13 April 2024 – Feeling Hot! Hot! Hot!

Miles driven today = 109

Total Miles to date = 4,021

I’m afraid I really don’t have anything much in the way of photos to show you today as, apart from our journey up to Verona this morning, all we have really done is sit around the van trying to keep cool.

From last night’s abode at Camping Reno we initially headed North for a while and spotted a few more flamingos paddling around in the coastal lagoons before doing a sharp left turn and heading inland on the RA8.  Despite being a dual carriageway this really is an absolute shocker of a road.  We immediately saw a warning sign indicating a bumpy surface for the next 3 kilometres.  Then after 3 kilometres there was another identical sign, repeat ad ifinitum.  Despite the road being almost dead straight Lisa was complaining of feeling travel sick from the constant lurching and I was glad of having the steering wheel to hang onto at times. 

We were relieved when Google Maps had us turn off at Gualdo and send us along a succession of narrow SP roads to avoid Ferrara.  Eventually we found our way to the much better maintained SS434 which whisked us across the pancake flat countryside all the way to Verona.

Today marks exactly two months since we first drove onto Italian soil and therefore our WindTre monthly data contract ran out last night.  We have tried several times to renew online but without success.  They just don’t seem to like accepting non-Italian debit and credit cards, so our only option was to find another petrol station or tobacconists where we could buy the top up over the counter.  We missed a few early opportunities and then, typically, we didn’t see another likely candidate for absolutely ages so it was only once we got onto the SS434 that we finally made a stop to see if they could assist.  No luck!  A few kilometres on down the road we pulled in again with the same result.  I was reconciling myself to having to watch this afternoon’s football on my phone when we struck third time lucky, so we now have wifi for the rest of our time in Italy and about 20Gb of roaming data for the remainder of our journey home.  We also took the opportunity to top up with diesel and LPG while we were there which made me feel an awful lot happier with the World and a lot less stressy.

So, we have made ourselves as comfortable as the heat allows at Verona Village Camping, which is a large and impressively well appointed site about 6km to the South of the City centre.  It’s fairly new so the trees which have been planted aren’t anywhere near large enough to offer any shade.  The temperature hit 26 degrees today and, if anything, is likely to top that by a degree or two tomorrow, which is probably going to make our proposed strolling around the city a little uncomfortable and a gelato or two may well be order of the day.  

But at least there are none of the mosquitoes which plagued us last night so we could happily eat al-fresco this evening and remain outside until the sun set.  This is the external thermometer reading at 8:30pm.  We’ve dug our USB fans out from the garage.  I hope we don’t need them to get to sleep but they are certainly making life a lot more comfortable in the van this evening.  I expected to experience these temperatures at some point during the trip but I didn’t anticipate it being this far North.  By the end of the week we will be in the Alps and I’m sure that it will be feeling a tad cooler by then.

14 April 2024 - In Fair Verona