Travel tips

Your well travelled hosts offer this advice for travelers to Italy:

Driving and getting around

Driving in Italy is easier than it looks, everyone is chilled and forgiving. Just be decisive and clear about your intentions. Mazzano Romano is a bit over an hour from Rome Fiumicino airport by car. A car is necessary to do any of the activities other than bush-walking the Treia valley. If necessary, one can travel between Rome and Mazzano bo a combination of walking, bus and trains from Saxa Rubra or Cessano. The bus connection is infrequent.

Telephony

While Il Patio and Il Terrazzo both have wifi, it is essential to have mobile phone connectivity at all times so that you can access maps, make emergency calls, or access useful travel apps. The main Australian mobile service providers offer global roaming at rates of around $5 to $10 per day. For longer trips, you can buy European SIM cards - but be careful to check the costs very thoroughly, as some can be costly. You will need your home country SIM, as you may need to receive codes for accessing certain online facilities. A dual SIM phone is one option, although it can be safer to remove your home country SIM and keep that somewhere secure, as phones are very vulnerable to loss and theft when travelling.

Cards and Cash

Many northern European countries are almost card-only. Italy is more of a mixture. In theory, all businesses are not required to accept cashless payments, but in practice small businesses often still prefer cash for small transactions, to carry both.

Driving

Driving in Italy on the opposite side of the road can take a little getting used to, but you will soon get used to it. Although traffic in Italy can seem a bit chaotic, drivers are patient.

Avoiding the baddies

There are baddies everywhere, and tourists are targets number one. This is not just a fable of gullible first time travellers. I have lived in Italy and France, and both countries major train stations are – I am sorry to say, a den of thieves – looking for a sucker. At Rome Termine station there are police and undercover cops everywhere trying to catch them (or at least deter them).

A purse should be worn right across your head and shoulder - if you wear it slung over one shoulder, you might as well give it to a stranger.

But if you take reasonable precautions, you can significantly reduce your risk of being mugged, pick-pocketed or have items stolen - thieves are looking for the easy prey, and if you are cautious, they won’t choose you.

The most tempting thing is that big travelling document pouch, the one that you get out while you are looking for that ticket – its got passports in it, money, documents, it is the target and prize of every pickpocket – and completely unnecessary. Almost every document can be carried only electronically – and carrying paper versions of hotel reservations and travel itineraries is not a good idea.

Remember this: They are quick, professional, and work like magicians, usually in teams. Do something dumb, and in a second your wallet or jewellery is gone. They use three techniques:

Suck you in – they hear you speaking English, come over and offer to help. They kindly help you get tickets from and Italian train station ticket machine, show you the platform, and help carry one of your bags to the platform – no helpful. They find your carriage, and help put your bag in the rack, show you your seat, and wave at you from the platform as the train slowly rumbles away. You wave back, and only then realise – they just removed your bag while you weren’t looking. Trust me, I’ve seen it.

So have your bags where you can see them especially when the train stops at stations.But one really simple trick is a small cable lock – lock the handle to a bar, or even two bags together. Just make your bags that more difficult to steal than someone else’s and… you’re not the sucker.

More elaborate versions of this include befriending people, taking them to bars and restaurants, showing them sites, and cleaning them out of everything. I have a nephew that can attest to that one.

Distraction – so common – a commotion, two people talking to you at the same time, don’t be distracted. One of them touches you, but it is the other one that is removing your wallet or passport from your bag. Keep things zipped away – deep in pockets. See the travel kit below.

Speed – your thought you had your eye out for danger – but it was so fast! My wife and I were crossing the road in Marseille, a guy was on the back of a scooter, talking on the phone, in a fraction of a second, he had reached for her necklace and tugged it off – fortunately, it also caught on a bag strap, and another relative joined in the mealy, and the thief took-off empty handed, but the episode was very distressing. So if you are going to dinner in a restaurant in your hotel, sure, wear whatever you want, but if you are just walking the streets – leave the fancy jewellery, handbags and watches behind.

Seclusion – Avoid dark alleyways at night. A friend of mine and I met a couple of charming chaps you showed us their gun, and asked for money. We gave them the cash from our wallets, and they politely thanked us and wished us good night.

There are some airports and train stations where I can assure you, someone is watching your every minute. As you step up to the car hire counter, or café in an airport, you bag can be just behind you on the ground or on a trolley, and it will be whisked away – take your eye off that bag for 1 second, and it will happen.

