i didn't sleep that well in Santhia either. the paper sheets on my bed ripped a little too easily and my dreams of getting caught in a fishing net turned out to be a little too real when i awoke and found my head sticking out of the middle of the sheet, one leg out the bottom and 2 arms from the top. i felt like i was in some kind of reality TV 'get-out-of-this' situation. the night was also complicated by Frederick who was 5-6 weeks on the way to Assisi after setting out from Belgium. a Priest by profession he'd been planning this trip for some time and was doing quite well. i didn't like to tell him about how he smelt, and being very British sometimes just tried to endure it, but he really did pong a little too much. it was almost overwhelming - but how do you tell a Priest they have body odour? maybe i should have just come out and said straight-off. anyway he seemed like a nice guy and we chatted a little and then set out walking together. again compared to the Camino de Santiago the VF has been markedly different in many ways. one main one is that on the VF i've only met 2 other pilgrims (both from Belgium strangely enough). on the CdS it was almost the opposite - there were so many people that as soon as the door to the hostel opened in the moring i used to shoot straight out just to be ahead of the crowd and sometimes it was just overwhleming with the sheer amount of people that you had to contend with. even so, it was a very communal experience and also very supportive. you got to know people as you were all travelling in the same direction at about the same pace and sharing the same experiences. on the VF its been very solitary. most days i walk along and don't really talk to anyone expect for people in cafes or the hostel owners. and i like it. sometimes its difficult - there's no denying it - but in the world we live we're saturated with noise and people and everthing is at such a frantic pace that you can never just stop to reflect or just enjoy a bit of solitude. there's a term i read about recently called 'ecological illiteracy' whereby people have just lost their sense of the environment - too used to TV's, radios, ipods, mobiles and all the rest of the noise that we feed incessantly into our ears without even thinking about it. after years living in India (and taking time out at various points in my life) getting away from this noise saturation was one of the main reasons for walking the VF. its not as if i'm going to be able to get completely away from it all, but so far (and for a long distance) its been just me and the sound of my own footsteps, birds cheeping away and the wind blowing the corn. it teaches you about yourself more than anything - your own resources, strength, determination, frailties and direction. the mind is a funny thing - sometimes you find myself thinking about the same thing over and over and over again. its like the mind has a hook imbedded in a thought that you just can't release it from. back in sydney that hook would be subsumed within the working week so you may think about it but not with such intensity or from such different angles. the lesson has been that eventually you get sick of thinking about the same things but that trying NOT to think about them has the opposite effect so i let myself think about them more. has it worked? its too soon to say but i think so. we'll see.
due to the blisters that'd come up on my feet i decided that Day 6 would have to be an easier day of about 20km and it was. Freddy & i wandered through wheat fields, lost the VF signs (yet again), walked along main roads and ended up at Vercelli which is quite a major town in Piemont. loads of history - Roman ampitheatres, sarcophagi, a hippodrome and lots of mediaeval Basilicas and Churches. not that i got to see any of them as my blisters were multiplying like you wouldn't believe and i had to stagger off to a hotel leaving Freddy to seek out a relgious hostel. the place i found to stay was the worst i've had so far. for 35 euros i ended up in a room in a house that was rundown and dirty with a street light right outside and cars beeping all night. i was at a really low ebb - in pain, fed up with the VF signage and really pissed off with being in such a miserable yet expensive flea-pit. it was Saturday night however so i washed and changed and then headed out to have a look round. of course all the Italians were dressed up to the nines and there was a night market going on which was great to see but i didn't really make the most of it because i was just feeling grumpy and very, very miserable. after having a hellish night of no sleep i left early planning just to do another 15km to get to a town called Robbio in the middle of the countryside. it was on the way that i really hit a wall. for a start the rice paddies around contained millions of mosquitos and i came under sustained attack all morning. the pain from my blisters were becoming almost unendurable and the heat was getting worse and worse. then to to it all the VF signs disappeared again right in the middle of the countryside. i didn't know where to go or what to do and after the third attempt of trying to find a path through the rice and wheatfields i just though to myself 'what's the point?' i was completely and utterly over it. dirty, miserable, in pain - i was sick of it so i made my mind up to just get to the next town, get a bus or train and head off to Sienna or Lucca and relax for a few days before seeing what i could do with my 4 weeks before my friends arrived to meet me in Rome. walking though the last of the golden wheat fields into the next small village the church bells began to chime. being a Sunday they kept chiming, and chimed on & on & on. the day suddenly seemed to have some joy in it even as i was saying goodbye to the Camino inside my head and my heart. i walked into a local cafe, ordered some lemonade, a coffee and croissant and just slumped in a chair too tired even to cry. then something happened. it was such a small and simple thing but the mother and daughter who ran the cafe came over and started asking my about my trip. they asked what i was doing and where i was from and when i told them they managed to say what a good thing it was that i was doing even though they spoke no English. i felt ashamed, a fraud, as i knew then that i'd given up.
