#26: Manual Driving Lessons
One of the (many) ways in which our life here is different to back home, is everything to do with driving.
While we weren't big drivers even in Melbourne, we still always had a car. And certainly David and I both had licences from the earliest age that we could sit the test for one.
In Lucca, we don't own a car. Instead we have a fleet of bikes, which very much meet all our needs from a daily life perspective. On the odd occasion that we want to head further afield and the train isn't practical, we have been renting cars. In summer, this is expensive! But in winter you can find hire cars available basically for free. We currently have the cutest little Fiat 500 (of course) for three weeks and the total cost is less than 130 euro.
One of the major points to note about rental cars (and cars in general in Italy) is that this is still a market in which manual transmissions are the standard. Renting or purchasing an automatic is significantly more expensive.
While the first car I learnt to drive in (at about the age of 12 on the beach at Stradbroke Island) was a manual, every car since then that I've been behind the wheel of has been automatic. I sat my driving test in an automatic, and honestly I've never given it a moment's thought since. Until now.
I couldn't keep stomaching paying double for rentals just to get an automatic. The time has come, I thought. How hard can it be? I used to know how to do it! It's like riding a bike, right?
It is not. Nothing came back to me. Also - a big wide beach with no other cars in sight is NOT the same as Italian roads with Italian drivers. David, my ever-patient driving instructor, tried to teach me the basics. But eventually even he lost patience with my inability to remember anything about the clutch, its purpose and its intended usage.
Also, he assured me when we pulled out of the rental car place that the road we were on was quiet. Of course it wasn't, we ended up merging onto the autostrada next to a huge truck about three minutes later. It was a fiasco.
After surviving this horror, I pulled over at the first available opportunity and refused to go an inch further until we were somewhere with no one else around. He got in behind the wheel and took us to a big, empty parking lot. Much better. Here we practiced first gear and reverse about a thousand times until I could finally do it without stalling, or at least swearing.
Today after dropping the kids at school, I walked up to the car and got in myself to log some practice. Without the residual freeway panic of yesterday, it was much better. I am still atrocious, but I haven't stalled again.
David is an excellent teacher, but I hope he won't mind me outing him as not actually an amazing passenger. He was in a scary accident with a friend when he was much younger (they were both fine) and ever since he's been a bit jumpy. He actually told me when we first met that if I'd been a bad driver it would have been a dealbreaker. Totally understandable, but still not always helpful to have someone dramatically slamming their hands into the dashboard in the brace position every time I crunch the gears a bit.
Anyway, I think I'm at the stage now where a few more drives and I'll be fine. Just as long as I never have to do a standing start on any kind of slope...
It was David's birthday on Sunday. We organised for the archangel Ilenia to come over and look after the kids, while we went out to dinner at a tiny restaurant (Chiasso13) I'd been wanting to try for months. It was amazing. Best meal we've had in Lucca, possibly Italy.
Everything about it was perfect. The place is not too fancy, no white tablecloths, but the owners and many of the staff have formerly worked at Michelin-starred restaurants. They all know what they are doing, to say the least. Our cameriere provided the perfect mix of menu information and guidance, and delivered the most delicious bottle of Chianti Superiore to the table that either of us had ever tasted.
Three courses later, we'd achieved that semi-comatose state of bliss that only an exceptional meal and wine can induce. The passeggiata home in the cold air was just the right amount of refreshing afterwards. A great success!
Lots of love,
Kate
