Driving in Italy Part II

Driving in Italy Part II

Driving in Italy can be...intense. You are expected to pay attention and not “zone out” as many (most?) Americans seem to do for most of their time in a car. Driving there is, as it should be everywhere, serious business and a car is a way to get from place to place with you piloting it...it is not primarily a means just to entertain you. 

And driving anywhere near Napoli steps up that intensity substantially. The southern part of the country, called the “Mezzogiorno” or “mid-day” for it's sunniness, is much poorer than Tuscany and the roads and signs are pretty neglected and derelict. It is no wonder that most Italian/Americans emigrated from this land of “little to no opportunity,” as did Sherri's Italian ancestors. On one trip I thought it would be fun to take her back to the “village” most of them came from and see if we could find any traces of them...a place called San Giuseppe sul Vesuviano”...”sul” being Italian for “on the” or “belonging to”...on the far eastern slopes of that dangerous volcano.

It is good that, by then, I had extensive experience with Italy, its roads and its drivers, as the signage was terrible, the roads broken up, and the driving so “assertive” it made Tuscans look like they were asleep at the wheel. Sherri was navigating and it seemed that, no matter which way we turned, we kept coming back to the same intersection, which had us laughing but was also frustrating.

Finally we stopped to ask directions at a gas station. A vital word to know in Italian is “dritta” for “straight” as, invariably, that is what you will likely be told in such cases. It also was a bit freaky when the attendant yelled at us to stop as we tried to pull out, but he only wanted to give us a pen as a gift...another charming trait of many Italian retailers.

While the map made it look like the area was filled with little towns separated by open land, the reality was that we were pretty much in what had become suburban Naples. The traffic was...chaotic. At one point I had motorcycles and scooters alongside and passing me , in my lane, on both sides of the car, in both directions. If I took my eyes off the car in front of me for a nanosecond somehow another car would have stuffed its way in between. And yet somehow it all just continued to flow without road rage or collisions. 

Our hotel was in a town called Nola, which after a short walk I decided stood for “Nothing Lovely At All” as it was scruffy and run down. Still, the people were as friendly as elsewhere in Italy, though I doubt they see very many Americans, and we did not hesitate to stop into a little bakery for the flaky filled pastries Sherri's family has always called “Shrividell” but is really pronounced “Sfoliatelly” though it is spelled “sfogliatelli.” 

From Pinterest
I don't care what you call it
It's delicious!

Parking at the hotel was like one of those puzzles you played with as a kid, made up of a frame with tiles you had to move around to get into a specific order. I could not enter the garage until registering and getting the combination to its gate, and the lot for this was full with cars owned by businesspeople who had just ended a lunchtime meeting inside. It was an exercise of “if you move here I can temporarily move over there so she can move back where I am now and he can get his car out.” Of course all of this with laughter, hand gestures, my bad Italian, and good humor.

That reminded me of the time I circled Todi late at night when all available spaces were filled. I kept winding up going down a very steep, straight road which took me out of the Centro Storico, whreupon I had to circle the entire town to re-enter and try my search again (yes, likely following those “Tutti le Direzione” signs...see Part I for an explanation).

Then I spotted one of the modern Fiat 500s obviously on the same quest. I guessed it might be driven by a local so I decided to follow him...right into a blind, dead end alley halfway down the hill. The driver was indeed Italian, and after getting over our laughter he directed me to help me back up into that very steep street, where I then blocked it until he could extricate his own car. I finally parked outside the city walls and got enough exercise to need a cold beer by the time I climbed back to the central piazza and our hotel.

Humor seems to permeate the driving experience all over the country. Once I needed to return a rental car to the garage in Piazzale Roma on Venice (you can drive TO Venice but not ON Venice). First I had to convince a construction worker to allow me to make a prohibited turn in order to get into the garage (not the only time I had to get permission to go “wrong way”). And then there were no spots on the first floor in the spaces reserved for rentals...I wound up taking the only space in the entire complex...on the roof! When I explained this to the agent when I turned in the keys, he simply smiled and gave the “Italian salute”...a shrug.

Then there was the time I was in total frustration trying to find my way into the Mestre parking garage. This was on yet another trip to Venice. Through my travel forum I was advised that the least expensive way to park overnight while visiting that lovely place (the garage on the island charged 30€a night) was to park on the mainland for 8€ and take the train across for another Euro each. 

But the garage was on the “other side” of the extensive rail yard from where we left the autostrada, the roads were under construction, and there were no signs indicating an alternate route to the train station. Once again I wound up on one street over and over again, circling downtown Mestre.

In frustration I saw what I at first thought was a road through a tunnel which seemed to lead where we needed, though entry to it was from the opposite direction. However, I figured our Fiat could be threaded between the stanchions alongside rather than trying to figure out how to get back to the entry.

It was only after doing this and proceeding for a hundred feet or so that I was the bicycle images stenciled on the pavement...and a cyclist waiting patiently at the other end of the tunnel.

Sherri commented that he was probably wondering “what those damned fool Americans are doing” in a bike tunnel but I asserted that, based on things I had seen such as a guy driving and parking on the sidewalk in Rome in front of a cop (who just shrugged and shook his head in resignation), it was more likely the cyclist was thinking “what are those damned fool Italians doing?”

To this day I have no idea how we finally got to the garage, as the bicycle path led us back to the same road with which we were already far too familiar. But when I asked the garage attendant for directions back to the autostrada the next day, of course the answer was “dritta..”which indeed got us there with no fuss.

My final anecdote is only funny looking back on it. Among other things it cost me over 100€ but it also could have been a major disaster. It brought home once again that, no matter how convenient and good gps software is...you cannot simply follow it blindly. A good map is always of great value. Context and knowing where you are rather than just following a blue line on a screen not only increases interest in your surroundings, it can also prevent you from driving off a cliff where the gps thinks there is a road, which in reality does not exist. 

I was looking for the Scrovigni Chapel in Padova, where we had reservations for a specific time. I did not realize it was located in what is now the heart of this rather large city, surrounded by high rise office buildings. As for the gps, it took me down a one way street towards the chapel in order to get me as close as possible. Following it blindly I missed the fact that I was illegally entering one of the restricted travel zones almost all Italian cities of any size have (ZTL zones).

ZTL Sign
Just try and pick this out while navigating city traffic amidst the clutter
From davlynmitaly blogspot

The one I missed was also monitored by cameras, but of more immediate concern was it was that the street was a dead end...though there was a top to the “T” it was a pedestrian only street, also common in Italy town centers.

So now what was I supposed to do? To turn around I had to swing into the pedestrian road and crowd, who were not at all pleased with me, and then motor back to the next crossing...going the wrong way!

And of course, halfway down that passage stood two metro cops. All I could do was lower the window and tell them “Ho perso” (I'm lost) and ask for their help exiting the area. They directed me out and did not write a citation, so I thought I was home free...until a copy of the fine notice from the city was forwarded to me six months later by the car rental agency. Though it took another six months before I got the “official” notice from the city, I did pay even though many “experts” thought the fine could safely be ignored. Not worth chancing any sort of bureaucratic confrontation in a foreign country, in my opinion.

Did I mention the area was under camera monitoring?