Adventure and laughs start here

Right, well we arrived early from the cruise 9.30 am and we waited in the amazing long queue at Rome airport for our hire car, this time much more efficient! they only taking 2 hrs!

After a long long walk from the terminal to our car waiting in bay 86 (as instructed) great it was a nice black Kuger, so luggage loaded, car photographed for any scratches, back pack unpacked into the cars compartments, water bottles in holders and we are ready to set the mirrors etc to prepare for take off..

Pete Jumped into the drivers seat and noticed a GEAR STICK NOOOOO, it was to be an auto car and he just don't think he can change gears with his right hand and use a clutch along with all the other complications of driving on the wrong side of the road in THAT Italian traffic...

So back to the car rental desk and a new car was assigned, opps their mistake, should have been bay 53... so back to the car park... now a much smaller Ford Focus happy Pete it's a positive on the little roads.

Right

Next challenge to plug in Gloria and set our direction south.
Hmmmm small problem, Gloria Princess Storker or GPS for short (for those who have only joined the blog) had decided somewhere between being filed away in Venice till now, had a dummy spit, literally, her tiny Italian map sim card had ejected and mysteriously disappeared ... so, two options ... to unpack the entire luggage in the boot to search for the tiny bit of plastic or go back to the counter and hire a " New Gloria" to get us on the road...

Walk back to the counter only to be told the car we now have had a built in system...Great but now to work out how to use it...that's OK I'm sure we can do this.

Walk back to the car and yes there it was ... in Italian! SO walk back to the counter to get further instructions and a little man ...
Ok now all set in English and we were told as soon as we left the terminal we would get a signal and it would work... OK!!!!

So finally we left the terminal ...1 pm. and yes as you expected, silence from Gloria ... and there we were ... out on the road out of the airport using our judgment heading to the notoriously busy Rome ring road.

Breath breath we can do this ... and after a few kilometres she spoke!!! oh we laughed and we were on our way.

We drove around Rome and around Naples and ended up in a tiny place though the most amazing mountains  some 450km south of Rome.

 

Arrived to our first destination Harmony Hotel in Praia a Mare and ... well that's a story for Pete to tell xx