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Four sections, sixteen guides
Everything on the site, in the order the material builds: the vehicle first, then the towns it cannot enter, then the roads that decide whether it gets there, then the year the country actually keeps.
Italy measures the van
Height, weight and length decide the route.
- Italy decides where you sleep by measuring the vanLength, height and gross weight decide which sostas, which passes and which ferries are open to you, before any question of taste.
- A sosta is not a campsiteAn area di sosta is a service point with water, a drain and a dump; a campeggio is a site with pitches and facilities, and the two are governed differently.
- Where the vans end up insteadWhen the sostas are full or shut the overflow goes to supermarket edges, ferry aprons and the ends of seafront car parks.
- The service column, and what it actually providesFresh water, grey drain, chemical dump and sometimes power — the four things that set the length of a stay.
The camera at the gate
How a ZTL works, and when the letter arrives.
- The camera at the gateAlmost every Italian historic centre is a limited-traffic zone enforced by camera, and the boundary is a line on a pole rather than a barrier.
- How a varco works, from the pole to the postThe gate reads the plate, the plate is checked against a permit list, and what arrives months later is a notice by post.
- When the letter arrivesNotices reach a foreign registered keeper through the hire company or the vehicle register, which is why they are so delayed.
- Nobody stops you at the gateThere is no barrier and no official — the enforcement is entirely after the fact, which is what catches people out.
The limit is the radius
Passes, hairpins and the turning circle.
- The limit is the radiusOn the high passes the constraint is not gradient or power but whether a long vehicle can get round a hairpin without shunting.
- Forty-eight turns, and none of them widenThe Stelvio's north side is the set piece, and the numbered bends are a useful way to describe what a long wheelbase meets.
- Weight limits, and the signed routeBridges and tunnels carry limits that quietly rule out a heavy motorhome, and the diversion can be a hundred kilometres.
- When the pass is shutHigh passes close for much of the year, and the closure dates shape any route drawn outside high summer.
North to south, out of season
The country when the campsites are shut.
- The country, north to south, out of seasonOutside July and August much of the coastal infrastructure is shut, and the route moves inland by necessity.
- The Dolomites, and the rifugi above the roadThe valley floors take a van; everything interesting is above them and reached on foot.
- Tuscan back roads, and where a long vehicle should not goWhite gravel roads between agriturismi are fine until a passing place is needed.
- The long run southBelow Naples the distances get real and the service network thins out.