Day Seven: Altopascio to San Miniato — 27.5 km (17.1 miles)

On pilgrimage in Italy, I’ve seen a fair amount of four-legged wildlife. Near Badia Prataglia I saw a family of boars, as I did also near Ponticelli. I’ve seen deer, too.

I’ve come to think of pilgrim pairs as four-legged animals. Perhaps it’s because I’m single and everyone else has a spouse or friend. Like Eiler and Halvard, two fun Norwegians I met last night and shared lunch with today. They walk closely together — like a four-legged beast — though their front and back legs are interchangeable depending on who leads.

Eiler, who slept in the bunk below me last night, gave me a tiny sticker with his name and email address. I had no great place to stick it, so I put it on my little tube of ChapStick. Now I tell Eiler that his name is always on my lips.

In addition to the Norwegian pair there is a French couple and also a couple of young Italian lads. I’m the sole loner, amongst people walking this stage today.

Anyway, enough about four-legged pilgrim couples and boars because the four legged wildlife I’m really excited about is….

A wolf. I’m pretty sure that today I saw a wolf.

In truth, it could have been a large fox or a feral dog, but it looked like a wolf to me, and I’m sticking to my story.

My wolf sighting came after the point where the track veers off pavement and heads into a stretch of back country. There’s a sort of plateau between Galleno and Ponte a Cappiano that is heavily wooded and rather remote, where the path is full of puddles in some places and in others is deeply rutted. In addition to the wolf sighting, I stumbled across two friends trying to extricate a Fiat from a deep mud hole.

Judge for yourself. Here’s a photo of the wolf:

In the pic above it’s dead ahead on the trail. It was limping as it walked toward me, dark brown and black in color. When it saw me it stopped. I took a photo and by the second picture it had gone. (nb: I spoke to a forestry expert this evening who happened to sit next to me at dinner. He said there ARE wolves in Tuscany. Grey ones. I saw a mixed breed wolf/dog. Still a cool deal!)

Compared to that, not much else happened today. Now that my ankle is close to normal, the distance went quickly. I arrived at the Convent of San Miniato about 2:30 I think and had a nice visit with the volunteer hosts before heading to my cell. That’s what it is, really. Small, simple, and right in the cloister at what Italians would call a convent and what we would call a friary.

Chapel is at 7pm. Dinner is at 8:00. Friday it’s fish in the convent refectory. Breakfast at a refreshing 6:30. What four-legged beasts await tomorrow?

 

Day 6: Lucca to Altopascio — 16 km (10 miles)

Today began like every other day. I awakened in the night with a brilliant idea and by morning I’d forgotten it. So in lieu of having a brilliant idea I decided to share a series of photos that depict today’s stage of the Via Francigena at 1/2 mile intervals, starting at Lucca and ending 16 km (10 miles) later in Altopascio.

That’s what 16 km looked like today.

Before, during and after taking the photos, some other fun things happened.

Before: The other day I realized I had skipped out of Pietrasanta without paying my breakfast tab. I mentioned it to Mora, desk person at Camere con Visto where I stayed in Lucca last night, and she offered to take care of it for me. In Europe it’s very common to transfer money person-to-person (or person to cafe), and since I remembered the name of the cafe, it was easy. I gave Mora 10€; she called and got the IBAN number of the bar and she will transfer the funds for me. Pretty sweet. I can’t really handle the idea that I cheated someone inadvertently, and with Mora’s help I’m making good on my debt via Europe easy bank transfer system. This would be much tougher to accomplish in the US.

During: Along the way I was passed by three Italian pilgrims, who paused just long enough to say ciao before pushing quickly onward. In hare/tortoise fashion I caught up with them during their lunch at a rest stop about an hour later. True to Italian custom, they begged me to sit down with them and share a glass of wine. I obliged and really appreciated their sweet gesture.

After: As I strolled into Altopascio at stage’s end, who should I stumble on but Mary Belden Brown and friends? She and her husband, Lynn, are leading a group of pilgrims on what they call a “luxury tour” of the Via Francigena. I’ve shadowed Mary and several in her group on Facebook for days, and it was fun to meet them and have a few moments to speak in true American English to some folks from back home. I’ve been gone only eight days, but I can’t overestimate how nice it is to speak to someone in my native tongue.

Other things happened, too. For instance, I conquered the Italian shower challenge. For the uninformed, this means I successfully showered in a doccia with no shower stall or shower curtain without flooding the entire bathroom. The secret is to stand in the corner and point the shower wand at yourself, turning the water on and off as needed. The Altopascia hostel, full with about 20 pilgrims, is equipped with one of those amazing and impractical showers, here shared by all the pilgrims of both sexes.

The growing number of pilgrims on the trail are mostly Italian, followed by French. I’ve heard there are Germans about, but I haven’t met them yet. And other than the luxury pilgrims, who are sampling portions of the route and won’t join the long haul to Rome, I’m the only American around.

