Pontedera (named because it was built near a bridge over the river Era) is a very pleasant little industrial town of about 28000 people, which is the headquarters of the Piaggio company. The buildings tend to be orange with lovely green shutters, and sometimes tiny balconies. The Piaggio factory, established in 1884, produced very stylish…

We were staying in the Ibis Milano Ca Granda, a 15 minute tram ride from the Stazione di Milano Centrale depending on the traffic. The hotel was ok but a bit quirky in an Italian manner, for instance Pauline asked if she could borrow an iron, as she wanted to iron some clothes to wear…

After leaving the hospital, suitably braced for the trip so to speak, we took the Citroën up the east coast of Spain to a little seaside resort town in France called Sète. In Sète we found a comfortable hotel near the beach, and wandered to a nearby restaurant for dinner. I ordered Moules et Frites,…

First of all, I apologise for the tardiness of this blog. When we got to Barcelona, I was starting to get considerable pain from my left shoulder, which I thought I must have hurt in Bordeaux by sleeping on it, as it is the one that I had an operation on when a young feller…