This one is for the Penna's!!

Our next stop was La Spezia where we were hiring a car to drive to a village called Rocca d’Arazzo where my Grandfather was born and lived until her moved out to Australia as a little boy. This was a mission! We got the car fairly easily but it was working out how to drive a left handed car that worried me! As it was my trip it was my job to drive, so after sitting and playing with the gears I felt like I had the hang of it. Got instructions of how to get out of the town and onto the motorway and we were off!! Now, when we planned this idea in London it seemed like a great idea…that is until we saw how people drove in Italy. Oh my god they are crazy! Lucky we were in a quieter part of Italy so it wasn’t too bad but the motorway, that was a different story. There was at least 3 lanes of traffic so a slow, an overtaking and a fast lane. The speed limit said either 110 or 130 depending on which section we drove. Now, I sat in the slow lane, not because I was going slow, but because I was actually doing the speed limit. The other 2 lanes were doing at least 20-40kms over the limit, especially those in the far left lane. It was freaking unbelievable! Even when the speed limit dropped to 80 every car was still doing at least 100. I have never seen Liz looked so scared. She barley spoke to me when we were on the motorways! But the roads were bloody unreal, as they should be since the toll was 15 euros, one way!!

Our plan was to drive to Asti and stay there the night then wake up the next morning to head to Rocca. We were basically on track with only a slight detour off the motorway as their numbers and signing was a little difficult to follow at times. We finally made it to Asti and found the first hotel we came across. Was really nice and clean and then next morning while having a pastry and coffee at their bar, we asked the owner how to get to Rocca d'Arrazzo as our map didn’t quite give us the smaller towns in that area. He kind of laughed a little when we told him where we wanted to go and just kept repeating that it was so small! But he and his side kick gave us really good directions and a map of the region and shook our hands on the way out. So nice!! We hopped back into the car and about 10 minutes later we were in Rocca d’Arrazzo.

This place is so tiny! Everything was just like you picture a small Italian village to look like, but sorry Mum, there were no cobble stones anymore. We walked around and found the Municiple Hall which also houses most of the government offices as well as the post office. The main street had 1 bakery, a little butchers, 2 bar/café places, a general store, a 1 pump petrol station and a bank. So it’s safe to say it didn’t take long to explore, but we did walk around all the streets just to check it out and to take lots of photos for you all. We did find the cemetery and had a look around but we only found 2 Penna’s and a few Doglione’s so I’m not sure if we are related to them or not. But I have the info which I’ll email to you all soon. It is such a pretty region out there and is mostly farms and vineyards. But it was so great just to visit there. A few people tried to talk to us and due to us knowing no Italian it made it difficult but I think we did ok with hand movements! I made you a short video clip so I hope you can all watch it!

After spending the morning there we headed back to Asti for lunch and a quick look around and then got back in the car to head back down to La Spezia. It was safe to say that I was not sad to give back the car as our trip back down was great until we had to navigate our way back to the hire car office…that was stressful in peak hour. I had gotten used to driving on the left side on the motorway but in the towns it was different…lucky I had Liz who helped me to turn on to the correct side of the road every time! Super Co-Driver she was!! I will send you all pictures of Rocca once I’m settled back in London as I’ll only be able to put a few up on here. Miss you all lots and lots
Xoxo

P.S I am still trying to upload the video. When it's up I'll send an email through. Sorry but the internet is being difficult!