It’s hard to know if Milan’s fashionistas are bemused more by my driving or by my vehicle as I stall, splutter and crunch the gears while double-parking the tuk-tuk on Via Monte Napoleone, the city’s swankiest street. Both it and I look comically out of place on a thoroughfare dripping with designer shops and high-end motors. I’ve just seen a Hermès shirt with a €10,500 price tag and spotted the Argentina World Cup winner and Inter Milan star Lautaro Martínez laden with Gucci shopping bags, and bouncing into a blacked-out Hummer with his girlfriend and minder.
Not that I’m here to shop. Our mission this morning is to take a photo of the three-wheeled contraption parked alongside a Ferrari or Lamborghini – which causes a mini traffic jam, much horn beeping and bewilderment as to why a ramshackle tuk-tuk is cluttering up the street.
Snapping a Lambo – which is harder than you might think, even in Milan – is the first challenge on the Italian Tuk-Tuk Adventure, a whirlwind one-week trip across northern Italy in this novel means of transport, spiced up with wacky challenges.
The trip is run by Large Minority, which began life organising similar adventures in Sri Lanka in 2009, and expanded to other Asian countries before setting up in Italy just before lockdown. Its small fleet of tuk-tuks was imported from India in kit form and assembled in Italy (with additional Italian components) by Piaggio. Large Minority takes care of all the logistics (luggage transfer, a backup vehicle with a spare tuk-tuk, and bookings in very nice small hotels and excellent restaurants), leaving us free to bomb about like big kids on our new toys. Weekend adventures and independent hire are also available.
After leaving Milan, our loose caravan of six tuk-tuks will make its way up to the Italian Lakes (via the Monza Formula One race circuit), then through Barolo wine country and down to the Mediterranean near Genoa, riding either alone or in convoy. The rules are fairly relaxed: the teams of two can take whichever route they fancy, there’s only a rough ETA, and even the challenge element is optional. It’s not a race, but it can get very competitive. Most teams are couples but I’m with my mate Dave, and we share the driving.
Our first destination is Bellagio, on Lake Como, an 80km journey north from Milan that takes us over verdant hills, along sparkling waterfronts and, for five terrifying minutes after I take a wrong turn, the middle lane of a highway sandwiched between two massive lorries.
Travelling through stunning countryside in such a small, slow (200cc) vehicle makes the short journey feel like an epic road trip and lasts nearly all day. It was my first time to the Lakes – for some reason I’d imagined them to be a bit stuffy and chichi, but I was blown over by how beautiful and effortlessly stylish everything is. Bellagio sits at the tip of a long, hilly promontory separating two branches of Lake Como, and the old-school glamour of the lakeside villas and winding streets blends perfectly with the watery landscape.
We heard that evening that this serenity was shattered briefly when three tuk-tuks (piloted by a group of friends who travelled in convoy throughout) entered the narrow streets of the elegant village. They’d hoisted Italian tricolours and their own flags (union jacks and a Swiss cross) above their tuk-tuks and were greeted rapturously wherever they went – not least in Bellagio, where they were cheered into town by the locals, and responded by banging out the theme song from The Italian Job, The Self-Preservation Society.
The next day is a blissful meander on the road that hugs the edge of glistening Como, pulling over frequently to drink in the millionaire lake views. The challenge for the day is to hunt down and take photos of the Lakes’ two most common freshwater fish (pike and perch if you’re interested), but by now we are so enamoured of the surroundings that we skip the tasks in favour of a leisurely lunch in the hill village of Brunate, a cable car ride from Como town.
There we stumble across Ristorante Bellavista, which not only lives up to its name but demonstrates why travelling in Italy is such a joy. The views from the garden over the town, the lake and the green hills beyond are so stunning that a place like this could easily cash in by serving overpriced fast food to tourists. Not here: the art nouveau features of the still family-run restaurant have been preserved, the elegant terrace feels like a film set, the staff are delightful and the food (homemade lasagnetta with wild boar ragù and porcini mushrooms, and fresh lake char with apple compote) is melt-in-the-mouth delicious and excellent value.
Choosing a leisurely lunch over completing the challenges (my one criticism of the trip is that they could be more imaginative) puts us out of the competition, although that hardly matters, because it’s really all about being in the tuk-tuk. It is a fun and fabulous way to travel: adventurous, a laugh a minute and – once you get the hang of the driving – pretty bloody cool. The vehicles are open to the elements and slow enough that we feel immersed in the landscape, which we pull over frequently to admire while, in turn, the locals admire our quirky transport.
Sadly, Dave and I have to leave the trip at the halfway point, but we follow the adventures of the remaining tuk-tukkers with envy on WhatsApp. As they head south towards the Med, the trip appears to get even better: they spend one night wine-tasting in a vineyard and another tucking into a farm-to-table home-cooked feast, and downtime lounging by the pool in a beachside hotel.
As for the challenge, two teams fought it out all the way back to Milan: Thelma and Louise v Goose and Maverick. The names might give you a small clue as to which team was more single-mindedly laser-focused on winning – so hats off to the young American couple whose trip had been delayed for three years by Covid, but who finally crossed the pond and whupped the Europeans to win this rollicking three-wheeled Italian Job.
The trip was provided by Large Minority, whose eight-night Italian Adventures costs £1,688pp in a team of three or £1,969pp in a team of two, and includes tuk-tuk hire, insurance, hotel accommodation including breakfast and a welcome dinner. The next available departure is 7 October; 2024 dates TBC. Weekend adventures available from £545pp and three-night “hire only” from £350. Travel to Milan extra. The company also runs group trips to Sri Lanka, Cambodia, Pakistan and India
