"Hamburg, 8:30 a.m., rain again. Perfect hold for hair - Three Weather Taft..."

If you can continue to say this advertising slogan, then you are old, very, very old. If not, you are young or forgetful. You can choose. If you grew up in the eighties like we did, you couldn't get around the Taft ad. Preppy lady in a business outfit, jetting around the world in a private jet. Regardless of the weather the hairstyle sits. Was this businesswoman the secret model of the jet set? In the nineties, she even flew around the world in the Concorde.

"Stopover Munich, it is quite windy. Perfect fit - Three Weather Taffeta..."

In the meantime, not only is the Concorde a thing of the past, but jetting around the world is no longer considered chic. Thanks to Corona, most people stay at home. Low-cost airlines are out. Nevertheless, I remembered this advertising slogan today. Not only because or although I am old, but especially because we have crossed various national borders.

Finally we are "on the road again." - We have arrived on the road again. We have been living in the bus for some time. But so far we had neither gone far nor arrived.

This has several reasons: Do you know that, you move into a new apartment, but it just takes time to arrive? - I mean really arrive, so that it becomes a home.
This was also the case with us. Starting with the breakage of the drive shaft, the pop-up roof stuck and there was disorder. In addition, our folding bikes from United City Bikes unfortunately gave up the ghost. But everything was supposed to be different.

Even on a bus, the sun is not always shining. Today, for example, it is raining. But what is much more important, we are happy. We are standing on a green meadow at the edge of the Ticino, Swiss Ticino. 45°29'54.3″N 8°46'17.3″E. Right on the edge of the Parco del Ticino, which runs along the river of the same name between Lombardy and Piedmont.

This morning we started in Wachtberg-Pech, near Bonn. Our destination Italy. Due to the traffic situation, the Navi leads us via Landau in the Palatinate, to or via France. So it happens that we take our breakfast shortly after sunrise on French soil, that is on a dirt road, near Roppenheim. The dew still hangs on the cornfields, clouds of fog waft over the ground. The perfect place for our fruit muesli.

When we made a pit stop at Delta4x4 a few days ago, we were given a cover for our spare wheel. Here is not only the right place to decide if this will be mounted, but also to take a few photos of it.

Iffezheim

Then we continue, at Iffezheim we stop again briefly at the Rhine power plant before we cross the same and thus the border with Germany. Our trip to France was short and sweet, but twice as nice.

We follow the highway, parallel to the Rhine. Our next stop, the Vitra Design Museum near Weil am Rhein, right on the Swiss border. This stop is shorter than planned. The museum is not open until the afternoon. But we still want to make it to Italy today. So we make it to Switzerland in time for a snack and already cross the border into Italy in the late afternoon.

Castano Primo

Shortly after, we enjoy our first Italian coffee in Castano Primo, a small town in Lombardy. For me, the most important place on our trip to Italy, therefore right at the beginning. Because here lives the older brother of my late Mr. Papa. This one I want to see again.

"Everyone wants to grow old, but no one wants to be!"

And when I say older, I mean it. My Uncle Hans is heading diligently toward the hundred mark. So you never know how often you'll have the opportunity to visit. Our last meeting was three years ago. Beyond ninety, this is a long time. - Time passes, but one thing has remained, his smile.

Happiness is seeing the joy in the eyes of his counterpart.

My uncle is happy, this cannot be overlooked. He laughs and cries with joy. The sight of him has also moved me to tears. In between, he asks many questions. The fact that we live in a bus makes him stunned. Even though he has shrunk in recent years, to me he will always be the tall, handsome gentleman he was in my childhood. A guy like a tree.

It's been a long, long time since my parents went to Italy with their VW Beetle and later with an Opel Rallye Kadett B. Always in the luggage their children. It's been just as long since we played in my uncle's garden or picked cherries. My cousin Christina still looks young and shy in the photos. Today she is a self-confident woman. She helps us translate. Because my uncle's German is also a little rusty.

Later, my parents no longer went to Italy. More distant destinations had become more chic. I think it's a shame that I rarely saw my uncle. Moments like this are all the more important to me. When I look at him, I see a lot of my father in him. And he apparently in me. That's why this visit was so important to me.

I can hardly remember the visits to Italy. But I look happy in most of the pictures. Except when my sister thinks she's sitting in my first Ferrari. Or was it my cousin Marco's after all 😉 .

"Onward flight to Rome, the sun is burning. Perfect protection - Three Weather Taft."

There is no onward flight for us, but we simply drive to the nearby Ticino. Whether the hairstyle is right? We don't care, and that's the freedom of today. The water flows over the rocks. The stream has already come a long way up to here. Just like us today, a long journey through many countries and through time. - I am tired, but also very, very happy.