An early start today for the drive to Rome. We left the hotel and drove the few hundred yards to the motorway junction, and for some reason only known to me and the satnav I got in the wrong lane and headed in the wrong direction. It was 15 miles before I could turn around so some 35 minutes and two tolls later saw us passing the hotel junction again.

After our diversion my compatriot insisted she would navigate and I should ignore the satnav. This continued until we reached Rome when her bottle went as our map of Europe is of little help in a city. At the last services I put in the coordinates of the meeting point. After a hair raising drive we arrived at the appointed place with a fantastic views of Rome.

At around 4pm a number of police motorcyclist arrived and took us in convoy around the sights of Rome. Everything was stopped in our favour much to the anoyance of the rush hour traffic.

We were taken to a square the you could look through a gate keyhole to see Rome. Unfortunately the van started plying up just as we arrived, so my stop was spent fettling.

After the convoy visited all of the tourist places in Rome the police delivered us to our hotel where the Crown Plaza wanted a photo call.