Alfa can take punishment

By ALASTAIR SLOANE

There was an old gumtree in Australia's Hunter Valley they called the "flogging tree". In the 1820s, the 3000 convicts who built the main road into the region from Sydney were tied to it and flogged. It is said that the ground around it was constantly sticky with blood.

The tree has gone now but for years after its use the iron staples to which the convicts were bound remained imbedded in its ironbark, a mute testament to the cruelties of Australia's convict system.

Just north of Cessnock, at a place called Deadman's Creek, another form of brutal punishment is recorded. Three convicts who didn't pull their weight on the roads were tied across a fallen tree. They counted down the last minutes of their miserable lives as fellow convicts were forced to fell another gumtree to crush them.

The gravel used on the roads back then was pulled in carts by convicts. Horses were considered too valuable for such work.

With the roads and further exploration of the Hunter River came early settlers and vineyards. By 1840, when on this side of the Tasman the Treaty of Waitangi was being signed, there were more than 500 acres of vineyards in the Hunter Valley.

Plantings by James Busby - a Scots immigrant considered the father of the Australian wine industry - from vine cuttings from Europe and South Africa took hold.

The production of wine grew. Dynasties were created. Some of the families who retain their longtime identification with Hunter Valley winemaking include Tyrrells, Draytons, Tullochs and McGuigans.

Coal mining in the area began with convict labour around 1830, mostly east from Cessnock and Maitland through to Newcastle on the coast.

By 1888, when a budding 24-year-old poet and author called Andrew "Banjo" Paterson passed through - two years before he wrote The Man from Snowy River and four years before The Man from Ironbark - the area was producing more than two million tons a year, more than half Australia's annual production. In 1887, New Zealand mined about one million tons.

It is the honeycomb of underground coal mines throughout the region that explains the conditions of some of its roads today, say the locals. Subsidence over 170 years, they reckon. Nature's way. Can't do much about it.

It was on these roads - and the motorways north of Sydney - that Alfa Romeo launched its new GT coupe, a good-looker designed by styling house Bertone.

Alfa says it is not a two-door variant of the four-door 156, from which it borrows many of its components. Rather, "it is a unique car in its own right". It goes on sale in New Zealand on August 1, priced at $82,990.

Alfistis, those men and women who worship at the temple of Alfa Romeo, might find it to be one of the best sports models the Italian carmaker has built.

It handled the bad Hunter Valley roads - and there are plenty of similarly bad roads in New Zealand, too - better than any Alfa we have driven. Some of the surfaces were appalling.

Potholes and ruts banged and crashed the suspension - double wishbones at the front and a MacPherson strut system at the back, like the 156 sedan - and shook the living daylights out of the steering rack.

At speed, broken surfaces - bathtub-sized but not as deep - mid-corner forced some hasty adjustments. But the GT, stronger and with a more rigid body than the 156 sedan, largely kept its composure, quickly settling back on line.

It's a spirited performer, its barking exhaust note coming from a 3.2-litre V6 engine developing 176kW (236bhp) and 300Nm of torque and mated to a six-speed manual gearbox. There is no automatic option.

The seats are about the best Alfa has done. So is the driving position. The cabin isn't bad either, well equipped but a bit fiddly and a bit tight on headroom for taller folks. The rear seats - in front of an adequate boot - could get a tad claustrophobia on a journey.

The steering is sharp and accurate, the front-drive handling poised and predictable, and the ride firm and sporty. The hotter the big Brembo disc brakes became, the better they gripped.

The car's worst feature was its turning circle, a whopping 12.1m. A simple U-turn always ends up as a three-pointer.

Standard equipment includes dual-zone automatic climate control, cruise control, multifunction information display, rain-sensing wipers, xenon headlights, rear parking sensors, remote central locking and remote-control operation of the boot.

Safety equipment extends to front, side and window airbags, the latest anti-lock brakes, and electronic stability system.

The stability control suits the car's sporty manners and wasn't as invasive in the twisty bits as some systems.

The GT is what Alfa Romeo is all about. More so since it has combined its sporty core values with an all-new build quality and reliability.

So far so good.