty town called Villach. The front brake job we had skipped in Amsterdam ( due to a parts delay ) still needed doing ( if not before, then certainly after the workout they got coming down those high passes in Switzerland and Italy ! ). The local  Mercedes dealer was able to get them in and install them in 2 days so we decided to wait it out and have the work done there.  The folks at MB in Villach were super helpful and once the parts arrived it was all done in just a couple of hours  – we should now be good for many more mountain passes !

From Austria we will finally start heading south again – in the coming blog we’ll share an update on Slovenia and our first days in Croatia.

Till next week…😉

In Case You Wondered

Q: What do you do for medical insurance being away for so long and isn’t it expensive ?

A: We’ve used several different medical  providers over the years but most recently have been using IMG Global, a US company. They have  a good reputation, offer a variety of tailored options, and make extensions easy ( a feature we often use ). We returned to Canada in late May, 3 weeks before our policy expired, and they even provided a pro-rated premium refund. In our experience, few companies do this. Most importantly they allow us to select a higher deductible ( excess ) in order to keep premiums more affordable. We “self insure” up to $2,500 USD and so far ( fingers crossed ! ) that’s worked well for us.