Don’t be re-assured by conviviality. The number of people that have said they have their passport in a small bag slung over the back of a chair in a bar or restaurant, and it disappeared – horrifies me. Don’t have valuables in small bags slung over chairs. In Peru, they even have clips on chairs in hotels so that you can attach your bag – and that is in addition to the security guard at the door.

Finally, and above all, either keep your valuables in and inside jacket pocket, or a bag with strong straps over your neck. Never, ever have valuable in a bag slung over your shoulder, in a back pocket of trousers, or a neck pouch – frankly, if you do, I’m on the thief’s side – as you are clearly giving your possessions away. A shoulder bag will be removed and motorbiked off before you know what happened, and an obvious document pouch will be cut off with a knife or scissors – if you want to see how that is done, catch the 64 bus in Rome at peak tourist time, and watch it happening – or have a wander around Barcelona.

Basic Safety

Use the word Secure to remember the six practices of basic safety when on the go:

Secure your important documents, use an across the shoulder bag or backpack when walking around, make sure it is properly closed, don't bring too many documents, and keep them in a safe place.

Extricate – make the things you are going to need easily accessible – if you need your passport, have it in a safe, but accessible location.

Cull – take the tiniest purse or wallet, with only the items you absolutely need, and only take what you need for the day when out and about.

Unexpose – don’t have a wallet accessible from a back pocket, wear expensive jewellery or flash around expensive stuff.

Retain – leave your passport, unessential credit cards and most cash in a safe place at your hotel. A hotel safe is much better than carrying around a passport, but can usually be access by hotel staff – if an item goes missing, the hotel will say you misplaced it. Do not leave a passport (or anything else) with reception – hotels only need to take a copy. The author is aware of a case when a hotel claimed to not have a passport that was left with them, and only handed it over when consular staff intervened.

You can also get various tracking devices of which the best is the Samsung smartag.

Respecting Culture and Law

Observe how people in each country behave, talk, and dress. In many places it is inappropriate to dress very scantily, where clothes that cover your shoulders, that don’t expose too much thigh, and avoid T shirts that my have offensive messages. If the custom is to bow in certain situations, or if churches, mosques or other places have dress conventions, obey these – if you can’t bring yourself to do that, you should stay at home. It is also polite to be sensitive to voice levels, loud, boisterous behaviour can be inappropriately brash.

Beware that shouting at officials, or insulting the leader of a country can get you arrested – and imprisoned for considerable time in a surprising number of countries.

Equally, be aware that in some places, you can be in crowded conditions, particularly on busses and trains, or in queues, and people may be squeezed together in conditions you are not used to. Grin and bear it – there will be new smells and many other sensations that will add to the experience of your travel.

Never, ever, go where you are not allowed – don’t cross a barrier, even a low-slung chain – however subtle. Your chances of getting arrested are high, and it isn’t going to be fun.

Illness

If you have a pre-existing condition, make sure you declare this on your insurance – this is vital, as your insurance could be rendered invalid if you fail to do so, but will usually cover you for pre-existing condition complications so long as you have declared it. But if you are ill, think very, very carefully about travelling. Airlines will generally not accept ill passengers – so you could be in big trouble if you try to board and plane with an illness. Equally, do not exaggerate an illness to airline staff – you could find that your minor headache gets you banned from your flight – the airline staff can be obliged to refuse to allow you on board – so be careful what you say.

The same goes with entry to countries – you may find yourself in quarantine if you try to enter a country with an illness.

Insurance

There is a reason you should always have travel insurance for International travel – and this is it: Whatever goes wrong, your bags are stolen, you lose your wallet – these things can be reduced and survived if you want to save money. But if you have an accident or very ill, even if you get looked after in hospital in another country, it is likely you will want to return home – and my example, of course, is Australia. Repatriation from another continent to Australia for a very ill person can cost upwards of a a quarter of a million dollars. People have come back from bad accidents in Europe with a half million dollar medical and transport bill.

Or you could get stuck in a country when you think you are fit to fly home, because the airlines do not permit ill travellers. So if you come down with a bad flu or any contagious illness, you will have to extend your trip – which will most likely be covered by insurance – the alternative could be going to the airport only to be refused permission to board the flight, or being offloaded at a transit location.

