i slept badly that night. sheer exhaustion for one thing (i calculated that i must have walked nearly 40km), plus a lot of frustration about the signage. on the Santiago route the signs were everywhere. that didn't mean that you didn't occasionally get lost (because you often did) but they added up to a coherant whole when following a pathway. on the VF the signs just seem to peter out in the middle of a field leaving you nowhere to go so you end up on the major roads again. of course wandering the Italian countryside is lovely but in the terrible heat of the day between 1 and 4 pm its almost unbearable - but you still have to continue as you're in the middle of nowhere with no-one to ask and no villages nearby. this is the down side. the up side is that you're walking through the most beautiful autumn countryside: the wheat and rice fields are golden, the air fresh and clean and there's peace. in some ways its the peacefulness thats the best thing about it all: quiet, meditative and tanquil. thats the majority of the day. until you get lost when you end up in the opposite state of mind. well, maybe i exagerate as by that time you're too tired to be annoyed - merely resigned to having to walk, and walk, and walk some more. it does teach you to extend your limits - which also seem to extend more & more & more. back back to Lake Viverone. i'd eaten in their restaurant the night before and the sunset from the hotel balcony set behind the Alps and i sat watching the the sky deepen to orange, crimson and then a dying purple. it was quite maginificent. i kept jumping up from my chair to go and stare at the colours changing even as my food was getting cold (the food was incredible by the way - somehow at the end of my 40km trek i'd gotten lucky and walked straight into one of the nicest hotels i think i've ever stayed in. the staff were wonderful, the food exquisite and the view over the Lake was breathtaking). i wandered down to the Lake in the evening, watching the ducks and swans swim by, and felt the cares of the day and my aches and pains just die away. of course they all came back during the night, but you kinda expect that. in the morning i woofed down a huge breakfast, got my pac ready and headed off. it was a serene morning. the Lake was clear and still, the light gentle and the early hour still carried a touch of mist. i walked around the shores of the Lake and stood looking over towards the Alps on the far side. at that point that i cried. it wasn't because of frustration or pain or being unhappy. it was because it was just so incredibly beautiful. its not easy to say why it was but it was a moment i'll remember for the rest of my life: a moment of absolute clarity when everything seems to fall into place and makes complete sense. it was as if everything in my life had drawn me to this point, at this time, for this moment.
my route for Day 5 was going to be a shorter one due to the excesses of the previous day. i decided that about 15km would be enough and headed towards a town called Santhia. i was now crossing from the Aosta Valley into the Piemont area. apparently there is a huge amount of benzoylecgonine in the River Po here (this is the by-product of cocaine, secreted in people's urine). its been estimated that the cosumption would be about 27:1000 population. thats a lot of cocaine. seemes odd when the italians in this region seem so laid back. i should digress into talking about the Italians actually as i know i haven't spent a lot of time talking about them as 'a people' (if you can do such a thing!). the first thing to bear in mind is that you're passing through different places every day so you never get to make friends or get to know people other than a quick 'bonjourno' or 'ciao' but even so most of the time they've been helpful, funny, engaging and quite, quite lovely. more reserved than the Spanish in some ways, but then pilgrims travelling to Rome are a relatively new thing in this modern age. in the cities the 'dress up and go out for a gelato' time seems to be around 4pm. i've often sat in a little cafe and watched people strut their stuff. being Italians style is everything and they put it all on show. on Saturdays the hairdressers are full as the women get their hair coffured and the degree of elegance is sometimes breathtaking to behold. of course not everyone meets the standards expected. one woman had such a big camel toe i spent the next 10 minutes looking round to see if she had any Bedouin following her.
the journey to Santhia was lovely. just a trek through the golden wheatfields now turning into rice paddies as the Alps flattened into Valleys and then into plains. Santhia itself was a smallish town and i'd decided to give the religious hostel a try. for pilgrims you can (of course) stay in hotels but you can stay in places run by religious fraternities for a small donation. on the Santiago route this was quite common and even though there were a couple of places i'd passed through that had had them in italy i hadn't tried them yet. i arrived at the hostel and a sign on the door directed me to a local cafe where the barista gave me a lovely greeting but said that they key wouldn't be available for a hour. i sat drinking coffee and dressing my blisters (one of which burst over the rather nice yellow cushion i was sitting on) before going over and settling in. it was actually rather nice - 3 lots of bunkbeds but clean and with everything i needed, except linen sheets. all they had were paper sheets which i'd never seen before. it was that day in that hostel that i met Frederick: the kind, plump, smelly Priest from Belgium
my route for Day 5 was going to be a shorter one due to the excesses of the previous day. i decided that about 15km would be enough and headed towards a town called Santhia. i was now crossing from the Aosta Valley into the Piemont area. apparently there is a huge amount of benzoylecgonine in the River Po here (this is the by-product of cocaine, secreted in people's urine). its been estimated that the cosumption would be about 27:1000 population. thats a lot of cocaine. seemes odd when the italians in this region seem so laid back. i should digress into talking about the Italians actually as i know i haven't spent a lot of time talking about them as 'a people' (if you can do such a thing!). the first thing to bear in mind is that you're passing through different places every day so you never get to make friends or get to know people other than a quick 'bonjourno' or 'ciao' but even so most of the time they've been helpful, funny, engaging and quite, quite lovely. more reserved than the Spanish in some ways, but then pilgrims travelling to Rome are a relatively new thing in this modern age. in the cities the 'dress up and go out for a gelato' time seems to be around 4pm. i've often sat in a little cafe and watched people strut their stuff. being Italians style is everything and they put it all on show. on Saturdays the hairdressers are full as the women get their hair coffured and the degree of elegance is sometimes breathtaking to behold. of course not everyone meets the standards expected. one woman had such a big camel toe i spent the next 10 minutes looking round to see if she had any Bedouin following her.
the journey to Santhia was lovely. just a trek through the golden wheatfields now turning into rice paddies as the Alps flattened into Valleys and then into plains. Santhia itself was a smallish town and i'd decided to give the religious hostel a try. for pilgrims you can (of course) stay in hotels but you can stay in places run by religious fraternities for a small donation. on the Santiago route this was quite common and even though there were a couple of places i'd passed through that had had them in italy i hadn't tried them yet. i arrived at the hostel and a sign on the door directed me to a local cafe where the barista gave me a lovely greeting but said that they key wouldn't be available for a hour. i sat drinking coffee and dressing my blisters (one of which burst over the rather nice yellow cushion i was sitting on) before going over and settling in. it was actually rather nice - 3 lots of bunkbeds but clean and with everything i needed, except linen sheets. all they had were paper sheets which i'd never seen before. it was that day in that hostel that i met Frederick: the kind, plump, smelly Priest from Belgium
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