QUOTE : Most travellers here feel that driving in Rome qualifies as an experience that can be added to one’s vita, that everyday autostrada trips are examinations in courage and that the Amalfi coast drive is a definition of hell. “These people really know how to drive,” I remember him saying as he swung our no-power rented Fiat into the passing lane, turn signal blinking. A Maserati zooming forward in the rearview mirror blasted us back to the right lane. Soon he was admiring daring maneuvers. “Did you see that? He had two wheels dangling in thin air!” he marveled. “Sure, they have their share of duffers riding the center lane but most people keep to the rules.” “What rules?” I asked as someone in a tiny car like ours whizzed by going a hundred. Apparently there are speed limits, according to the size of the engine, but I never have seen anyone stopped for speeding in all my summers in Italy. You’re dangerous if you’re going sixty. I’m not sure what the accident rate is; I rarely see one but I imagine many are caused by slow drivers (tourists perhaps?) who incite the cars behind them.