I was driving all morning on Sunday, giving rides to several ppl (a dozen or so) and also we did several video footage with Jim and Chris while in motion. Then we decided to depart for the return trip... 2100km lay ahead...
I was allready feeling tired but I drove nonstop from Donington to Dover most part with Tony ahead, and amazingly the sun was up at the London area and the weather was warmer, so I pressed the high boost button to see if now everything was ok and it WAS! Adrenaline was back to me running through my vains. We arrived to Calais at 9 o clock in the night and George was asking me were to spend the night. I thought to keep diving until I got tired, in order to earn a day's trip. We arrived ar Reims (which was the target for the night) but I kept going (the Autoroute was totaly empty and a joy to drive at high speeds), then came Metz but the vains kept pumping adrenaline so I kept going, Strasbourg was next and George said "help us God" when he realized we bypassed it.
Kept driving NON-STOP and we entered Switzerland at 4 o clock in the morning and the city of Bazel at which I allready got 2 tickets on my way to Dony (1 for speeding intown and 1 for a redlight). We stopped for refuelling and I went to the bathroom but 10 minutes after we left the Gass Station I realized that I forgot my jacket with my credit cards in the pocket in the Gass Station Bathroom. Immediately took a "U turn" on the outskirts of the city at Zebra lines area, and drove like mad to find my jacket. Unfortunatelly I passed by a Polizei BMW M3 with over 150mile/hour and the hunt was on! The Polizei never used their unique police lights but kept flashing at me so I thought it was a kind of streetrace and instead of stopping I drove insanely towards the town trying to avoid them (I did bytheway) and then they used the blue unique Polizei lights and I knew I was fooked for good. I tried to explain them honestly what has happened and amazingly they escorted me to the Gass Station to see if my story was true. Thank God I found my jacket and their attitude changed towards me from madly aggressive to aggressive. Finnaly I recieved one more ticket only for speeding (total amoung of the 3 tickets 1400 Swiss Franks, must be 7-800 pounds). George has all that story on Video! I wont ever drive through that town in my life.
By this moment the time was 5 o clock in the morning and I decided to keep going since this story really woken me up. Drove through entire Switzerland by night and arrived at the Italian border at 7.30 o clock in the morning. Disaster was waiting for me. The Italian Autostrata was closed for some reason and the Boarder Guards turned all the cars around, never allowing them to cross to Italy!!! Opened all my road maps used my Sat NAv and planed a route for a very old highway through Lugano and Varese that could drive us to Milan and so on. When we managed to arrive at Varese we got lost because all the Milan signs were pointing autostrata and not the old highway we were searching. Took us 1 hour to find our way out and into a crawling convoy we headed to Milan. 11 o clock now and we are at Autostrata out of Milan, the driving conditions are perfect, the car is in agrressive condition (high boost worked perfectly now) and I drove for another 3-4 hours at high speed and testing accelrations with various "exotic" cars we met on our way.
We arrived at Ancona Port at 3 o clock in the noon and we got on the Ferry to Greece that will take us another 22 hours. George is snorting so hard I had to leave our room so I am posting this looooooong thread to let you know what we ve been through since we lect Donny.
Drove for almost 30hours Non-Stop, thats a real hangover! and no matter what some may think or say I enjoyed every sec of it.
Oh! Did I allready mention that the ELAN Engine is BULLETPROOF?
Costas
PS The Passport Control Officer at the Port said smilling "Bella Machina, bella Lotus!"
PS I just found out I am gonna be back in England on a 3 day vacation trip to London in 10 days (next weekend).
You had me smiling ALL the way through that tale Costas. Drive safely pal, and enjoy 
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