I admit it. I’m missing home and part of me is ready for the leap back to the U.S. and home, family and friends. But there are miles to go before I leap. Miles to go before I leap.

There’s a certain masochism in pilgrimage walking. We separate ourselves from the comforts of home and family and friends. We walk blistered, taped and braced. Sometimes in discomfort, too cold or too hot. We sleep in simple rooms, accompanied by the snoring of strangers. We delight in a stamp on our pilgrim passport at day’s end, then our name on a certificate when the journey is over. After we are home and healed up and our photos are merged into the forgotten recesses of our hard drives, we long to deprive ourselves again, to push our physical limits, find another pilgrimage, and let it pull us out the door. More kilometers. More strange languages and creaky bunks. More blisters. More pain. More deprivation and discomfort.

So I admit to some pilgrim guilt when I booked a room for a second night here in Lucca. It didn’t help any that Daniele was out the door to Altopascio at 05:00 or that Paolo texted a few minutes ago to report that he’s reached San Miniato today with a total distance walked of 45 km (27 miles).

Me? I walked a couple of km — at most –inside the walls of this lovely Tuscan town, then took off my shoes to let my feet luxuriate in the sunshine. I gazed at a cathedral. Studied a basilica. Sat in a caffe drinking tea, and in general worked diligently to squeeze as much rest as possible out of this day.

Lucca is a smaller, quainter and more accessible version of Florence. Its big buildings lack the ambition of Renaissance Florence, but it is likable. The town feels like that bargain jacket you found at the store. You paid less and it’s not the famous brand, but it fits perfectly and feels better on you than the fancy one.

Here the restaurants and hotels are cheaper and the tourist rush is not a stampede. Florence is so First Class in its art (Michelangelo) and architecture (Bruneleschi), while Lucca combines its Second Class together in a thoroughly livable and lovable way. People live here and work here. And is happens also to be beautiful. Plus this is Puccini’s hometown, and Napolean’s sister lived in a palace here. So they’ve got cool stuff, too.

I read an article recently lamenting that Florentines cannot even buy a loaf of fresh bread in their city. Here there is bread aplenty, and local cheeses and wines and handicrafts. You wander, joyfully aimless in Lucca, almost like in Barcelona’s Gothic Quarter.

So I can barely remember how guilty I’m feeling for taking a day off to enjoy Lucca. Does it really make sense to breeze through one of Italy’s great towns just to obsessively follow a masochistic pilgrim timeline?

“I think not,” I say to myself, as I slowly stir my tea at a cafe in the sunny piazza.

Tomorrow. Yes, tomorrow, I will get myself back on the trail.

Day Five: Pietrasanta to Lucca — 33.2 km (20.5 miles)

“Do you have any panini without meat?” I asked the bartender in Camaiore in Italian.

“How about this one with prosciutto?” she replied, pointing to a panino with meat in the display case.

“No thank you,” I replied, a little louder. “Do you have any panini without meat?”

We finally settled on a panino on focaccia with tuna. “May I have it hot, please?” I said loudly.

“It is made of tuna,” she said as she placed in on the serving plate.

By this time I not only was doubting my Italian, but I was doubting my sanity.

“May I have it hot?” I asked, very loudly. With her eyebrows raised she pointed at the toaster oven on the counter behind her.

“Yes. Please!” I said.

Why, I asked myself as I ate my hot tuna panino, had that been so hard? Then I realized what it was. Seated on the other side of the room were ten, elderly, Italian men shouting at the top of their lungs.

I had walked right in to a meeting of the Italian Men’s Shouting Club.
I’d awakened several times through the night at the hostel in Pietrasanta. Four men in bunk beds in a small room made for stuffy air, and I wasn’t the only one who made a couple of trips to the bathroom. One pilgrim was out the door by 05:30. Daniele left at 06:00, and Paolo and I packed and headed to the Caffe at about 07:00. After a couple of croissants and cappuccinos I suggested to Paolo that he go on ahead, since I was certain to be slow.

After he left, I loaded up my things and headed out. Already it was obvious it would be a beautiful day, but I did not in any way look forward to the 33.2 km (20.6 mile) distance to the stage end at Lucca.

The day felt like a trudge. I was tired. My foot hurt. And today there was no choice but to follow the official route through the mountains and across the river to Lucca.

The first obstacle was a steep path through overgrown vegetation — shades of yesterday. The next challenge was walking on the busy highway. And what turned out to be the day’s biggest challenge: where would I find food and water?

Which brings us back to the Italian Men’s Shouting Club.

There I was, in Camaiore with a hard fought hot panino, at one of the only cafes I could find, and ten elderly men were screaming at each other.

