Hi everyone,

Thought I'd do a quick post about a little project my wife and I are going to undertake this coming summer.

We'll be starting out in August and heading across to Italy, in Gina our 500, roughly from top to bottom, and then back again.

We've set up a site specially for the trip: www.thegreatfiathunt.com

If anyone has any contacts or tips, we'd love to hear from you.
It will be really good fun - though I am hoping that my "mechanic's skills" won't be tested too much (if at all!).


Cheers,

KJ

All the best with your project. Is your car standard or uprated? What is your planned route? I would suggest that you contact the Fiat 500 club of Italy, who, if you have problems, will be able to provide contacts. I have just come back from the Senigallia area (Marche region on the Adriatic coast) and I reckon that I saw about 6 Cinquecentos every day, parked or being used. If you know where they are (and the Fiat club should be able to help) you will almost be able to go from 'Raduno to Raduno' at that time of year.

Have fun, with a ~million still in use,and most of them still in Italy you should have no problem finding them.

Maybe it would be a good idea to have an Italian translation of your homepage. If you don't know anyone who could do a good job translating, you could start with Google translate.

Hobbler's idea of contacting the club is a good idea, it's highly likely there will be some local meet ups during your trip that you could go to without a major detour.

How are you getting to and from Italy? Driving all the way or taking one of the summer trains or a ferry part of the way?

cheers, Steve

the hobbler said:

All the best with your project. Is your car standard or uprated? What is your planned route? I would suggest that you contact the Fiat 500 club of Italy, who, if you have problems, will be able to provide contacts. I have just come back from the Senigallia area (Marche region on the Adriatic coast) and I reckon that I saw about 6 Cinquecentos every day, parked or being used. If you know where they are (and the Fiat club should be able to help) you will almost be able to go from 'Raduno to Raduno' at that time of year.

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Hey the hobbler - thanks for the note and the well wishes! Yeah, Gina is standard; she's in really good nick but for a few things that need to be tended to before we head off early August (seatbelts, some brake lines, and get the kingpins done). We've reached out the 500 club in Italy - and they've been really helpful having pointed us to their contacts all over. We're just finalising the trip details at the moment, but broadly we'll drop in near Como, head across to the east via Verona and up near Bassano Del Grappa where my family is from, then cutting back to around Parma, across to Ancona, then a diagonal back down to Rome, Amalfi, then across to Puglia, all the way down around the bottom via Taranto, then across to Sicily (very pleased to have a photo op in Corleone!), back around to Amalfi, across to Sardinia, then Livorno/Firenze, and around to the Fiat Museum near Genoa, Torino and then back again to London via Lyon etc. Phew! We're really keen to get up to the test track in Torino on the way back too - it will be a nice homecoming of sorts for the old girl (I'm pretty sure she was built there)!

stevehg said:

Have fun, with a ~million still in use,and most of them still in Italy you should have no problem finding them.

Maybe it would be a good idea to have an Italian translation of your homepage. If you don't know anyone who could do a good job translating, you could start with Google translate.

Hobbler's idea of contacting the club is a good idea, it's highly likely there will be some local meet ups during your trip that you could go to without a major detour.

How are you getting to and from Italy? Driving all the way or taking one of the summer trains or a ferry part of the way?

cheers, Steve

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Cheers stevehg ! Its a great idea to translate the page; I'm still taking my Italian lessons via skype with my teacher in Verona (http://www.inclasse.it) so it sounds like a good (or bad depending which end you're on) opportunity for some homework - I'm surprised my teacher hasn't suggested it yet to be honest! Really looking forward to getting to some of the meetups - should give me and Renae plenty to work with.

How are we getting to/from - to be honest apart from the ferry across I had only really considered driving - had no idea there were trains we could get on. I've done a bit of a seach, but a lot seem to have stopped operating. Is there any you can recommend?

