Travel Diary 16

Travel Diary 16

Got away nice and early from La Spezia. About 8.30am for a change. Had a quick trip down the Coast road to Pizza. Except one cannot see any coastline on the way. The autostrada runs through hills and ranges that reach down to the Mediterranean Sea and is punctuated by tunnels along the way.

The toll was fairly cheap as well. Only 3.30 euros for the 88km trip. Interesting about tolls here. Every highway and motorway has at least one if not two. Prices vary and most have no one to collect the tolls. They are geared to accept Cash, Cards and give change. Very organised! We are half way through our European trip and already have spent nearly 300 euros on tolls. I can imagine what Aussies would say about that!

The alternative is too add hours and hours of travel through small country towns and villages with speed limits dropping to 30kph and roads narrow and police speed traps frequent. So, autostradas and autovias etc are very acceptable. So far, from what we have seen, France has the best systems and road conditions. They are a real pleasure to drive on. Spain and Italy have some good roads, but often they need repair in places. Secondary roads are a nightmare!! Our original plan had been to time travelling through small towns and villages, going to local market days to buy fresh food, meeting some of the locals etc and generally seeing what life is like out of the big cities.  We quickly came to realise that to do this would mean one of two things. Either hardly travel anywhere due to the time it would take or simply park up and spend a week or so in only a few places. I can understand why some people just hire a home or apartment and spend their time in one spot.

As for public transport, I like the system in Italy the best. Mostly one buys public transport by the time. For example, in Rome, you can buy a 100-minute ticket or a 24-hour ticket or a 7-day ticket. With one of these tickets you can travel on any train, tram or bus. Few bus drivers can sell tickets either, and it is a real honesty system. But one does not see many people getting free rides. They apparently all honour the system.  A 24-hour ticket cost 7.00 euros each (about $A10) and it can be used as often as one likes during that 24-hour period.

The other thing we have noticed is that Italian public transport needs cleaning. There is some serious graffiti in places. Also, on another occasion our timetable had printed that the last train left at 11.30pm and we arrived at the train station just on 10.10pm. We sat down and about 10 minutes later the Station Master came out and told us to go as he locked up the entrance for the night. No more trains! Apparently the timetable is wrong? Or maybe they just decided to go home early! Apparently this is not uncommon! But, this is Italy, where anything can happen and usually does.

We arrived in Pizza and stopped at a McDonalds on the outskirts of town for coffee and quick check on the address for the leaning tower and Duomo etc.  The girl at McDonalds gave us some great easily understood directions and half an hour later, off we went.

All was well for about 20 mins and then we realised we could see the leaning tower above the city houses and we began to look for a Car Park. We followed the Parking Here signs and arrived after a few blocks. However, there was a height restriction and it was too low for a campervan. We were right beside the entrance to the Leaning Tower complex and I pulled into a one-way street 50 meters away to try and work out where to go and what to do. Parking on the street seemed to be impossible due to no spare spaces.

I suggested that Kerrie walk back to the Parking spot and ask them where campervans could park. This was done in hope, as normally such questions do not get even answered, regardless what language is used!  I drove 50 meters down the one-way side street and did the usual Italian thing, double parked and blocked off 2/3rds of the road.

Five minutes later a lady came down, and pulled up beside me and blocked off the rest of the road! Got out, put on her emergency flashers and walked off! Couldn’t believe it!  There were cops 50 meters away at the end of the street watching and they did nothing! As I said, this is Italy …

Kerrie got back when there were only 3 cars behind me wondering what the hell I was doing and as expected, she had not been answered. So, we wandered slowly down the street, let the cars behind us pass and around a corner and then low and behold, there were three car spaces together on the side of the road. Yippee!

We took them all up; thanked the African guy who pointed out where we paid the parking fee and then told him No we weren’t buying anything from him. But in the end we gave in and paid 3 euros for a box of tissues which cost 1.50 euros in a supermarket!! After all, he had helped s to some extent, so I figured it was the least we could do.

Then back up the street, across the road, past the police chatting away and doing nothing, negotiated the tents full of touristy stuff and rubbish made in China, underneath the train bridge and joined the couple of thousand of other tourists gawking at the leaning tower and Duomo!

The complex is right in the town centre and consists of three buildings – a Baptistery about 9 stories high and beautifully engraved, covered in statues, a church which is almost as tall and separately, the Leaning Tower. So we did the usual thing along with everyone else of taking a picture holding up the tower with a finger or hand – and I mean “everyone else!” Imagine one thousand people trying to line up their one thousand partners or friends for such a holiday picture. In actual fact it was amusing! Silly, but such is life. I bet the first person to do this wishes they had got paid a cent for everyone else who copied!