i'd given up.
i don't know even now why i changed my mind and why i continued on but i did. some how that simple conversation with none of us being able to speak the other's language made me question myself and remotivated me and off i went again, limping own the street towards Robbio and once again determined to get there whatever pain i was experiencing. it also helped that i'm reading 'Decline and fall of the Roman Empire ' for the third time (i never finished it the first 2 times !) and the amount of times i've read about marching over the Alps in 10 days flat or some other such incredible feat and i think to myself how lucky i am, and also what do i really have to complain about? a few blisters, thats all. it kinda reframes things in a way that makes me feel less sorry for myself.
Robbio was a great little place. i went to the local church as i'd read they had a religious hostel. the local priest greeted me, took me to this car, reveresed at top speed, virtually did a handbrake turn, sped round tight corners on 2 wheels, did some 'pretend running over' of locals he obviously knew and then dumped me in the centre of town in a very bare dorm above the local police station. as it turned out i'd arrived in Robbio on the day that the annual Autumn festival was taking place. i did the usual washing, went out to get a coffee, walked back and there sat Freddy on the balcony, waving at me ...
due to the blisters that'd come up on my feet i decided that Day 6 would have to be an easier day of about 20km and it was. Freddy & i wandered through wheat fields, lost the VF signs (yet again), walked along main roads and ended up at Vercelli which is quite a major town in Piemont. loads of history - Roman ampitheatres, sarcophagi, a hippodrome and lots of mediaeval Basilicas and Churches. not that i got to see any of them as my blisters were multiplying like you wouldn't believe and i had to stagger off to a hotel leaving Freddy to seek out a relgious hostel. the place i found to stay was the worst i've had so far. for 35 euros i ended up in a room in a house that was rundown and dirty with a street light right outside and cars beeping all night. i was at a really low ebb - in pain, fed up with the VF signage and really pissed off with being in such a miserable yet expensive flea-pit. it was Saturday night however so i washed and changed and then headed out to have a look round. of course all the Italians were dressed up to the nines and there was a night market going on which was great to see but i didn't really make the most of it because i was just feeling grumpy and very, very miserable. after having a hellish night of no sleep i left early planning just to do another 15km to get to a town called Robbio in the middle of the countryside. it was on the way that i really hit a wall. for a start the rice paddies around contained millions of mosquitos and i came under sustained attack all morning. the pain from my blisters were becoming almost unendurable and the heat was getting worse and worse. then to to it all the VF signs disappeared again right in the middle of the countryside. i didn't know where to go or what to do and after the third attempt of trying to find a path through the rice and wheatfields i just though to myself 'what's the point?' i was completely and utterly over it. dirty, miserable, in pain - i was sick of it so i made my mind up to just get to the next town, get a bus or train and head off to Sienna or Lucca and relax for a few days before seeing what i could do with my 4 weeks before my friends arrived to meet me in Rome. walking though the last of the golden wheat fields into the next small village the church bells began to chime. being a Sunday they kept chiming, and chimed on & on & on. the day suddenly seemed to have some joy in it even as i was saying goodbye to the Camino inside my head and my heart. i walked into a local cafe, ordered some lemonade, a coffee and croissant and just slumped in a chair too tired even to cry. then something happened. it was such a small and simple thing but the mother and daughter who ran the cafe came over and started asking my about my trip. they asked what i was doing and where i was from and when i told them they managed to say what a good thing it was that i was doing even though they spoke no English. i felt ashamed, a fraud, as i knew then that i'd given up.
i'd given up.
i don't know even now why i changed my mind and why i continued on but i did. some how that simple conversation with none of us being able to speak the other's language made me question myself and remotivated me and off i went again, limping own the street towards Robbio and once again determined to get there whatever pain i was experiencing. it also helped that i'm reading 'Decline and fall of the Roman Empire ' for the third time (i never finished it the first 2 times !) and the amount of times i've read about marching over the Alps in 10 days flat or some other such incredible feat and i think to myself how lucky i am, and also what do i really have to complain about? a few blisters, thats all. it kinda reframes things in a way that makes me feel less sorry for myself.
Robbio was a great little place. i went to the local church as i'd read they had a religious hostel. the local priest greeted me, took me to this car, reveresed at top speed, virtually did a handbrake turn, sped round tight corners on 2 wheels, did some 'pretend running over' of locals he obviously knew and then dumped me in the centre of town in a very bare dorm above the local police station. as it turned out i'd arrived in Robbio on the day that the annual Autumn festival was taking place. i did the usual washing, went out to get a coffee, walked back and there sat Freddy on the balcony, waving at me ...
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