a long day

We had our first really bad day today, due to a combination of the Italian's poor road signage and my short temper.

After disembarking the boat in Ancana at 7am, Woz and I were really keen to make the most of our early start and get some good driving under out belt before a long lunch break. Once we reached the motorway we were flying along, loving being in Italy and loving being on the road. Not long after this however we had to take an exit to transfer to another motorway. In what we have discovered is the norm, at 130km per hour we were given 500 metres notice to turn. I think by about 400 metres I had worked out in my mind what I had read on the sign, by 450 had worked out which direction we had to turn and by 500 said to Woz, 'We have to turn right soon' and zoom, past the exit we flew.

'Never mind, we'll take the next one and go back' we said happily. We were on holidays, we didn't care about exits, but adventure!

Twenty minutes later, we finally reached the next exit on the motorway and so having gone so far along we decided we'd take the smaller roads back to the main motorway. Until now I had been able to navigate us smoothly to any given destination and with a fresh boost of confidence I was up for the challenge. What followed was at least an hour of driving around in circles in rural Italy. We would approach an intersection, be given two choices, take one, then reach another intersection and be given two entirely different choices, neither of them heading in the direction we wanted, so we would choose one, then get to the next intersection and be faced with an entirely new direction once again .... this continued for HOURS and by the end of it I was cursing Italy and it's town planners. 'Now I remember why we hated Rome!' I screamed at the cows we passed.

By afternoon we reached La Spezia and the start of the Cinque Terre but it took us so long to find the actual road that leads to the Cinque Terre that we spent yet again another hour just driving around in circles, cursing the Italian town planners. By late afternoon we finally found ourselves on the right road and drove along the Cinque Terre from start to finish, reaching the last town at sunset.

Oh and yes, it was worth it.