Spectacular - Etruscan Civilization of 900-500 BC

 Neat = Spectacular

Our second day in Caserta and Sandra's research has hit another homerun!

Santa Maria Capua Vetere,Caserta (Campanian amphitheatre)

Alot of people, us included, have heard of the Roman Colosseum, and many of us have been there. Matter of fact we are fortunate enough to have been to many such World Heritage Sites (WHS).

Well the Colosseum in Rome is apparently a nickname for the Flavian Amphitheatre. Now we all know. So this amphitheater predates the Roman one by centuries and is attributed to the Etruscan civilization of 900-500 BC. It is thought by many to be the model for Rome's amphitheater.

Our weather forecasting skills allow us to see it early enough in the day to avoid some of the thundershowers that are rolling through western Italy right now. The big difference between this and the one in Rome, is that it is in Hidden Italy and away from alot of tourism. But the artifacts and access are as Sandra said, "Neat" which I suggest is spectacular. Regardless, our tour of the site today was amazing.

There may have been another 15-20 people on site at the time of our visit and they all were Italian. The site is more 'natural' in its state, meaning you are seeing it not reconstructed in the manner of the famed Colosseum, but rather with almost worn out seating due to the age and exposure to the elements. 

Here in a series of photos is the story of what we saw.

Campanian amphitheatre (Click on any pic to enlarge)

Inside the main seating area

Amazing walk through the staging area
for the beast fights

The Cages for the animals
below ground

The Main corridor leading to steps
 that would have the combatant
animals or people enter the arena.

Artifacts in natural patina

Old and New - Perspectives

 Old and New      -   Perspectives

Mount Vesuvius - Tale of 2 Cities? (Click any picture for a larger view)

Our ride south from Ostia via Roma started with a blustery morning in Ostia and an observation re: trafficking that'll have to be explained offline.

We left the B&B at 10:30am having checked weather forecasts and knowing we'd have to adapt to what came next. We already felt the winds which were bringing in the weather systems we'll experience over the next couple of days. The 220 kms is covered in less than 2 hrs. and we had decided to use the Autostrada to allow us to move through the weather quicker., try to outrun, or take cover at a rest area. We had a brief shower catch us for a few minutes but because of the hot conditions we dried up within a couple of minutes. No harm no foul!

For those not familiar with Italy, in 2014 we had titled that area south of Rome as Hidden Italy. It's still true today. As we arrive in the Caserta area it's still much more a day to day city than a tourist centre even though it has some interesting sites to see.

For one, it's on the north side of Mt. Vesuvius where Pompei was on the south side. Different perspective, different outcomes. With the rain squalls coming off the Bay of Naples it was visible and invisible in a matter of minutes. We walked to a Mercato close by, got some fruit, buns, and a bottle of Montepulciano Abruzzo and made lunch after checking into our Novotel hotel. Our sightseeing today was decided by timing between the rain. This saw us both have a nap (still getting over J/lag) to awake to nicer conditions and we made our way around 5:30 pm to Casertavecchia, the old town, which is actually high up on another mountain looking toward Vesuvius.

We were glad for the cooler conditions and fresher air as we wound our way to the mountain top and walked the old town. Parking was at a premium and again the bike found a premium spot with a view of a slightly obscured Mt. V.

Royal Palace far below (center)

Another spectacular view overlooking Caserta itself revealed the Palace and it's grounds. The old town itself has a cathedral from the 8th century with brick work reminiscent of the orthodox churches we saw in Bulgaria from that same time period.

But it was the relic art work inside that revealed just how old this church really is.

As we walked the old town streets we are struck by the beauty/luxury of being able to step back in time. One interesting conversation occurred as we returned to our bike, where a gaggle of Italian visitors were using the viewpoint to take pictures. They had seen the Cdn.flag stickers on the bike before we returned and on our approach noticed our riding jackets bare the same ones stitched on. With a hand motion of applause one woman replies "Complimenti!" and they ask where we are from in Canada. 

In Hidden Italy, away from the demands of tourism, you encounter some inconveniences as well. We were heading back into modern day Caserta on a Monday, to discover many of the Trattoria's near our hotel were closed. The Palace is closed Tuesdays. 

I'm reluctant to head to a fast-food restaurant  but we start walking in that direction only to find a great little pizzeria/gelateria that was doing 'land-office' business selling pizza's out the door faster than you could shake a stick. We lined up got a couple of huge pieces of pizza boxed for E3 and headed back across the street to our room with a view to enjoy some of that wine, and great pizza - Napolean style.

What a beautiful end to an ever changing day!

Ostia Antica and Ostia Lido

 Ostia Antica and Ostia Lido

After a nice hot humid afternoon getting repacked after recovering our riding gear from panniers etc. we enjoyed a nice pizza at our B&B suite hotel. They run an extremely successful B&B, pizzeria near Ostia Antica, which was the birthplace of Rome before Rome. We had been here passing through in 2006 and stayed in 2014 while visiting the ruins of Ostia Antica itself. Our neighbor Jeff who has a degree in Archeology remarked about how impressed he was with OA and it is impressive. Our 2014 Ostia experience is here. 

