Michael Palin moves from the busy streets of Chicago to a suburb of Oak Park, Illinois. Here, in a town that Hemingway apparently called a place of 'wide lawns and narrow minds', his ambitious and creative mother dressed him as a girl and wrote some melancholy music.

Later, in Michigan, Michael visits the family summer cottage. He tries fishing and shooting, which according to Hemingway's young diaries were his favourite sports. Michael then travels to Europe and arrives at Milan station. After a quick course in first aid, he finds himself behind the wheel of an ambulance. He goes to the Italian front where Hemingway was shot and wounded and ends up at Italy's largest war memorial in Redipuglia.

Michael drives a tank in Paris and visits Hemingway's shoe-box apartment. He ends up in American hospital in Neuilly, after an encounter with a broken lavatory chain and a skylight.