Eurotrip Day 2

Surprise sunshine made this day much more special than expected - managed to have the roof down for about 60% of the journey. The temperature outside has now increased to a peak of about 26c, which was plenty warm enough for me, although the weather man is saying Aosta, Italy is going to be a toasty 28c. Also a surprise was the route taken today - a healthy dose of country roads. In particular while passing through Switzerland a mini mountain pass, great fun! Switzerland has the most stunning scenery I've ever seen, I just can't describe it. I drove next to Lake Geneva and pulled over to quickly take a few snaps, unfortunately they're a mere shadow of the real thing.

This is one of those 'you have to be there' to appreciate it. It's just absolutely stunning. right now as I type this I'm about 20 miles behind the tall mountain to the right of the image.

Driving today was a little 'scarier' than I would have liked, twice I was worried about having a very, very serious accident. The first was while passing a car @ 85mph, he decided to move into my lane. This is the first time I've hit the brakes as hard as possible at that kind of speed, and it's very scary - it was difficult to keep control while evading the other car. The second time exactly the same thing happened, except at a slower speed... and with a lorry. All caught on camera, so should make for some interesting footage.

My laptop is rapidly running out of space for storing video, and the camera won't capture at a lower quality. This is disappointing since it means I'll probably have to skip videoing the journey after the alps, that is if I want to capture the mountain passes in at least 720p (I do).

I'm not getting tired driving for extended periods of time (about 10hrs driving today), so I'm going to increase the number of hours planned for the next few legs of the journey. MPG according to the on-board computer is currently at 38.6mpg, this despite driving at high speed, revving on the mountain pass with the roof down... I'm surprised actually, it's rather good considering my usual MPG of 34.4. Also had more people staring at the car, including one woman who said 'wow, nice car!'. There is a dearth of nice cars in France though. Switzerland had a few hot hatches, many modded with alloys, paint jobs, and de-badging. Car highlights today are an Aston Martin Vantage, Ferrari F430, and a few nice looking Jags.

The sat nav almost went out the window early on. It gave poor directions, mixed with a hefty re-calculation time. Basically when you went wrong due to poor directions it would recalculate... the whole route. This would mean that if you went wrong, you would be without navigation for about 3-4 minutes. If it wanted you to take a junction just as you passed it (because it was re-calculating) it'll start recalculating all over again. I came very close to pulling over and just getting the map out. I don't think I'll get another Navigon sat nav.