Originally Posted by GearsForFears

The thing is, I'm not knowledgeable and my dream is fuzzy. Someday I'd just love to have a vintage road bike like my cousin and his friends in Italy had when I was a kid. They came in beautiful bright colors, particularly blue or yellow, they had superb lines and went really fast (even up the steep end of the mountain to the village in Umbria where my family lives). This would've been the late 60s and 70s. I remember one in particular that was yellow and grey/silver and had the make written in cursive. Pretty sure these weren't cheap or bottom-of-the-line bikes - my Italian relatives aren't poor. Anyway I was just in awe of those bikes next to the boring identical Schwinns all my friends and me had at home in the U.S., or the cruiser with the curved top tube that was my loaner bike in Italy. That Bottecchia, had it looked as sweet as it did in the photo, was not unlike what I'm imagining. I've done some Googling and such but haven't really found anything that makes me say, aha! Maybe my memory is idealizing it. I've asked my damn cousin but he shrugs and says he can't remember. That's b.s. of course. He just doesn't want the American to have a nicer Italian bike than him.