Dating to 1948, this car was produced by Lancia and was designed with the assistance of a wind tunnel. The car was made between 1937 and 1949, so this is one of the later versions of the model. Lancia was later taken over by Fiat and I note that in an auction a car similar to this was listed at over £30,000. That seems a lot of money to me for an old car, but then again I’m not a car collector.
I was fortunate to be able to take a photo of this without people in front of it, it’s a popular location for people to take photos of themselves and friends. It’s a 3D sculpture by the French sculptor Marc Didou and it does stand out in its location near the Palazzo Nuovo.
I was at first slightly confused when the BA app told me that my flight would be 21 minutes late departing and 92 minutes late arriving into Gatwick South. It transpired when we boarded that this information was correct, the inbound flight had been delayed by bad weather at Gatwick and we had now missed our slot in Turin. Fortunately the delay wasn’t quite that bad in the end and the pilots were good at keeping customers informed.
The Club Europe cabin stretched back six rows, although there were only five customers in those seats. The main cabin was relatively busy, but by no means packed. I went for my usual afternoon drink of Gin and Tonic.
I was a little disappointed by the food, not because of what I was served, but because I saw what other customers thought of it. I thought that the salmon on quinoa was excellent, with a depth of taste, fresh flavours and it was nicely presented.
However, one customer rejected it and wanted a sandwich and another asked where the toasties had gone. Toasties? This isn’t what I’d personally want on a flight, it’s stodgy and uninventive in my view and I’m glad BA got rid of it last year.
The service was polite and efficient, although the cabin manager did get caught talking to a customer for quite a while and even I could sense other customers wanting another drink.
The flight made up a little bit of time en route, so what looked like it could be a delay of a couple of hours got halved. All in all I thought this was another well managed flight. Unfortunately, after a run of Club Europe flights, I’m back in economy for my next few excursions with BA so I will no longer be able to praise the improved Club Europe catering arrangements.
This car was on display at Turin’s National Automobile Museum and was interesting in itself to see how the air bags had deployed and how the car was damaged. It was also surprising (to me anyway) as the car, which had an open window, still had that new car smell.
There’s only airport lounge at Turin Airport which is used by lounge access companies such as Priority Pass, as well as by the national airlines for their customers. It’s also well signed and so isn’t difficult to find.
Views over the runway and the environment in the lounge is clean and pleasant.
I was initially pleased at just how many power points there were across the lounge. Until I realised that these really aren’t well designed for anyone who wants to use an adaptor, as it won’t fit because of that extruding element on the left. So my devices went uncharged because of a design which I must admit I’ve never seen before.
The lounge has picked up more than a few complaints about the quality of the food options, although that might be a little unfair. There was plenty of choice including pastries, pizza and fruit, with the quality all seeming reasonable. There were yoghurts with no spoons available, but otherwise the selection was well presented and looked appetising.
For reasons unknown, the lounge doesn’t have any self-pour drinks and customers have to ask even for glasses of water. I’m unsure of the logic behind not having soft drinks at least on self-pour rather than add this extra layer of complexity. I noticed many lounge visitors didn’t have a drink, either because they didn’t like to ask, or because they didn’t know that they had to.
I’m also not convinced that these signs on the toilets are sufficiently clear and I watched other people being just a little bemused by this. These are the male toilets for the avoidance of any doubt.
Overall, the lounge was clean, the staff were friendly and the food and drink options were adequate. The lack of access to power was more irritating than anything else given the effort they’d made in terms of the number of power points, and ideally I’d have been able to pour my own water and soft drinks. However, it’s a comfortable and quiet place to visit and the views over the tarmac are extensive.
I haven’t been very impressed with the public transport in Turin and the unnecessarily complex way that buying tickets works. However, I noted that I could get a €5 fare from the city centre to Turin airport if I used my Torino + Piemonte card.
I still don’t think having a ticket purchasing system which requires people to go to bars is ideal, but anyway, it’s signed at least.
But, those with the card can buy their ticket on the bus without a surcharge. This seemed quite advanced compared to the other forms of ticket purchasing I’ve seen in Turin, and I wondered how they knew my 72-hour card was still valid.
My wondering was solved when it transpired that I could have presented any card, the driver couldn’t tell if it was out of date or not. He was very helpful though, although he had to phone a colleague and then find some paper receipts in order to process my transaction as he said he didn’t know how to deal with the card. It seemed unduly fiddly, but the driver remained helpful, even though this caused a delay to the bus journey of five minutes which I was a little conscious of.
I have since discovered that until recently it was possible to buy tickets for this bus service on-line, but that facility has been withdrawn. I hope that they put it back soon, or just let people pay for the journey on the bus itself without this surcharge issue.
Anyway, the bus got to the airport on time and for the price that I had hoped to pay. The driver was friendly, the bus was clean and everything else ran smoothly, so other than the ticket purchasing everything went well. The usual rate for this bus journey is €6.50 and realistically, it’s necessary to use cash to get this as paying by card is challenging.
Part of the collection in Turin’s National Automobile Museum, this is a Brixia Zust, made in the Brescia region of Italy. It’s the 10 HP model made in 1908, with the manufacturer trading being 1906 and 1912 and eventually becoming part of Officine Meccaniche, which later became part of Iveco.
