It’s The Last Ride

It’s The Last Ride

Here in the Pacific Northwest, fall is upon us, anticipating that dreaded day when it gets cold and rainy for what seems like forever. A cursory glance at the next ten days’ weather feels like today is the day. As Todd Rundgren said in the song of the same title, “there’s no use crying, because we’ve seen it coming.”

Ugh.

It’s a glorious day in the Alfa. The sun is out, the birds are singing, and there are plenty of Simpsons clouds punctuating the blue sky.

People smirk at you in a Porsche. #askmehowiknow. People smile at you when you drive by in an Alfa Romeo. Young and old.

With a new Mini Cooper Countryman JCW in the driveway as a loaner, it’s the epitome of a modern game console meets transportation car. It’s a ton of fun to drive, with 300+ horsepower on tap and a grumbly exhaust note. Way more exciting than the X1 on which the car is based, but that’s another story.

Driving the Spider is always an experience that slows time down, and that’s a good thing. The 84, with its Bosch injection and higher-compression pistons, is a perky car. It’s not a fast car in the way my 305hp Boxster S was, but it is brisk, and on a sunny day that’s all you need.

Grabbing a mocha before moving through the neighborhood makes the morning loop through the countryside that much better. It’s 51 degrees, which means a bit of bundling, but the Alfa cabin is remarkably unwindy.

The dual overhead cam engine comes to life instantly, settling into a nice, burbling idle. This car always needs about ten minutes to thoroughly warm up the engine, and more importantly, the gearbox. If you aren’t familiar with Alfas, second gear in a Spider is somewhat tender. Even when warm, you can’t romp down from fifth to second for a turn. Relax.

I’m fortunate that none of my three Alfas has “the 2nd gear problem,” yet I treat them gingerly. This one just turned over 171 thousand miles today.

This is analog driving at its finest. Where the Mins are fairly digital cars, every action in the Alfa is deliberate. Where the 73’s clutch engages fairly close to the floor, and the 79 more at the end of its travel, the 84 is nice and linear throughout the range. It’s clutch perfection. The wacky shifter position works well out on the open road, and rowing between the gears is a joy, feeling every engagement, up and down. This motor loves to rev, and keeping it in the 2,500 – 4,500 rpm range is the sweet spot. Yeah, you can rev it out to 6,000, but for some reason, it just seems so out of character with the Spider’s relaxed nature.

Where the Porsche loves to be pushed hard through one tight corner after another, the Alfa feels most at home through long sweepers. The manual steering (and that wooden wheel) has zero slack, requiring nothing more than delicate inputs once the forward speed exceeds 10mph. The only car I’ve ever driven that was this pleasant was a perfectly set-up BMW E21/320i. Sometimes, more tech doesn’t equal more experience.

My usual route features plenty of such sweepers, along with some nice banked turns and elevation changes. And plenty of trees. Before I know it, I’m back in the garage again, battery tender attached.

When will the next nice day present itself? Who knows. After 24 years of living in the Pacific Northwest, it’s never been the same from year to year. So the top stays down in the garage just in case. I plan on driving the Spider every time we get a dry day throughout the year.

Top down.