Who needs lights anyway?

shortly after Christmas, I was invited by Italian collector Corrado Lopresto to join him and some friends at Vittoriale, former home and now museum of the late Italian poet and car lover Gabriele D’Annunzio. Corrado had planned it as a winter tour for pre-war cars; in the event, owners of pre-war cars could park inside the Vittoriale but post-war cars were also allowed to park outside.

I felt it was impolite to visit in one of my German cars and, after discounting my Fiat 500L, I chose the Alfa for duty. Waking it up after winter in my brother’s garage in Milan, I found everything was fine except for a soft rear tyre, thanks to the magnesium rims. A fill-up with fuel and we were ready.

At the meeting point – Corrado’s garage – more than 25 cars had assembled, and were joined en route by many others as we made our way to Lake Garda, our destination for the day. To my surprise, most of the cars on the trip were pre-war, challenging the misty winter weather with their roofs down.

My GT ran perfectly on the journey there, though it had been a little bumpy at the beginning as the tyre, newly re-inflated, took a few miles to lose its flat-spot. There was the occasional flash from the alternator warning light on the dash, too.

After visiting Vittoriale and taking a look around its garage, we set off on the journey home as dusk fell. And as soon as I switched on the lights, I knew something was wrong: the alternator light came on immediately and there was no sign of it disappearing.

A quick check of the fanbelt showed nothing wrong, but the red light stayed on. It started raining so I turned on the wipers, but their slow movement confirmed there was a problem. So I switched off everything except the sidelights, hoping that I wouldn’t hit something in the dark, and headed for home, about 100km away.

The car ran quite well, but every traffic light caused palpitations as the engine revs decreased, though it never quite stalled. Finally I arrived at the garage, parked, and switched off.

I tried to restart, but the battery was flat, so I put it on charge and went away. I feared a burnt-out alternator, and checked the following day – only to discover a loose cable. It took ten minutes to fix, but I couldn’t have done it in the dark, in the rain, on the highway. Luckily the GT has a strong character – and a strong battery too.