I’m not that engaged by cars and so visiting the national automobile museum didn’t overly excite me, and I had envisaged it being quite a brief visit. However, it’s a substantial museum and I was there for much longer than I had initially anticipated.
The start of the museum tour starts with a reminder of from where this all began, horse drawn carriages. The carriages evolved into having engines and then the carriage design changed over the decades into the modern day car.
I’ll post about individuals cars on another occasion, as there were so many historic vehicles in the collection. However, of note was the excellent way that information was displayed. There were panels by each car giving information about it, with the additional option of QR codes for visitors who wanted more detail. This worked smoothly and gave me all the information that I wanted without initially being overly complex.
Highlighting the need for cars to be more environmentally friendly.
The downside of cars, they end up like this.
There was a substantial collection of F1 cars and behind was a large video screen displaying an impressive animation.
An individual F1 car.
I know a driver like this.
Visitors could walk on this map of Turin, with automobile related sites pointed out.
As well as the restored cars, some of which I thought were perhaps over-restored and lost their originality, there were some car frames (or whatever they’re called) on the wall which showed the inner workings of the car.
Overall, I thought that this was a really well put together museum with plenty to interest those who aren’t necessarily that obsessed with automobile history. We can’t all be aware of when sunroofs were first placed into Skodas and I’m pleased that the museum aimed at a wider audience. Looking through some of the reviews, there were a not inconsiderable number of people saying the same, they had low expectations as they weren’t that engaged in cars, but left feeling that the museum had worked for them.
There was a strong focus on Fiat vehicles in the museum, but since Turin is their home, that’s not surprising. And I liked just how many early vehicles there were on display with some rare cars in the collection. I was also surprised at how many people kept stroking the cars, even though signs said not to touch them, which must be a constant irritation for the museum ensuring that they’re all cleaned regularly.
The museum was also well signposted and I only went the wrong way once, which is definitely on the low side for me. The staff were all helpful, but mostly looked a bit bored wandering around the museum looking at their phones, but they were visible if anyone wanted help. It wasn’t that busy during my visit which also made it a pleasant environment not having to wait to look at any individual item. Overall though, this is one of the best museums I’ve visited in terms of the visitor experience, so all rather lovely.
The Rock Cafe is likely inspired by the Hard Rock Cafe, but this is an independent outlet in Turin and it has a unique sort of vibe to it. I visited here as it was the city’s best rated burger restaurant, although it wasn’t open when it was meant to be and so I had to come back an hour later.
The interior is quirky and has a music theme to it, with rock music also playing, although fortunately at a quiet level. The restaurant has table service and the staff members were friendly and engaging, making an effort to check if I had visited before. This simple question is vastly under-asked by restaurants, it gives them the chance to either thank returning customers or an opportunity to explain the menu.
The restaurant doesn’t have any English menus at the moment, although they’re on order, but I found an English menu on their web-site which made choosing easier. The staff member had though offered to translate or assist me with any questions that I had, so the process was efficient and helpful.
An American beer, at the appropriate temperature and it tasted suitably refreshing.
The onion rings tasted fine and there were a decent number of them, although weren’t exceptional in terms of the coating.
The burger was though far better, the sesame seed laden bun contained bacon, boar burger, some salad stuff and the devil sauce. The meat was tender with a wonderfully rich taste, the bacon had a depth of flavour, the bun was fresh and it was served as a large portion with 200g of meat. No cutlery is supplied with the burgers, but fortunately it held its shape and didn’t collapse midway through my eating it….
Customers can choose between rare, medium and well done burgers, and with this menu option, they can also choose between the more mild angel sauce, the hot devil sauce or the very hot satan sauce. The devil sauce sufficed me and I requested a medium burger, which is how it arrived.
The central bar area and seating, the premises are relatively large and there’s a outside dining area as well. There was one stand out view from TripAdvisor though in my opinion:
“Wow, it was AWFUL!! Italians come to the USA and tell us our Italian food is not Italian, well let me return the favor. Your burger and fries (An American staple) is NOT even remotely close to how it should taste. The burger was under cooked. A burger should NOT be rare like that! The fries live up to the name. As hard as rocks. The coleslaw was also semi-crunchy! Wow….semi crunchy coleslaw.”
The restaurant responded appropriately, but I’ve seen no end of American restaurants offering rare and medium-rare burgers, fries should in my view be crispy and coleslaw is often semi-crunchy in the US. I can imagine how irate the restaurant must have been to receive such a bizarre review.
The prices here aren’t the cheapest, but given the friendliness of the service and the quality of the burger, I’m glad that I came here. There’s a welcoming vibe to the restaurant, although my biggest complaint would be that their opening hours on Facebook and their web-site don’t seem to entirely coincide with when they actually open.
And just because I could, I thought it only right to sample an Italian special item on the McDonald’s menu. Asiago PDO is cheese and Speck Alto Adige is lightly smoked and cured ham, and they’re merged together in a crispy coating. It’s an attempt to do something different and the flavours do work well together. In a country without Greggs, this will just have to do…..