A nicely dressed 35 year old woman was sitting next to me, rolling her eyes at the ongoing tirade. We were both trapped, along with a deaf bartender, in an Italian shouting match.

This had happened to me once before. While Theresa and I were pausing at a bar in Montelibretti in our 2014 walk to Rone, about five men had walked in, shouting at each other like they were in a blood duel. After ten minutes of screaming they suddenly sat down and started playing cards, as though nothing had happened.

In this walk I’ve had men shouting at me. Like Frederico in Massa, a veteran pilgrim, who saw me across the parking lot a couple days ago, knew I was a pilgrim, shouted me over, and insisted on a selfie. We’re Facebook friends already. Then there’s the fellow today. As I left Valpromaro he saw me and shouted me down. Running across the highway, which I’d begun to enter, he told me I’d taken a wrong turn and then showed me the right path.

I’m thankful for both of these fellows and glad they used their vocal gifts for the good.

But the Men’s Shouting Club at the bar was still a curious mystery.

I guess I knew implicitly why they were shouting. They’re all elderly and perhaps almost deaf. But I think also they were shouting because of their joy in community and the stability and confidence of their relationships. They are poor, rural, and have known each other forever.

The Shouting Club reminded me that we Americans love our decorum in public, but it’s too often a sign that we’re isolated from each other. Cafes and restaurants become an extension of our cocoons of isolation. We don’t really have decades of friends with whom we’ve grown up, whom we’ve watched graduate and get married and have joy and experience hardship and grief. Maybe in comparison we walk on eggshells with our friends, unsure how long we’ll be together or what level is our mutual commitment. You have to like someone pretty hard to shout at them everyday in the Shouting Club, after all. Every day for the rest of your lives.

I don’t think the Shouting Club members thought I could speak Italian, because I could clearly hear them guessing, at the top of their lungs, who I was and why I was there.

So I threw on my pack, paid my bill, and walked over to the nearest Shouting Club members.

“I’m an American pilgrim walking from Piacenza to Rome on the Via Francigena,” I said loudly, for an American, while other members shouted in the background.

“I’m a shepherd,” said the dark haired one. “I’ve walked parts of the Via Francigena myself,” said the other. We exchanged a few pleasantries and I headed out the door.

From 10 meters away, with the door closed, I could hear a man shouting at the top of his lungs in Italian:

“HE’S AN AMERICAN PILGRIM ON THE VIA FRANCIGENA WALKING FROM PIACENZA TO ROME!” 

And for just a moment I was a topic of conversation at the Italian Men’s Shouting Club.

P.S.  A very long day, accompanied by hunger and thirst. Note to Via Francigena stewards: The green scenery is nice, but don’t forget to steer pilgrims toward food and water. There. I said it without shouting.

Day four: Avenza to Pietrasanta — 24.8 km (15.4 miles)

Last night I enjoyed a tasty pizza dinner with Paolo, a pilgrim I’d met yesterday, so it was a delight to see him again on the way out of town this morning. As I stood in the piazza at Avenza, debating which way to go, I heard Paolo’s familiar voice calling out, “Pastor!” He was in the fruit store, buying provisions for the long walk to Pietrasanta and had spotted me.

Paolo is a 24-year old Italian who’s finishing up his Master’s in Business and getting ready to do an internship at a financial firm in London. He’s heading to Rome before he begins his work in early June. Armed with a scallop shell, he’s also a veteran Santiago pilgrim.

As I gazed at my smartphone, choosing among the apps that are guiding me on the walk, Paolo said in his excellent English, “Let’s just walk the Via Aurelia. It’s the main road and we know it goes up and down the whole coast.”

I agreed, and as we set out we both knew a couple of things: the “official route” of this walk is frustrating, and our day on the Via Aurelia would be brutal with traffic and no sidewalks.

It is frustrating to walk the official route. If you slavishly follow all the signs you will find yourself walking long — though scenic — walks that add many kilometers to each day’s total. With two lengthy excursions from the beach area of Avenza to the nearby mountains, the official route’s total distance for today is 31.9 km. (20 miles). If you walk the Via Aurelia from Avenza to the same destination of Pietrasanta it’s only 19km (12 miles). That’s another 3-4 hours on the trail, and after several hours on foot each day the brutal pilgrim truth is that scenic aspects blur together while the urge to just get there becomes overwhelming.

So Paolo and I set out on the Via Aurelia and, dodging cars, covered about a quarter of the day’s distance in no time.

Paolo soon discovered a truth about the current state of my walking. My foot still hurts just enough that I’m quite slow. He wanted to cover some ground, so we parted with a handshake, knowing we’d see each other at the hostel this evening.

That meant it was back to me choosing which route to go. Since we’d made good time, I decided to head up to the hills on the official route. After two days on the seaside I’d finally get to view the sea.

