Ape

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And a very ‘Ape New Year to you, too

January 5, 2009 in Holidays, Vespa/Ape, winter in italy | No comments

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CASOLE VAL D’ELSA–Ape means bee in italian and you probably know it is pronounced ahh-pay. Other wise the headline here is really hanging by a thread. Wouldn’t be the first time, you say? If you saw the earlier blogs about Adopting a little Italian Ape (three wheeled mini-pickup based on a Vespa) you know we went all the way to the far side of Ontario, Canada to get our motorized memory of all things Italian. Just the sound of it takes me there and I’m tickled and surprised to see it every time I go to the barn. But Bad Monkey that it is, as soon as we got it home to Maine it immediately decided to test our love for it by pitching some kind of mechanical fit. So, it had to go to the time-out corner of Peter Brown’s Cumberland Avenue Garage and get totally taken apart, and then put back together. If you’d like to see and hear that distinctive buzz, check out Our Ape Road Test Video on You Tube. Its film debut/road testing/second home coming. First trip was 22 miles with snow in the air. We made it!
italian ape made by vespa
The photo here was just taken a few days ago in Casole Val d’Elsa by our friends at Avis Studio in Portsmouth, NH. Paul and Jane just got back from several weeks at Spannocchia the thousand acre, sustainable agri-cultural estate. It is in the heart of Tuscany, just outside Siena and we write about it often here. Can’t wait to hear all their stories.

OK, see you in Italy,

Stew Vreeland

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Honey, I’m home.
(part six of a series)

September 18, 2008 in Vespa/Ape | 7 comments

GRAY, Maine–Midge, this cute Italian followed me home. Can we keep her? Pleease? Well, we did it. We brought this piece of Italy home to remind us of the old country every time we step out the kitchen door into the garage there. As if we need Italy reminders!
bringing home a bit of italy. an Ape?!
bring home an italian ape. from canada
Could a stranger be forgiven for thinking this part of Maine is crawling with apes? Apes around every corner like we were in downtown Siena or something. Having one in town is just some guy (Paul) being eccentric and leading edge. Two is surely the beginning of a trend, no? I drove it around the yard a bit last night and realized I was way too trippunchy to do that so I bucking bronco’d it into its new home and turned off the key. And went to bed. whew. Going to get comfy driving it this weekend. I’ve never had a motorcycle with hand operated clutch, so I keep moving my left foot around over there. Nope, still nothing there. I’ll get it. Until then, looking into the garage you just want to pinch it on its cheek, it is so cute sitting there.

Before calling it a day, we stopped at our major benefactor’s office, so Bill Goddard could see the whole righteous rig that his valiant Tahoe drug across all of Northern New England and a full Canadian province. Then we showed the STV marketing team the new Company Car and then home. Home. Love the sound of that. By evening I had confused the town hall and the State of Maine as well. They really didn’t have a book sitting around where they could research initial sales prices of one of these. But they kept after it and eventually it worked out, I gave them some money and they gave me a plate.

All’s well that ends well and this may be the end of this part of this adventure. I will try to do one more wrap up with the a photo gallery that shows the Canadian Countryside and the trip adventures in more photo detail. We’ll see how the weekend goes. Thanks for coming along for the ride. Saluti a tutti!

(travel note: the Lavazza Cafe was a giant fun surprise to find on the Mass Pike. Plaza just before Worchester.)

See you in Italy,

Stew Vreeland

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It was a dark and stormy night.
(part three of a series)

September 15, 2008 in General Globe Trotting, Italian Cars, Italy in the media, Motorcycles, Real Estate, Traveling, Vespa/Ape, woodstove | 2 comments

DARK AND STORMY NIGHT IN ONTARIO
BAYFIELD, Ontario, Canada–Fine weather turned to foul weather and that turned to famously abusive Ike. Just as we were pulling into our Bayfield Ontario on the shores of Lake Huron so was the tail of the hurricane and everything went black. And wet. And wild. They had seven miles of road closed on one side of town. Lakes in people’s yards and standing in the fields of ready to harvest crops. Crazy. We stayed inside and talked cars and apes with Ken Johnson and his wife Delores and went our to eat in the hurricane. I went out barefoot to avoid being soaked and put on my shoes just before getting out of the car and going into the restaurant.

We got up this morning and loaded the Ape on the back of the Tahoe.

And there it is! And now we’ve got an ape following us wherever we go. Looming large in our rear view mirror like some crazed tailgater out of a Steven King novel bent on leaping right over us. So, there’s that. And now we have to do fret about busting thru customs with a 25 year old three wheeled Italian motorcycle. We idled in line for awhile and then explained it slow and carefully to the border crossing lady and her uniformed associates as more uniformed people ran by pointing at it going “what the heck is that?” Finally “pull over there” became the answer we expected. But when we got it inside a real matter-of-fact crew cut guy said “who’s importing the scooter?” I raised my hand. And asked if I could go to the bathroom. We’d been driving forever. The guy sighed and waved me to the elevators. Just like I’d planned, by the time I got back down, a responsible adult, Paul as it turns out, had pretty well settled everything and they were stamping my papers with what they no kidding called “the full BS stamp of approval” and we were solid gone before they changed their minds. No tax, no charge just “have a nice day.”
APE from ontario
ape of ontario
LAND OF THE FREE AND HOME OF THE APE

Finally. We’re back in the US, back in the US and we seem to have a newly naturalized ItaloCanadian with us. Can’t wait to get this little green bit of Italy settled into life on the farm in Gray, Maine. We’d be well on our way but now we’re sorting out Paul’s Lancia in the morning. And starting our caravan of Italian cars across America to Maine.

Non vedo l’ora amici, non vedo l’ora. And I can’t wait. Getting closer to home every minute. Stay tuned.

See you in Ape, (I’ll be the one waving like mad and grinning my face off)

Stew Vreeland

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