So it was time, again, for a 10 hour drive, this time from France back home to Italy. It was a sad occasion, saying goodbye to our elderly neighbours, who had so nicely let us use their washing machine when ours died, and greeted us with wine and pastry treats on occasion. In fact the old man grew teary as we drove off! Departure was later than originally planned, because Carlee and I decided on the 'lets get up early and roll the legs out' thing, which sounded better when we had organised it the night before. It was far from distressing was leaving our little house behind, although, despite the lack of bench space, the epic set of stairs and...we won’t even mention the beds again…I grew to love our little home because it was ours :)
Entertainment is scarce while traveling, and time occupying games such as eye-spy became quite repetitive by the time I was 10 years old. Even as girls, we can only take so many pictures of ourselves, and rub on a certain number of bubble-gum tattoos (pictured) before the novelty wears off. So a combination of i-Pods, books and pointless conversations roam around the back seat until it’s time for a toilet stop, which comes a lot more often than the need for petrol. If you need to ‘go’, then you need to pay, 50 euro cents in fact, or sometimes just a donation. For this fee, you get clean, sanitised bathrooms, where the toilet seat is self-cleaning and everything else automatic and touch free :D hygienic!
The most difficult decision is what to buy, which is primarily based on how long it will be until our next stop, which is generally 2-3 hours, which means that you’ll find me purchasing some sort of food item every time we stop! When crossing borders, we simply pray that the van, or even the car, doesn’t get stopped at border control. What we forget to pray against is the race car breaking down. And sure enough, after putting along at 50km/hr on the autostrade, we had to pull over, re-pack the van, and leave the boys with their luggage roadside, in the hope that they would make their way home in the next three days! … It’s now 11pm, and we’re still waiting on them...
Entertainment is scarce while traveling, and time occupying games such as eye-spy became quite repetitive by the time I was 10 years old. Even as girls, we can only take so many pictures of ourselves, and rub on a certain number of bubble-gum tattoos (pictured) before the novelty wears off. So a combination of i-Pods, books and pointless conversations roam around the back seat until it’s time for a toilet stop, which comes a lot more often than the need for petrol. If you need to ‘go’, then you need to pay, 50 euro cents in fact, or sometimes just a donation. For this fee, you get clean, sanitised bathrooms, where the toilet seat is self-cleaning and everything else automatic and touch free :D hygienic!
The most difficult decision is what to buy, which is primarily based on how long it will be until our next stop, which is generally 2-3 hours, which means that you’ll find me purchasing some sort of food item every time we stop! When crossing borders, we simply pray that the van, or even the car, doesn’t get stopped at border control. What we forget to pray against is the race car breaking down. And sure enough, after putting along at 50km/hr on the autostrade, we had to pull over, re-pack the van, and leave the boys with their luggage roadside, in the hope that they would make their way home in the next three days! … It’s now 11pm, and we’re still waiting on them...