What are your stories of driving in Italy? I have a job in the Philadelphia region that requires me to drive 200-300 miles a week in southeaster Pennsylvania; all types of roads and times of day and weather conditions. I also would think nothing of driving up to NY city and dealing with Manhattan's taxis. But after just 3 days of getting around Italy in a rented vehicle I promised my wife that we would never drive in Italy again. Why do Italian drivers need to drive directly on your bumper? Anyone got a good story to share?

Driving in Italy is an aquired skill. It requires driving defensively and offensively at the same time. After a while, you know exactly how the other drivers will act and react. You don't belive it, but you know it.<BR> The autostrada is fast,but the driving style makes sense. Slower cars stay to the right lane, medium speed cars stay in the right and pass on the left, fast cars do the same, but spend more time on the right, and slower cars in the right get out of the way.<BR>Genrally, the farther you go south in Italy the "crazier" the drivers get. <BR>Yes, they get very close to cars in front of them, and that can be very nerve wracking at first. but you do get used to it. <BR> However, the Italains are generally not very good at merging, everyone wants to wait until the last possible moment to merge which causes traffic congestion. <BR> My best reccomendation is to drive defensively, and dont try to drive like them. They have been driving like that their whole adult lives, you havent. <BR><BR>Enjoy the ride!

I've never driven in Italy however I have ridden with an Italian driver in Paris and it was an experience I'll never forget. Very good drivers, but very aggressive and spastic! We drove around the circular 3 or 4 times chasing some girls in a BMW just because it had a Swedish sticker on the boot and he had a thing for tall blondes(stereotype I know).

I found driving in Italy to be amazingly easy. Last September I drove out of central Rome, all around Umbria and Tuscany, and into downtown Florence. The only problem I had was that signage was very poor in the cities and it could be very easy to get hopelessly lost. Luckily that didn't happen to me. It was much easier than I had been led to believe. Of course I spent two years as a cab driver in college so traffic doesn't bother me. Only good story was when we drove into the city center of San Gmignano which is pedestrian only except to drop off luggage and we made a wrong turn and got stuck in a dead end that was too narrow to turn around. Old ladies appeared out of nowhere yelling at us and wagging their fingers. Finally able to back out without hitting any of the tourist horde.

Got on a toll road and the little machine refused to give us a ticket. People behind us were getting impatient, so we just got on. Probably stayed on for about 15 miles. When we tried to get off, the guy taking the money didn`t speak English. He gave us a ticket for the longest toll in Italy! it came to about $70, U.S. (P.S. we didn`t pay it on the advice of the bartender at our hotel.) Never heard another word about that ticket.

I drove in Italy. There were times on the streets of Assisi where we had about 1/2 inch on either side of the car. My sister was white knuckled from hanging on. We made it with no scratches or dents, but almost hit a flying nun who appeared out of an alley running. It was close. If you read Francis Mayes under the Tuscan Sun she talks about the unwritten rules for driving there.

Pat, we had the exact same experience with the toll road north of Rome. Couldn't figure out how to get the ticket to come out so drove on through. Same very angry tollbooth attendant at the other end and irate, honking drivers behind us as he charged me about $5 I think and handed me a piece of paper. I didn't pay any attention to the piece of paper until I got home but it appears to be a ticket in the amount $70. Glad I didn't look at it or I might have felt I had to pay it.