The Amalfi coast in a Bentley

It is a truth more or less universally acknowledged that the four most
beautiful words you can hear are: %26ldquo;You have lost weight.%26rdquo; But what are the
four sweetest words in the English language to which one can give breath?
I%26rsquo;m not sure there is a consensus on this, but %26ldquo;Bring the Bentley round!%26rdquo;
must be fairly close to the top of anyone%26rsquo;s short list, and I had the
pleasure of uttering this delightful phrase one late-September morning to
the front-desk manager of the entirely appropriately named Hotel Splendido
in Portofino.

The day before, someone had thoughtfully left me a Bentley Azure in the garage
of the Splendido, with which I was to complete a near 1,000-kilometre dawdle
down through Italy, finishing up at Ravello on the Amalfi coast.

Italy has long exerted an attraction over Englishmen, and it was with the
intention of putting the Grand back in the Grand Tour that I lowered the
hood of the convertible, flexed my big toe and nearly mowed down the manager
and staff of the hotel who had lined up to wave me off.

The great thing about Portofino is the whole of the town is some sort of
Italian national monument %26ndash; this means you practically need planning
permission to open a window: potentially irritating if you happen to own a
house here and want to improve it, but great if, like me, you only drop by
once a decade.