The good news, is that the Australian government made basic hospital cover and repatriation a compulsory element of international travel insurance in this country (you can guess why). That means you can shop around for pretty economical insurance, and you know you are covered for the worst case scenarios. There will be other insurance policies that offer all sorts of extras, covering lost items, flight delays, and so forth. These premium policies are exactly that, in every way.

There have been two comparison studies done that indicate that the insurance policies offered by airlines during the process of purchasing a flight online tend to be quite expensive – potentially double the price of other offers – but they are convenient – and can sometimes be purchased with frequent flyer points.

But watchout for catches – a policy purchased for a holiday may claim that it is invalid if they find out that you were working on the trip – so read and ask about the details.

Personally, my choice is to use a premium credit card (nearly every brand has this option) that offers frequent flyer points and travel insurance for trips purchased with the card. Watch out for the details, these often only cover card holders that are paying for certain proportions of the trip or are travelling together at all stages, so if you buy tickets for your family, but someone you purchased a flight for is travelling separately, they may not be covered.

Fines and parking tickets

It is easy to get a fine on public transport for the wrong kind of ticket or to get a parking fine when travelling overseas. Many countries leverage this - in Berlin, the airport is just outside the standard train ticket zone – and it is a regular practice for the controllers to hop on a train and make a sweep of travellers without the correct tickets. In Venice, the controllers check vaporetto tickets as to whether they have been validated, and issue hundreds of fines every day. Weird parking payment systems suck-in tourists all over the world. These fines are notoriously hard to pay. It might say you can pay online – but they don’t take credit cards. Here’s the catch. These agencies and governments then sell the fine to a lawyer or debt collector. Nearly every European government and local government agency has such an arrangement. They pursue the debtor, and if the fine is not paid, the next time you step into any related country, you may be arrested. A parking fine in Germany? Unpaid, you can never go to Europe again. And so on.

The solution: Pay the fine immediately, before you leave that country. And do everything you can to avoid a fine in the first place. Always get the right parking, bus, ferry or train ticket. They will pursue you, they never, ever give up. The more you try to avoid them, the more the big bucks build up.

At the hotel or other accommdation

A few tips relating to accommodation – in many countries you will be asked for your passport at check-in – this is a legal obligation, not a hotel policy, so you must provide it. However hotels will now make a copy and hand it back. Never ever let the hotel persuade you that they can keep your passport – that is not true, and highly risky. A niece of mine asked for her passport on checking out of a hotel in Greece, and the hotel denied having it. She sought help from the police, and that actually made the situation worse. The Australian consulate got involved, and – surprise – the hotel found her passport – but by then her trip was ruined.

However generally it is vastly safer to keep valuables and your passport in your hotel room that to carry them with you for the day – you want to carry such things with you as little as possible.

But at the same time, I am rather sceptical about hotel safes. They are as good as you are going to get for a laptop or camera – but remember that the hotel can always open the safe. The way this one works is that the staff just remove one item, a passport, some cash, or a card, leaving everything else exactly as it was. If you challenge reception about this, the story is that ‘you must be mistaken, maybe you didn’t put that item in the safe’.

My technique is that I carry a small safe box, and leave passports, cash and cards at the

hotel in this, locked to something secure in the room (and hidden). It is only plastic, but it creates too much hassle, and an obvious theft – enough to discourage the potential culprit – when there will be much easier targets. These or similar can be easily purchased on line, such as here.

While I am not going to tell you how it is done, it is damned easy to get into any hotel room – so heed my warnings.

And leaving a hotel – have a check of the room – after you have left. Some people look around the room before leaving, to check that they have everything. Then they leave. Without – the ipad, wallet, the obvious thing they just looked at. Exit the room, with your bag, then walk back in and check then.

Use the Frisbe check:

• Fridge (for water bottles)

• Room (all around)

• Incidentals (check for the key, phone or wallet on your bedside table)

• Safe

• Bathroom

• Electric chargers

Some areas have a small tourist tax that is always paid in cash on departure - so carry some cash for this. Sometimes this is charged on arrival – but you get coupons for discounts – or even free use of some (or all) public transport. Credit-card electronic room keys can get wiped by being with proximity to damn-near anything, to an RFID cover can come in handy. Many European hotels have large old keys and key tags - but these can be left at reception when going out.