28 years ago I toured Europe and to a girl who grew up in New Zealand and hadn't really been that interested in world history, it was like a slide into Alice in Wonderlands magical world. It literally opened my eyes to human history and beauty and architechure that I didn't realise existed before. Incredible!
A few months ago my daughter and husband were asking me about my travels and what was my favourite place in the world, a difficult question to answer, I've travelled quite a lot and have many favourite places. But if I had to say one country for shear accumulative beauty it would have to be Italy.
so for my 50th birthday they bought me a 2 week holiday in Italy - fabulous. What a great family I have.
We arrived in Pisa and picked up our hire car. Driving in Italy is FUN, indicators seem to be a nice to have but by no means essential part of the process,this means that my psychic radar has to be full on all the time to try and guess which way, how fast, far and brave the other drivers feel as I pootle along the narrow roads trying to get a feel for the car, many of these roads have no footpaths so obsticles such as very old men wheeling bycycles, old women walking dogs, tiny green 3 wheeled vehicles going at 5 miles an hour all have to be factured into your radar alert, as well as the other drivers. Not to mention that in Italy they drive on the other side of the road and the controls are on the other side of the car.
I had an incling as to what I was getting myself into when at the car hire the Italian lady who was booking us in looked absolutely HORRIFIED when we didn't have extra insurance cover - guided by her distress and local knowledge we duly took it out and thank goodness for that!
next, a word about Italian Truck drivers.......
Just to put your mind at rest we made it in one piece to our hotel just outside of Montepulciano - a gorgeous Hill top castle (where they filmed the Twilight films) more later on this fabulous city.
speak soon as I continue my adventures in Italy.
No comments:
Post a Comment