KJ

Oh - PS - being the very modern lady that she is, Gina has her own Instagram account if anyone would like to see the shots live from the road:
ginathefiat

Cheers!

kjtosco said:

Cheers stevehg
How are we getting to/from - to be honest apart from the ferry across I had only really considered driving - had no idea there were trains we could get on. I've done a bit of a seach, but a lot seem to have stopped operating. Is there any you can recommend?

KJ

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It seems like the Dutch car train running to Northern Italy has stopped running this year, which is a shame. So you'll have to enjoy the pleasures of French food & wine too on the way down

stevehg I fear that we may not get too far past Reims then, courtesy of my co-pilot!

kjtosco said:

stevehg I fear that we may not get too far past Reims then, courtesy of my co-pilot!

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Go a few miles further to Epernay, much nicer than Reims, and your co-pilot is still surrounded by her favourite tipple.

cheers, Steve

If you are driving through Wiesbaden, Germany, fell free to stay with us on you way!

Giardiniera1969 said:

If you are driving through Wiesbaden, Germany, fell free to stay with us on you way!

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Many thanks Giardiniera1969! I don't think we'll get that far north but it's always good to know where our friends are!

Hi KJ
i admire you both for taking on a venture like you are , i (we) have done it many times but in more modern machinery.
If you are near Nereto in the region of Abruzzo you can pop in and see my recent purchase which is a restored 1969 model.
I intend to have it shipped back to the UK soon and thought many times of friving it back.
Have a fab journey and don't forget to wave.

Stef

llanrads said:

Hi KJ
i admire you both for taking on a venture like you are , i (we) have done it many times but in more modern machinery.
If you are near Nereto in the region of Abruzzo you can pop in and see my recent purchase which is a restored 1969 model.
I intend to have it shipped back to the UK soon and thought many times of friving it back.
Have a fab journey and don't forget to wave.

Stef

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Many thanks Stef! We'll be somewhat close to there - we'll be heading across to Perugia. Would love to take a look if we have a chance; perhaps you can DM me the details?

KJ

Will do.

When do you actually leave ?

I have put pics on the 500 classic section.

Hi Stef - thanks for the reply; she looks a beauty!
We head off on Friday afternoon.

I hope it's all going well Kieren. I have been following your journal. I must do something similar and soon. Researching I came across these inspiring achivements.
http://www.angelroads.com/

fiat500 said:

I hope it's all going well Kieren. I have been following your journal. I must do something similar and soon. Researching I came across these inspiring achivements.
http://www.angelroads.com/

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Thanks Peter! Hope you're well. Sorry for the late reply... between places that don't have internet and a broken... and now new laptop I haven't been able to post as much as I would have liked, but hoping to catch up over the next week or so.

Things going well. Currently in Lecce and almost at the halfway point (Wednesday). Have racked up around 4,100km so far with the only casualties being:

- 1 condensor
- 1 set rear axles (more about heading that one off at the pass)
- new exhaust manifold gaskets and bolts (bigger diameter as the thread in the head was crossed and wrecked; managed to get her sounding pretty cool for a while without the expense of a fancy exhaust system... but with a bit of a drop in power unfortunately!)

Oh... and have lost at least a few kgs of body weight from driving in 38' heat in the south. Sadly the pasta has reversed all the gains!

Everyone along the way has been absolutely fantastic and many cannot believe we have driven all this way in Gina. The raduni are also fantastic - making many new friends along the way. We still have another 3 to go by the time we get back.

Thanks for posting the link - it is great to see what some others are doing and we certainly have a much greater appreciation for these sorts of things now! We also came across these chaps while hunting around on the fiat 500 club italia site who seem to be up for a challenge too:

http://berevolution.it/en/


Kieren

When you say "halfway", does that mean at a turning point to head back?
It sounds like you're really having some fun over there.

It's about halfway in terms of time gone in the trip (have a hard stop in Nov), but probably distance too. We've had to adjust some plans due to the problems in France to stay roughly on time, and we'll save some Kms too