Blogs from Ancona, Marche, Italy, Europe

Buonasera fellow travelblogger - We have escaped Ancona and are heading north on the Autostrada Adriatica. What a lovely name for a motorway . It makes the M1 sound mundane and ordinary. We follow our English friend as we head out of a busy heavily policed town. He must do this run with regular monotony as he knows how to exit the port. He is younger than us and will probably drive all night and be back in the UK tomorrow. We pass places we know. Rimini with its miles and miles of sunbeds, the motoGP track at Misano. We have been a couple of times to watch races there, Corriano , the birthplace and burial place of Simoncelli the bike rider and Gradara with its lit up castle . It looks pretty at night . ... read more

Geo: 43.6158, 13.5189 GÜN 09 GÜNLERDEN CUMA: Gemimiz Hellenic Spirit dehşet…Gerçekten Helen ruhu taşıyor... Saatinde sıraya girdik ve gemi tam saatinde 17:30 da kalktı. Yerimiz çok güzel… Elektrik te bulmuşuz.. Bilgisayarları bağladım.. Öldürsen kalkmam buradan .. Akşam yemeğine bile ayrı ayrı gittik Ayşe ile… Keyfimiz yerinde …hele yukarı çıkmadan önce kendimize iki adet ,küçük whisky şişesi ayarlamıştık..İki şişeyi devirdikten sonra uyku bastı… İki şişeden sonra uyku basınca ben aşağıya yatmaya gittim. Şimdiki gemilerde artık eskisi gibi değil .. "Camping on Board" yani gemide kamp sistemi ile gece aracına dönüp yatabiliyorsun. Bu niyetinizi bilet alırken belirttiğiniz taktirde, size hem rahat ulaşılacak bir yer, hem de hava alabileceğiniz bir yer veriyorlar.. Uyuya ,uyana sabahı ettim. Sabah 07:30 da Ayşe'ciği dün akşam bıraktığım yerde buldum.. Pek... read more

So far everything has worked to plan which means that Monday evening we are sat on a ferry from Ancona to Greece. Looking back we have been amazingly lucky with the weather, we missed the storms in Northern Italy, saw some in the distance, and caught a torrent of rain when sat in a bar in Pontremoli. So all in all, a few spots of rain and some nasty spray in the UK, and a few spots on the last leg yesterday, south from Bologna to Cattolica. Today the short hop from Cattolica to Ancona was uneventful, beyond anything one might encounter on an Italian highway. I think Italian car drivers think everything on two wheels requires no more space than a Vespa carving through the traffic of Milan. (Hilary says that the Italians do not ... read more

Made it to Ancona today, a short trip. It was pretty uneventful all the way. We found a hotel without much of a problem. Then we thought it might be a good plan to book the ferry to Patras so off we went to the ferry terminal. The booking office for Superfast Ferries was closed. After a thunderstorm and a revisit things turned out as I expected, not going to open until tomorrow morning. The ferry sails at 13.30 tomorrow so no big deal. It is a pleasantly warm evening. I've had my second ice cream of the day, and my 4th coffee. Time for a beer or four. And, today, we are posting from the ferry to Patras. More later...... read more

Well I went round the port today, and it gave every appearance of being completely deserted. Probably because it's Italian Liberation Day I think; this Irish truck driver I ran into in an Indian restaurant told me all about it, as well as many other things. He looked somewhat like my grandfather, with his nose and spectacles, but had none of his manner. He drives an eighteen wheeler around Greece, and he's in the Hell's Angels. If he is to be believed of course, but he would have gained nothing from me by lying that way. I'm now looking into staying in Corfu for a couple of nights between tomorrow and the thirtieth. Failing that I'll do day-trips to the surrounding coast. That's what I did today; just took the train to the next town over, ... read more