Day Three

We had a good start too the day in Innsbruck with nice weather although slightly overcast which continued until we got to Vipetino where we turned onto the SS44, at this point the sun broke through and stayed with us for the rest of the day. The SS44 is a really twisty piece of road with little run off or opportunities for picture taking (too busy to stop) at least until it reached Merano where it turned into a normal country style road. However when we turned off to take the SS38 to go up through the Stelvio Pass OMG what a difference..hairpins tight turns, this road has everything.

Stelvio On The Way Up



Unfortunately disaster strikes halfway up the SS38 to Stelvio when the the car suddenly goes from normal temperature to in the red within a few minutes. we pull over quickly at one of the constant hairpins to check things out just as the expansion tank decides to blow it's contents all over the road (see picture below).
After much head scratching I work out that for some reason the front radiator fan is and hasn't been running which is the route cause of the overheating. Fortunately we have copious supplies of water on board (5 litres) and are able to fill the system with a reasonable amount to get us going. I decide to pull the plug off the radiator switch to make the fan run permanently. We get going again, and on a wing and a prayer manage to get to the top of Stelvio pass where we are able to get more water to refill the system completely.

Disater Strikes!!


Nice view where we broke down though :)

Nearly at the top

View from the top

Relaxing at the top

This is quite high up lol

On the way down



We finally got to our hotel in Grosio in the late afternoon...more tomorrow!!