First couple of days

OMG!! What a journey it has been so far and it is only Sunday night. The journey starts with a 14 hour flight from Melbourne to Dubai and although we were both feeling pretty tired we didn’t manage to get much sleep. I struck up a conversation with an older lady Pat (76), who was travelling on to London for her brother’s funeral. We bumped into her again at the queue in Dubai and she was all consumed with finding where the smoking rooms were. Having only given up part time and hanging out for one myself Kim and I decided to help her. Anyway after walking for what seemed like miles we did find one. It wasn’t what we expected though, you had to order something equivalent to the minimum of $11 each to be able to smoke there.  Kim or I didn’t have any local money so Pat shouted us, god love her. I think it was out of desperation on her part because she was determined to knock back 3 in the hour she had before her next flight!! Pat eventually left us with a local coin each for luck and was on her way as were we.

The next flight from Dubai to Rome was a bit better in that we had a spare seat next to us so we could spread out more but it still didn’t seem to help us get any more sleep. We finally arrived in Rome where we proceeded to follow the baggage claim signs as did every one else only to arrive in this big room surrounded by glass doors either side. Everyone seemed to just stand there waiting, but for what we weren’t quite sure. Eventually trains arrived on either side to take us to another terminal to collect our bags. After collecting the bags we walked on and there were two signs – nothing to declare and goods to declare. Could it be this easy we thought…oh well lets just go we said and so we did. Apparently border security doesn’t exist in Rome!! We walked through the doors to 30 something degrees and masses of people standing around holding signs. We made our way to a public phone as instructed to call the car leasing company but had no luck there.  We finally found a very nice man who didn’t speak English but could see we needed help find a taxi for us. After a very long wait we got the car and headed for Fiuggi.

Now the fun begins ….driving on the wrong side of the road from the wrong side of the car! We got to our accommodation ok but after that is where the shit hits the fan!! We arrived at 6.30pm and Dorothy met us and gave us a quick rundown and directed us to the local shops. We headed off with a purse and her little hand drawn map and nothing else. BIG MISTAKE….HUGE. The township is filled with narrow winding roads and two way traffic where there is barely enough room for one car. We found a shop (apparently not the one Dorothy directed us to) and then drove around for the next two hours because we couldn’t find our way back. It was dark by this stage and we were tired, frustrated and getting emotional when we saw a Best Western which we thought was bound to have someone that spoke English cause we sure as hell can’t speak Italian!! So in we march with nothing…..no address, no name for the place we’re staying, no glasses to read the map he gave us….nothing. The only thing I could vaguely remember, and I mean vaguely, was the street name. I don’t know how but he managed to find where we needed to go and directed us there. So 9.30pm we arrived back to our accommodation for dinner which consisted of a packet of chips and a glass of lemonade which we bought under the assumption was water.

New day begins with high hopes as after yesterday’s debacle we thought it couldn’t get any worse. We started on our trek to Tivoli to visit Villa D’este which was going to take us about 1 hour, unfortunately for us it took 4 as the signs we followed took us in the wrong direction. We have found out that the saying ‘All roads lead to Rome’ is very true. Finally we drove into a petrol station and a couple pulled up beside us in a campervan so we asked them for help. Us with little Italian and them with little English they were great and gave us the assistance we needed. We eventually made it to our destination and it was well worth the stress getting there. It is a renaissance villa with magnificent fountains and gardens and we thoroughly enjoyed it. We left there and arrived home within the hour it should have taken us to get there….things are looking up.

So far I have been doing all the driving and Kim has been navigating so we are not sure who is at fault but the next trip the roles will be reversed so we will soon find out. We are having a break from driving tomorrow though and travelling into Rome by train so we will only need to drive to the train station. I’m sure we will be ok, there has never been any incidents of trains getting lost…. has there?

I have forgotten to mention how mad the drivers are. Apparently Kim read somewhere that the speed limit is 130 on the autostrada, not that we see many signs anywhere.  I actually managed to get to that speed one day and they were flying past me and I mean flying. They don’t indicate, they park wherever they want to, they straddle two lanes, they overtake on bends and all this whilst driving at breakneck speeds. Not for the faint hearted!! On a brighter note the weather has been hot, over 30’s every day so far and even though we’ve been off the beaten track at times every one we meet has tried their best to assist us. Stay tuned for the next instalment and photo's to come.