Thanks all. We've had a great trip in Italy so far. The reactions of most people are hugely enthousiastic. A couple of hours ago we parked on a bridge on the Arno, next to the Ponte Vecchio, for half an hour, and it was great fun to sit on the wall 10 metres away and hear the Italians pay the compliments.

Now that I know the systems and I've done about a thousand miles, I've painted a couple of lines on the tarmac and I am just bonding with this machine. Some people will bleat "sacrilege", but in town I've found that the "wet" combined with "auto" setting makes for nice pottering. She is just so much easier on the throttle then. As soon as we're out of town, we switch to "race" (auto off of course) and then she becomes just so alive and eager. She loves to wiggle her but out of the corners, but she doesn't feel intimidating at all. I'm a decent driver but nothing special. This car makes me think it is all me. I don't feel the systems interfere - very flattering. "Sport" is great on the highway if you're cruising and not looking for noise, the exhaust valves then staying closed more often.

What a fab car, I love all the switcheable personalities.

A real bonding trip then, and still 1000 miles to go. Sun is shining here in Tuscany, sitting on the terrace with a birra, life does not get better than this. Surely.

Thanks for listening!

Onno

With my first Ferrari, my-still-beloved 550, I drove 5,000 miles in the first 21 days I owned it. My second, the 365 Boxer, I drove from London to the Nurburgring and Amsterdam in the first week. The 330GTC, I drove 2,000 miles in the first week, on a trip to cover all Swiss Alpine passes.

I love really getting to know the car quickly. For the 458, I needed to keep the revs below 5,000 for 1000kms. That was dealt with on the first drive, from Amsterdam to Lugano. It was a stty day with lots of traffic jams, so no real hassle. I was slightly annoyed that 5k rpms kept me below 120mph on a couple of open stretches, though. :-)

She has about 2500kms now (1500 miles), should be another 600 miles by the time I get back on Tuesday.

She has properly blatted on the Italian roads, should be well run in by now! Taking the back roads through from Annecy to Epernay tomorrow, should be fun (decided against Verona today, because of the earth quake).


Onno

I've specified the two-tone on the configurator back in July, so I' m sure it's still possible. It is a tick box in the exterior section. Two-tone is expensive, you pay for the fact that the car is sprayed in a separate paint hall, not the regular production one. The upside is that the quality of the paint job is better.

Onno