This morning, Sunday, we reset and were just going to go for a walk when I suggested we head close to the Lido and then take our walk there. It was a good plan.

Neptune and Friend to the left

The Lido was busy when we got there around 10:30 am as it was super sunny, 33C humid and real beach weather. As we walked the Lido we got to see Neptune with a guy fishing beside him, and jam packed beaches.

Beaches crowded

The architecture there is very clearly 17th-19th century and beautiful with many restorations in place and ongoing.

After a nice 1 1/2 hr walk in the heat we found a gelato place and had our 1st gelato. The owner a woman came out when I was getting mine and offered a taste of an almond gelato she had just made. It was excellent and added to my cone with the cheesecake gelato I had ordered.

As we sat out front in the shade a bus sounded it's horn to get cars to move that were double parked because of the busy beaches.

Double parking common on streets

Glad we have our bike!

We later found a mercato and bought buns, mortadella, and beer for a quick bite lunch back at the hotel. Nice way to spend a day resting up for our next destination Caserta. 

Psst.. don't tell Customs it wasn't til Monday.

Supper under the Stars

Ok, so have you ever gone to a restaurant where you were "stunned' by a meal?" I was in 2014 with Al Bajniero in Ostia Antica about a 2 block walk from our B&B. In an earlier year 2006 we had a similar experience at a ristorante just off Christof Columbo.

One of the risks of such a memorable experience is creating a legacy memory of a meal that raises expectations beyond a reasonable level. That's what we feared here. The ristorante is still there and this evening we went there wondering what it would be like. Well it exceeded the high expectations we had because it exceeded in every category, taste, prep, value, setting. Sandra ordered a spinach stuffed Ravioli with a Bruschetta starter and the red house wine. I a fish stuffed ravioli with 5 large shrimp. It was superb with a 1/2L of house red wine. You just can't get high quality food delivered in such a special setting for more than twice the price of here in Canada.

There's a reason Sandra is smiling and the place is special for family special meals.

Amazing Food and Company

Special celebration this evening

Hope for the Best, plan for the worst!

 Hope for the Best, plan for the worst!

Ready to Ship

This year we re-committed ourselves to travelling back through parts of Europe on our bike. Westjet's BikeAir program was not well founded at the beginning but in June seemed to have found it's feet. We found reasonably priced premium Economy seats, chose Rome as the destination as Barcelona/Spain doesn't honour the EU temporary permit for moto's for leisure purposes. We wanted to avoid as much of the high tourist season and high heat temperatures. 

Plan for the Worst

We knew that Westjet would fly the bike from Vancouver as well as Calgary with a small surcharge but since we had family to visit we decided to truck the bike to Calgary and visit family in advance. That worked great and a benefit was my son-in-law came to the cargo drop-off and I got a picture with the bike after the customs clearance was given for it.

Next day, was flight day, our premium economy seats came with priority boarding passes and we were through Calgary security in record time and seated at the gate. There on the tarmac was our bike,

On the tarmac

now strapped to a handling platform and we actually saw it being loaded. Every other time we've shipped that all happened in the background. Wish I could have seen in in 2011 go through the Panama canal.

loading into the Hold

Boarding was efficient and we sat down to be greeted by Heather who offered us a wine spritzer. After last year with Air Canada we thought we must be sitting in Business class. The remaining service for the flight duration continued to be a business class experience.  and an on time arrival. Yeah! Westjet.

Part of planning means to consider the range of outcomes that could happen versus the best case scenario. We felt we needed to address Italian inefficiency by planning for something going sideways. That meant we wanted to address Jetlag, and customs clearance or damage to the bike in some capacity. Our own customs clearance was the fastest yet and we had changed our 1st night hotel to be closer and serviced by a shuttle just in case something happened. Everything went to plan and we checked in were in our room and received our verification call from World Flight Services (WFS) that the bike was now at Cargo City ready for pick up. Now AMC had cautioned it could take 4-6 hrs. to be ready for customs clearance. Expecting a chance of late arrival and a 6 hr window would have put it at customs closing of 6 pm on Friday. Now I wanted to make sure Customs for cargo was open Saturday and both WFS and the ADM (Customs website said it was open Saturday 8 am to 1pm.. So I confirmed with WFS that I would be in at 9 am Saturday. He said "Perfect", and I thought I can't believe this working out as best case. Because of the variables we had purchased our motorcycle insurance to start on the Saturday so even if we could have got there Friday Customs wouldn't have cleared the bike without an insurance policy in force.

Saturday the worst not first of August

Knowing our experience with jetlag we expected to be up early and ready for breakfast and to catch the 8:20 am shuttle back to the airport. Instead we woke up at 7:55 am got sort of ready, ran down, changed the shuttle until 9:00 am, had a quick breakfast and headed off. Fortunately an Australian/Sardinian lady sat beside me as I showed the driver the address I needed to go to. He told her he would show me where to catch that shuttle but he couldn't go there. When I disembarked his shuttle he saw the airport shuttle that travelled to Cargo City, some 5kms from the terminals, and stopped it and told the driver where I needed to go. I was there in record time. I thought well, the sleep in and early rush wasn't a problem as I'm on track. Boy was I wrong.

