As one might expect, life can be pretty interesting here along the Cote d'Azur.
Our friends Dave and Mary came over from Bedfordshire to spend an extended weekend with us. The first full day of our visit together was spent in Monaco. Which was a Good Thing(tm) because the entire village was to be shut down the next day. It seems that some Important Chinese Person or other was visiting the Prince.
The day after the Chinese visited the Prince saw the traffic flows around Nice seriously disrupted and we didn't know why. Well, it turns out that French President Macron was meeting nearby with the very same Important Chinese Person to no doubt plot the Chinese Economic Takeover of France. No wonder the buses weren't running their regular routes. No wonder there was a heavier than usual Gendarme presence.
The knock-on effects of these disruptions (economic and transportation) could still be felt the day our Good Friends escaped the bright and sunny climes of southern France for the more familiar cold wintery England.
After spending the day over lunch and then on the colline that overlooks Nice our Good Friends were packed and ready to brave the bus system out to the airport. So down the hill we went to the Rond Point and around the corner we go to pass in front of Station Gatto. Around the gas pumps and...
... wot's all this, then?
It seems that the disrupted traffic patterns had washed up something rather interesting. Flotsam in the form of a sportscar.
There sat a very pretty roadster of one kind or other. The engine was exposed and mechanics were tending to a sparkplug. One man was lighting a fire under the sparkplug's gap. But that's not how you light the engine's fire, now is it? No, he must've been working on heating up the plug or trying to burn off some carbon from a rich-running motor.
So what did we have here? Oh, look, there's a scorpion on the rear fin. Oh, look, there's a nameplate on the valve cover. Ah. It's an Abarth of one kind or other.
OK. Need to move along. Off to the bus. And past Place Garibaldi. And past a huge Gilets Jaunes manifestation. But that couldn't be right either, could it? It was late Monday and... oh... never mind. They were there and that's just that. 'Round another corner and to the first bus stop of the Aeroport Bus.
The transfer of humans and luggage was successfully achieved. Our Final Farewells were well made. And I'm hoofing it back to the Rond Point and our Winter AirBnB.
Thinking about things and doing a bit of research I learn that the Abarth is a 1955 207A. What a pretty thing it is. Being made for export makes sense in that sufficient time has passed from when the House of Savoy and the Northern Italians run things here in Nice and that France likely now qualifies as one of Abarth's export markets. Hence, seeing the 207A washed-up here and not in Italy seemed to fit history as scribbled somewhere by someone out on the 'net.
Approaching Station Gatto I hear the flat *blat* sound of a running highly tuned (for it's day) 4 cylinder. Hah! They got it running!!
Or did they?
As I walk up they're pulling jumper cables off the the terminals. The car again sits silently. What next? it seems to be asking.
Our friends Dave and Mary came over from Bedfordshire to spend an extended weekend with us. The first full day of our visit together was spent in Monaco. Which was a Good Thing(tm) because the entire village was to be shut down the next day. It seems that some Important Chinese Person or other was visiting the Prince.
The day after the Chinese visited the Prince saw the traffic flows around Nice seriously disrupted and we didn't know why. Well, it turns out that French President Macron was meeting nearby with the very same Important Chinese Person to no doubt plot the Chinese Economic Takeover of France. No wonder the buses weren't running their regular routes. No wonder there was a heavier than usual Gendarme presence.
The knock-on effects of these disruptions (economic and transportation) could still be felt the day our Good Friends escaped the bright and sunny climes of southern France for the more familiar cold wintery England.
After spending the day over lunch and then on the colline that overlooks Nice our Good Friends were packed and ready to brave the bus system out to the airport. So down the hill we went to the Rond Point and around the corner we go to pass in front of Station Gatto. Around the gas pumps and...
... wot's all this, then?
It seems that the disrupted traffic patterns had washed up something rather interesting. Flotsam in the form of a sportscar.
There sat a very pretty roadster of one kind or other. The engine was exposed and mechanics were tending to a sparkplug. One man was lighting a fire under the sparkplug's gap. But that's not how you light the engine's fire, now is it? No, he must've been working on heating up the plug or trying to burn off some carbon from a rich-running motor.
So what did we have here? Oh, look, there's a scorpion on the rear fin. Oh, look, there's a nameplate on the valve cover. Ah. It's an Abarth of one kind or other.
OK. Need to move along. Off to the bus. And past Place Garibaldi. And past a huge Gilets Jaunes manifestation. But that couldn't be right either, could it? It was late Monday and... oh... never mind. They were there and that's just that. 'Round another corner and to the first bus stop of the Aeroport Bus.
The transfer of humans and luggage was successfully achieved. Our Final Farewells were well made. And I'm hoofing it back to the Rond Point and our Winter AirBnB.
Thinking about things and doing a bit of research I learn that the Abarth is a 1955 207A. What a pretty thing it is. Being made for export makes sense in that sufficient time has passed from when the House of Savoy and the Northern Italians run things here in Nice and that France likely now qualifies as one of Abarth's export markets. Hence, seeing the 207A washed-up here and not in Italy seemed to fit history as scribbled somewhere by someone out on the 'net.
Approaching Station Gatto I hear the flat *blat* sound of a running highly tuned (for it's day) 4 cylinder. Hah! They got it running!!
Or did they?
As I walk up they're pulling jumper cables off the the terminals. The car again sits silently. What next? it seems to be asking.
