Italian F1 Grand Prix

A couple weekends ago I checked off another of my must-do's from The List. Friday after work I high-tailed it home, threw some clothes into a piece of carry-on, and headed for the airport. After a very short layover in Amsterdam I was on my way to Milan, Italy.



Saturday was a free day, so I took the metro train to the city center for a day of wandering. The desk clerk at the hotel told me to get off the metro when I saw a church on the left. According to him, "You couldn't miss it." So when I saw the "church" I got off to check it out. It was impressive. What I would only come to realize later in the day I had gotten off at the wrong "church". While the church I initially saw was impressive, the real church, the Duomo, was unbelievable. Most impressive was the color. Surrounded by dark, old buildings, this cathedral and its near white color seemed to glow. Easily the most impressive cathedral I've seen so far. I guess that shouldn't be surprising since I wasn't too far from the center of the Catholic universe. As it turned out I was there in time for the Saturday evening service. So I stayed and sat in on the service. The rest of downtown Milan was very cool. I spent some time in what is their Central Park. Not too far away is a huge, thousand-year-old fortress. And of course the shopping options are never ending. For those of you who don't know, Milan is the fashion world's ground zero. For the women reading this post, specifically my sisters-in-law, you would have thought you had died and gone to heaven. I'm thinking all credit cards would have been maxed out by lunch.

Now to the reason for the weekend's trip, the Italian F1 Grand Prix. I woke up Sunday morning with no idea how I was going to get to the track. So I decided I would wait in the lobby and ask he first person I saw that looked like they were headed to the race for a ride. As it turned out, the first two to exit the elevator were two Polish brothers. My day was about to get interesting.

The first could not speak English so he pointed me to his brother who could speak just enough for us to have a difficult conversation. Even then I had to motion with my hands that I was looking for a ride. His response was the English equivalent to, "Why not." Turns out they were in a larger group of about 7 friends, all from Poland. When I saw their car I knew I had hit the jackpot. We drove to the race in a Mercedes Benz CL 600. This is a V12, 500hp near $200,000 car. To top it off he said, "My other car's a Lamborghini." (And he wasn't kidding. In the back seat were Lamborghini hats). Despite the language barrier, before reaching the track I was one of the gang and they were buying me drinks. At the track we split ways, but arranged a place for meeting after the race so I could get a ride back to the hotel.

Despite the light rain, the race was great. My general admission seats were marginal, but I decided that you don't go to an F1 race for the action on the track. For the most part these races are 200mph parades. You go for the sounds. I'm convinced the sound of these cars is one of the greatest sounds on Earth. I couldn't have been more than 50 feet from the track and the sound was so loud. It is nearly painful to your ears, uncomfortable to your teeth, but exhilarating to your heart... well worth the price of admission.

Boat Show in The Netherlands

A couple weekends ago I set off for Amsterdam to attend what’s touted as one of the biggest and best in-water boat shows in Europe. Late the Friday night before I booked a ticket for me and my car to cross the English Channel on a ferry, and early Saturday morning, with no more than a couple hours sleep and no real plan to speak of, I set out on the motorway (English interstate highway) in my car. The first stop was Dover,UK on England’s southeast coast. There I (along with a couple hundred other cars, trucks, and campers) drove onto the lower deck of a very large ferry boat. When I arrived in Dover I was hoping I would get to see the famous White Cliffs of Dover (see Robin Hood movie with Kevin Costner). Sure enough, as the ship pulled away from port there they were in all their slender. They were stunning… particularly with the morning sun hitting them. The 1 hour ferry ride was pleasant… a nice break after what had already been 3+ hours driving in the on-again, off-again rain and what would later prove to be another 3+ hours in the car. An hour later we all pulled off the ferry, this time on the opposite side of the road than when we had boarded. I was now in Calais, France. After a minor detour (nice way of saying getting lost) I was headed north. All I had for directions were a few notes scratched onto the back of an envelope. Of course, now all the road signage was in French (and I took Spanish in high school). Anyhow, the highway numbers were such that I could more or less keep myself headed in the right direction (though sometimes more sure than others). Before long I had left France and was in Belgium, around Antwerp, and finally The Netherlands. At no point when crossing the border from one country to the next (other than before getting on the ferry in Dover) did I have to stop and go through some sort of customs / security checkpoint. A few hours (and only a couple wrong turns) after disembarking from the ferry I found myself in Amsterdam.

I had no hotel reservations so my first order of business was to find a place to stay for the night. A task easier said than done, because now all the signage was in Dutch. However, as I was driving towards the city I could see off in the distance the familiar words “Holiday Inn” atop one of the larger buildings. So I decided I would point myself towards the familiar hotel in hopes to find a room there.

As I drove in and around downtown Amsterdam one thing stuck out like a sore thumb. Bikes. Bicycles as far as the eye can see. Traffic was light because nearly everyone was riding a bike. And one would think with so many bikes they would be riding the latest in two-wheel technology. Just the opposite. All the bikes were vintage 1950's. Some may have been that old, but many were new... designed and bought to look old.

After finding a room for the night and taking a short nap I set out for a walk to find something to eat and see a bit of the city. For the most part, from what little I saw, the city was beautiful. There's a nice balance of old architecture with bits of modern, northern-European design spattered about. I didn't realize this before visiting, but the city has a very extensive network of canals running through the streets (a small version of what you might find in Venice. In some areas the canal runs right against the buildings.) Rail cars powered by overhead cables run down the middle of the the streets without canals . And of course wherever there are people there are bikes. As the hours grew late you begin to see the less attractive parts of the city. Trash everywhere and people seem to have no issue with relieving themselves wherever and whenever (in one case it was off a bridge into one of those canals). As you walk about you can smell the marijuana sold legally in designated "bars". (I had an interesting conversation with an African gentleman who apparently spent his summers in Amsterdam as a drug dealer. He was telling me how it was only legal to sell pot before 1AM. After which you had to get it from someone like himself. Turns out he was dealing some much harder drugs of choice as well). And the infamous red light district is right in the middle of the action. Even after 12AM the city was bustling with people (it was a Saturday night).

The next morning I headed to the boat show on the coast just west of the city. The weather was not good, but the rain was pretty light. Long story short, there were a lot of boats. Hundreds upon hundreds. There were so many, after a while they all started to look the same. Though some were amazing and couldn't help but stand out. I particularly like the all-wooden boats and the 60'-70' sailing yachts. If only I lived near water (and had a couple million bucks to blow). Despite the rain I wondering around the docks for nearly 4 hours taking it all in before setting off for home.