29th September 2006.

Drive eastwards out of Venice, make a right turn through Slovenia and you're into a 15th century world that has not yet begun to change.

The Istrian peninsula of Croatia borders the Caspian sea and has a sub tropical, palm tree populated environment. After 600 years of
Viennese influence, it would be easy to assume that you were still in Italy. The restaurants serve pasta, fish and pig on a stick
(over a blazing fire). But put one foot onto a crosswalk and you just KNOW that this is not Italy. All traffic instantly stops and waves
you across, if you happen to be in any doubt about driver intentions.

Apart from one autoroute that runs down the middle of the country, all other roads are two lane blacktop in pretty good condition.
But these roads all run through mountainous districts, never stop turning and there always seems to be traffic coming the other way.
So that patience is essential at all times. There are virtually no straight stretches in the roads and the drop offs to valleys below are
intimidating. Even a twin turbo Porsche is going to have lots of trouble passing anything on these roads.

  A first time auto enthusiast visitor to Croatia, will spend a lot of time studying car badges, because up to 75% of the cars on
the road will be unfamiliar.

With petrol priced at $1.60 a litre  ($7.00 a gallon), most of the cars are small and diesel engined. Shown on the left is a tiny
little Hyundai Getz diesel, something we're never likely to see in North America - unless the price of fuel triples.

Hyundai has just set up a dealership network, so they are few and far between so far. Toyota does not seem to have enjoyed
much market penetration either.

The most popular cars are Renaults, Peugeots, Citroens, VWs, and SEATS.

The sight of a big Mercedes or BMW will almost guarantee that the car is driven by a German tourist.

The twisty roads have become a popular playground for the sportbike enthusiasts from all over Europe. Fleets of them, going flat out,
roar by one knee on the ground and just having a whale of a good time.

In the 700 Kilometres we covered in a week we never saw one police car or radar trap.

The best four wheel touring device would be a Lotus Exige, the closest thing you can find to a sport motorcycle.
A Corvette Z06 would be nothing more than an embarrassment. Far too large and clumsy for this type of terrain.

The funniest scene on the whole trip was at a small village, high in the mountains, where tourists had to park below and walk 400 meters
up to the lookout at the castle. The streets are shiny cobblestones, polished by myriads of feet over many centuries.
 
But there is a hotel inside the castle walls, where guests have the privilege of driving up the narrow streets and a
Chrysler Grand Caravan (diesel) tried to enter the archway in front of the hotel.

Since the archway was built in the 14th century and was designed to let two horses pass, the Grand Caravan got stuck,
backed up, scratching the paint on both sides and had to retreat down the hill, where a Renault Twingo
(which will go through the arch) was despatched to pick up the luggage and the rueful Dutch driver.

Big cars just don't belong in this environment and the Opel Astra wagon we rented was just about as big as one would want.

You will note that Chrysler does, in fact, produce a diesel minivan and could easily introduce one in North America, if the opportunity
arose.

The food was great, the cost very reasonable (far more so than in Italy next door) and the people friendly and honest.

Now if I could have just had a couple of days on my own in the hills with a MINI Cooper S ..................

Ah, well you can't win 'em all, can you?