There is a path leading into the entrance way for each building and one that runs around the outside of all of them. The entrance to the Leaning Tower was closed and guarded by a soldier with a machine gun. We decided not to ask him if we could get special permission, as our only excuse was we were from Australia and we did not think that would cut any ice with him. Very severe looking chap. Every tourist venue has armed soldiers and police standing around watching. I’ve no idea whether this is normal or just due to the heightened terrorist risk.

We walked around, taking photos and then decided to head back to the van after a quick visit to the toilets. Seems like everyone else had the same idea at the same time. The queues meant nobody should wait until the last minute to go! We got on the end of the queue and then noticed we had to pay 0.80 euros to get inside. No way around this as everyone was funnelled into a single line by posts and coloured ropes, past a desk one at a time and the 80 cents was collected.

Except that the money was collected from women as they needed toilet paper. No paper in the toilets, again!

I noticed that some men were just walking past and not paying and I joined them! In and out. Very quick and waited for another 10 minutes until Kerrie came out. Apparently the ladies had a very long line!! This was borne out by the large number of men standing around waiting, like me, outside!

Back to the van, just made it before the parking time ran out and then off again. The African guy wished us a Happy Holiday in pretty good English. The one-way street ran around a bunch of houses and alleys and the occasional shop and then onto the main road out of town. Florence here we come!

A couple of hours later we arrived near Florence. I had Google Earthed a camp site the previous nights as the ACSI Camp site book only listed sites that were a long way away from the city. I had found one that seemed to be about 20kms away from the city centre and had a restaurant, a swimming pool, beautiful views and a free bus to the nearest public bus stop. Good stuff! Or so I thought!

The time was around 6.00pm when we got off the autovia and onto the local city road network. And Simon, our friendly navigator, had some kind of a fit. We ended up on a road that had 2.5meter stone walls on either side and was about six inches wider than the van. It was not until we were well into the road that we saw a sign that said “No Campervans”! Too late, nowhere to turn around. Nothing to do except keep on going. Well, what else do you do. Just drive on and hope no one was coming in the opposite direction.

Unfortunately, three cars did. We had the wing mirrors pulled in and I knew there was a car behind me going at our speed and I was seriously holding him up as I was going no faster than 5kph. I could not back up as he wasn’t going to move and when a car came in the opposite direction, they had to back up some 50 – 80 meters before there was a space near a large drain or ditch the stone walls had moved away from, giving us just enough room to pass.

The road went on for about 4kms and by the end of it I was a wreck. Time and time again I had asked “Room on your side?” before moving off again. I could not see how close I was due to the mirrors being folded in and Kerrie kept gasping due to me missing things on her side by an inch or less. 

I exaggerate not!

We got seriously upset with Simon and had some harsh words with him as well as with McRent for giving us software so out of date. I mean, even the Italians knew campervans should not be driving this road. You would have thought they would have put up a sign saying so well before it was too late! But! Yep … this Italy!!

Eventually we got out onto a major intersection. I went stuff this and just drove across and stopped in a bus stop. Couldn’t care less at this point. Simon blithely informed us there was only another 5 kms to the campsite and all of it along more of this road! I said No way! (Well I did say some other things but they are unprintable!)

So, we cancelled Simon for the night, got back in the van as I had had to have a walk around and cigarette and seriously wanted a drink to calm the nerves, and anyway, it was getting dark and so on we went. But in our direction! I figured that if we just drove off the side of this hill we were on, we would strike a road somewhere that would lead us around it in the right direction. I had found Google maps and there was such a road called something very long in Italian – Via something – and If we found that, then we could reset Simon to the camp site road.

All went well for about 200 meters and the road down the hill narrowed up on a bend and a car coming from the other way did not move over much and I pulled over too far to ensure we missed only to collect a low built stone wall. It was about 300mm high and just caught the edge of the side of the van leaving some scratches and paint missing and but no bent panels! Small mercies!

We got out and looked and then I went “You know what? It’s happened, can’t do anything about it. I’ll move back a few inches, swing wide to get away from it and worry about the scratches later!” I also said some other things, but they too are unprintable!!

Eventually we freed ourselves, took a photo to send to the company we rented the van from; decided this did not fall into the category of reporting to the police and about 30 minutes found ourselves in a tiny village with equally tiny roads going up a hill to the campsite.

What a day! We checked in for three nights and poured ourselves a … yep! A red wine each!

As night settled in, we stood at the edge of our site with the hill dropping away from us giving us an unrestricted view of Florence or Fiorenza as the locals call it. Lights were coming on in the city and it was quite picturesque. The city was about 800m below us and spread out in all directions. It fills a valley between high hills and higher hills behind them. Between the hills we could see the lights of villages and smaller towns further away and long streams of lights on the major roads heading towards them. So I grabbed my camera and set out to get some night shots.

