Day 5

We woke up bright & early this morning after a good night's sleep at a lovely hotel courtesy of Jaguar Land Rover Schweiz AG. After some breakfast and a last drive to Gstaad, we briefly stopped at Hansueli Brand, Ledi Garage Feutersoey to thank them once again for hosting us for a lovely meal the night before. We then made our way along the scenic 2 hour drive to Sierre.

The roads passed through the local Alps and are great fun to drive‚ and a super view for the navigator.

At Novelis we had a very interesting tour of their Aluminium facilities and had the opportunity to see where some of our Land Rover parts start their life. Our hosts were very patient with our many questions‚ we're Engineers after all!

We were then treated to a lovely lunch courtesy of Novelis‚ very much appreciated. They thoughtfully presented us with some bottles of the local Swiss wine to take with us as we couldn't have any. After lunch we said our goodbyes and set off towards Italy. The drive took us up to almost 2000m and we were within the snow line. The views were breathtaking‚ beautiful white slops merging into green woods and pastures.

Towards the end of the afternoon we arrived at the Italian border. The lead car for the day (Stuart & Dave K) were stopped by the border guards and temporarily interrogated (must be because they look dodgy!). Once they were released we were on our way.

We made good progress, finally arriving by 8pm. Bertrani Trasporti Spa (Mr Sergio Bertrani) had very kindly arranged our hotel accommodation for the night and even had a table booked and ready for our arrival‚ we were so grateful. Tomorrow we are visiting them and can thank them in person for their very generous hospitality with our meal.

Dr Esther Hills