Cargo Customs security was helpful and the WFS info got them pointing me in the right direction, unfortunately WFS while giving me Ingresso 4 Room 25, for the paper work failed in their email info to mention they were on the 2nd flr. In the EU, grd floors are 0 our 1, our 2nd floor is their 1, and our 3rd is their 2nd.  I knew that and since the grd floor didn't have rooms it had cargo bay #'s I thought perhaps that what he meant. In any event I did get directed to the 1st floor where a helpful fellow told me they were in Rm 25 down the hall called BCUBE. I went down there and no one was in as most of the offices were closed being a Saturday. I found him again, and in the interim he found out that the AWB # reflected WFS instead of BCUBE and he walked me to the 2nd floor Rm 25 where WFS was located. Quickly I got my paperwork stamped, paid and they directed me to go the ADM for the Customs clearance done and then return to Xpress to get the crate brought out with the bike.

When I got to ADM 2nd floor I walked down until an office dr was open but the agent there was on the phone and he motioned me to the 2nd office door open. I went in there and in broken English after looking at papers he happened back saying 'not possible' Monday return. I questioned this and he said "Feesh (fish) fresh vebgitables'  and waved the Italian 'fini; hand sign. He motioned me off.

So back to WFS to question this and Yuri said he would come with me.

We went back to ADM and talked to the 1st guy who waved me off earlier. He gave the same answer, "Feesh. vegbtables". Now Yuri was clearly invested in not accepting this as they are familiar with ADM policy for Saturday mornings. So after a lot of back and forth and the agent saying he could do it if a supervisor was there to approve it , but one wasn't he said Monday. That's when I said "no transport" no hotel, must be in Caserta", he finally looked around the room and finally agreed. Since I knew from dealing with Stefan Knopf before to be prepared with document copies the moment he wanted something I had a copy for him and then fed him a copy of each document I knew was needed. Yuri said after that being prepared and making it simpler for him, was what stopped him from being lazy.

Anyway another 1/2 hr ensued in getting paper cleared by the Xpress Box and my bike was brought out. What should have been 1 to 1 1/4 hrs became over 3hrs. but I had the bike, started up and drove back to the hotel to load up and check out. Then put the GPS in place and apparently going though security at the airports it had reset all the GPS settings. I had to drive to our 2nd hotel which we preferred by memory and then finally got it working correctly. Whew what a day's work which just shouldn't have been that difficult. Now I know what Stefan says when he says "they think they are 2nd to God". referring to customs agents.

Anyway, it confirmed the need to anticipate what could go wrong and plan for it.

Do K&N Air Filters Work?

 Do K&N Air Filters Work?

I rarely do service tips or 'how to's'  but with so much dis-information out there about this specific product I feel the need to share my experiences. 

I've had a K&N air filter on this motorcycle since 2012 and we've ridden in a huge number of difficult conditions. This year I am re-shipping the bike to Europe for a couple more trips and wanted to do all the needed service work to ensure the bike is well maintained for the duration.

As you know the K&N air filters are a 'reusable' filter. I've used them for 20 some years in the Porsche we had, previous and current trucks, and our cars. The engineering concept is simple but technical. You can read about it from K&N directly.

This year I wanted to refresh my re-oiling technique and thought I'd check Youtube to see what was out there. Like everything else there are good and bad videos and information. One that struck me was a guy that claimed he did a deep technical analysis of the contamination of oil in a Ford truck and associated it to a K&N filter. Since I'm an evidence based guy, comparison analysis' needs to be done in a controlled environment. This test was anything but that. 

His conclusions were based on what he found in his oil, 

• based on using two different types and brands of oil 
• driving in an uncontrolled field environment without clarifying them
• (two different service intervals, one using a K&N filter and the other an after market single use paper filter that reputed to be of better quality, pleats and fabric, than your normal replaceable filter.  

That introduced too many variables to be linked to a single product, the K&N air filter or conversely a replaceable paper filter.

So I took the time to write this from a single service cycle experience with my K&N air filter and our motorcycle. So the service cycle was 8764 kms. When the air filter was removed the exposed side had bugs, fluff and a dark brown 'dust' colored appearance on the tops and down the sides of each exposed pleat. The unfiltered air side of the top housing on both the exterior and interior were dusty as you would expect.

Exterior of the Air box top showing dust

Interior of the air box top on the under side
 above the filter element

But when I lifted the filter out to do the service work this is exactly what I saw. The two fuel injection throats and secondary butterflies were perfectly clean as was the whole of the internal casing. No trace of dust existed inside.

Untouched when K&N filter removed
perfectly clean

So this example shows that no perceptible airborne particulate dust penetrated the filter element material. I'll let that be a testament to the performance of the product and the ease of correctly servicing the filter by an owner.