To do that I needed my longer lens which is difficult to keep completely still while shooting and this proved to be the case next morning when I checked them. While I had rested the camera on top of fence posts for some shots trying to keep it still, none of them are any good as they had blurred from movement. I had needed to change the settings to accommodate longer exposure times and the extra half a second or more had done it. So, tonight I’ll pull out the tripod and use the remote shutter control.

In the morning we caught the free shuttle service down to the village and saw in daylight just how narrow the street leading up to the campsite really is! Mirrors required on a number of corners to see what is coming around them. No footpaths and even the local police have to wait for elderly shoppers to move on as they walk on the roadside!

The bus to the city duely arrived and we piled on board and about 20 minutes later found ourselves in Florence, downtown in a little Piazza and not quite knowing where to start. Out came the map we had acquired and found out where we were, so we could work out where to go!

First off was a Museum I wanted to visit. Has lots of famous painters works and sculptures etc. This was about 400 meters away from where we were through another Piazza and down a side street. The streets were packed with people. Obviously all tourists with back packs on, bottles of water strategically attached to belts and back packs, cameras at the ready and more frequently, mobile phones being held on selfie-sticks. Groups of teenagers escorted by tired distraught looking adults, were straggling along talking at the top of their voices while wearing earphones attached to an iPod or phone or whatever. You could hear many languages from various American accents to French, guttural German, Dutch, the odd English dialect, something from one of the Scandinavian countries and above everything else, Italian being spoken fast and furious.

As we rounded the corner into the street where the Museum is, we were forced to stop. The street was packed with queues of people all waiting to get in. We eventually made our way to near the entrance and read the signs. The doorway was divided into two entrances. One was for the people on a “Skip the Line” tour and the other was for the real Tour people.

We have discovered that “Skip the Line” Tours do actually get one inside a venue quicker. But not by much as there are so many “Skip the Line” tour groups, that they have now got their own queues! And they get priority over those who are not part of those groups.  These people, hoping to score a ticket and just walk in had at this venue at least a one and a half hour, if not two-hour wait. One could pay over the top to any of the touts trying to flog off spaces in a “Skip the Line” Tour they were selling! Only 40 euros with an hour wait when the ticket price was 12 euro! We had two of these people approach us and the second one was 5 euros dearer than the first. I told her the first offer was cheaper than hers and her response in mixed English and Italian was oh well if you want monkeys and bananas go with him.

I looked at her and laughed and said “It wouldn’t matter who I went with, I’d still be with monkeys and bananas!” She thought that was very funny and had obviously missed the irony!

In the end neither of us felt like waiting up to two hours in the hope we could get in. Plenty else to see. So off we walked down the street, over the square into an ancient monastery that is now a church. Plain and very ordinary on the outside but beautiful on the inside. We walked in past the beggars sitting in the doorway and had hardly been there for 5 minutes when the priest came along and advised he was locking up. We had to go. On checking the time, we found it was 12.30pm.

So many places close between 12.30pm and 2.30pm or even later. And this church was no exception. The priest had to go to lunch and confessions and conversions could wait! He did, bless him, give me a picture of the Virgin Mary as consolation!

About this lunchtime business. We have even found a supermarket that closed at 12.30pm and reopened at 4.00pm. Banks that close for 2 or 3 hours and so on. Tourist areas and most retail shops in city centres do not generally close. But some do!

On the other hand, they mostly stay open until much later than 5.00pm.

Time, lack of tickets and hundreds, if not a few thousand tourists all worked against us. We were unable to get into the two Museums we wanted nor into a couple of Galleries. Even the Duomo was booked out with queues going around the entire church in both directions.

We did see the massive Duomo from outside. It is a little similar to the one in Milano but much, much bigger covering almost an entire city block. Interestingly, it has green marble used extensively on the outside. Have not seen this colour used before and it gives a different effect as you could imagine.

We also saw a Plaza with a large number of statues around it. All copies of the real ones inside the National Gallery of course, but still quite impressive. And, of course we got see about three versions of “David”!!

Interestingly we another little Museum which advertised “Leonardo da Vinci” – same as the one we had seen elsewhere.

I would have loved to spend a lot more time in Florence as there is so much to see and do. Unfortunately, we needed to do some housekeeping at the van and the one day was all we could afford.

The next day, we got stuck into the housekeeping and then spent the afternoon at the local village called Fiersole. This was founded by the Etruscans way back in BC times. Then the Romans made it a trade centre. Excavations of the Roman ruins are on display along with a Museum displaying Roman, Greek and Etruscan artefacts. Lunch at a local café overlooking Florence, then caught the free shuttle back to camp.