Day 1, Country 1 of the 777 Adventure: ITALY

In a nutshell:

For more information... keep on reading below...

So the night before we picked up the van, we had planned to stay with a couch surfer the night before the 777 Adventure begun to keep costs down.

How pleasant does that look?

(Couchsurfing.com  if you haven't heard of it is a cool way to crash for free on people floor, free sofa or bed. Just do your due diligence when picking a host and read between the lines if you know what I mean but yeah we found at least one decent one in Rome.) 

Although from where we landed @Ciampino Airport the only non creepy guy that replied was the other side of Rome in the opposite direction to where we had to pick the van up. Also dubious about having to meet in his pals restaurant. (Guilt EATING/SPENDING!) which would have been bad for budget but

Bulgarian phrase: "Make my tummy smile" 

We decided on a whim (standard 2Anoo practice) to head south towards Anzio and the nearest train station to the van collection point. Which when announced on Italian train tannoy sounded epic! “Villa Claudia”.

Anyway on route we tanked some cafeteria pasta an what we thought was savoury risotto…. We soon realised sifting through the amaretto biscuits & Tina revealing that the label said zucchero. That we were tucking into a hearty Pudding. 

€10 for the shuttle bus from the airport to one central station

€12 on the food & a big bottle of water (the Risotto last 2 days because neither of us enjoyed it but we ate it 

€7.20 for the train

€45 for the B&B on the same street as The Wicked Camper collection Depot

So already hacking into the £700 budget before the official 777 Adventure began but needs must.

Train arrived at VILLA CLAUDIA

Our legend of a Ex Professional Poker playing host Massimo which is Italian for Maximus (cheers Gladiator) was driving past the station, spotted us ladened with backpacks coming off the train so shouted us and offered us a lift. 

So after an epic sleep in a proper bed and an epic wash in a proper bath we were up and at em! Ready to attack the mega drive from: Anzio, Italy to Edinburgh, Scotland 

The 777Adventure was Officially Underway

Day 1: 

Anzio - Roma - Vatican City - Santa Marinella - Montepescali - Pisa - Massaciuccoli

7 Hrs driving

262miles covered 

all at a rough cost of €56.50 (£47.89)

With our rough budget of spending no more than £100 (€117.98) a day 

left us with €61.48 (£52.11) for sustenance, which me and Tina had very different opinions of.

With places and people along the way we wanted to see the route was forever changing.

We actually never sat down and planned a route before we set off. 

I just banged all 7 countries into the Michelin Route planner to get rough costings of Tolls, fuel, distance etc. 

And roughly figured out that covering a distance of about 250miles a day and living of a budget of €42 (£36) a day between us after fuel & Toll costs we could manage all of this on £700 (€825.87).  

For the 1st time ever we bought a sim and traveled with internet so had google on hand literally 24/7 The Sim cost £27 from ThreeUK with all you can eat Data and Feel At Home capability making it easier to stay in touch while your abroad. Covered us in all 7 Countries as we went. 

We also had a temperamental out of date Sat Nav and a Map of Europe to keep us right when all the batteries died but through listening to locals and searching out green or by blue bits on the map to camp at night we were set. 

Folk on roads in Rome were a little mental. A zebra crossing is a game of chicken every time and unexpectedly the car doesn’t always win. There's some hard charging old Italian ladies over there. 

The people not in cars were awesome, chatty and kind. Safe to say we loved Italy! 

The Sights:

The Colosseum blew us away

The 777 Adventure continues stay tuned for Switzerland Day 2...