So I headed for the hills, comparing the accounts in the various guidebooks. One caught my eye: “shave off 800 meters by taking the steep path that cuts off the long loop before the castle door.”

Shave off distance? Take a nature path instead of an asphalt road? Come to a castle door? I couldn’t resist.

I should’ve known something was awry when I couldn’t find the steep path. The GPS pointed me to an overground trail, no wider than a human foot. As I climbed higher and higher, the trail at first got very steep. Then it disappeared altogether.

I’d placed myself in thick undergrowth, surrounded by thorn bushes, on a path too steep to go back down, with no castle door in sight, in a place far out of earshot of any human being.

And my GPS confirmed it. I was located exactly on the trail. What a comfort to know that in this desperate situation, at least I wasn’t lost. 

To extricate myself I bushwhacked back downhill a few painful steps with thorns pulling at my clothes, crawled under a fallen tree, and scrambled up a steep, gravel bank. Finally at the top, I saw this sign:

And this relic:

After turning the page in the guidebook I read this line: “Don’t bother knocking on the castle door. It’s never open.”

So, no castle today. No damsels in distress. No dragons, no wise wizards, no young kings pulling swords from stones. No heraldic trumpets or cavalcades of shimmering knights. All I got out of that was some scratched up arms and legs to accompany me to Pietrasanta — and some time added to my day.

But I did get to view the sea. And I did have a nice pasta lunch. I saw marble being sawn and walked along a pretty river in the glorious sunshine.

At the end of the stage in the main Pietrasanta piazza I heard a familiar voice, shouting “Pastor!” There was Paolo, smiling after his efficient 19 km. And at the hostel was a new friend, Daniele, an archaeologist from Rome, relaxing after his 31.9 km on the official route.

They’re great guys, but only I walked 24.9 km, and the steep path to the castle door.

Day Three: Sarzana to Avenza — 17km (10.6 miles)

Every day in Italy I’m reminded of how my Italian language skills need improvement. Like last night at dinner when I was struggling to describe to the waiter exactly what I wanted.

“Just tell me in English,” he said. In English.

“I need to practice my Italian,” I said. In Italian.

“You can practice tomorrow,” he said. In Italian.

I think he regretted the joke a little, because by the end of the night he’d brought me two lovely glasses of chilled limoncello and had marked them on the check as offerta (complimentary).

But I really am trying to learn this language, and I’ve decided I’ll set an achievable goal while here of learning — indelibly learning — one new word for the day.

So today’s word is invece (een-VAY-chay), which means “instead.” Invece di is “instead of.”

As I made my way from Parma via train to my new starting point, I learned invece from the station loudspeaker which announced, in Italian, that: “The train headed from Bergamo to Pisa will depart in three minutes from Line 1 invece di Line 5.” That set off a mad dash by about 20 panicked, prospective passengers down the steps from Line 5, through the tunnel and up the stairs to Line 1.

This invece word seems downright powerful, I thought, as I ran right along with them. That was my train!

In fact, the word seems to symbolize my entire day.

For starters, I was at the train station invece di walking because I hurt my foot two days ago. So now I’ve skipped ahead on the train, taking pictures of Via Francigena sites through the train window invece di outside in the fresh air.

Invece is not all bad. I did this part of the Via Francigena inside the warm and cozy train invece di outside in the cold and rain.

Invece works with simple things: I used my external battery to give power to my iPhone on the train invece di the electrical socket, since those things never work on Italian trains.

And sad and sentimental things: I’m missing my fiancée, Theresa Elliott, because I’m in Italy invece di back home.

It works for things geographical: by the end of today’s walk I’ll be in the region of Tuscany invece di Emilia-Romanga or Liguria.

And things fun and laughable: I was almost late to the train in Parma today because I was watching video of the President’s comedy routine at the White House Press Corps dinner invece di packing up my stuff.

It works for things relational: I met other pilgrims in Sarzana –Dutch and Italian! — so I’m making friends invece di being alone.

Invitational: Theresa and I are culling our wedding list to only some of our friends
aand family invece di everyone we’d like to invite to our big day.

And obligational: I’m under a little pressure to wrap up this walk in May invece di extending into June because we’ve promised friends we’ll enjoy Memorial Day Weekend with them.

For things adversarial: I snapped at two of my sisters in emails this morning invece di being patient and long-suffering.

And things itinerarial: by the end of the day I’d walked 17km (10.6 miles) from Sarzana to Avenza on both feet invece di giving up this walk due to a bad foot. 

These are all invece pics:

And with that, I’m fresh out of invece tricks.

It’s an important word really, all about choices and changes. It’s a pivot word, implying a before and after, something left behind with something new to be welcomed.

So I’m welcoming this new phase of my Via Francigena in which I’ve merrily skipped ahead instead of grinding out each successive kilometer on foot. Arriving, on foot once again, at the Ligurian Sea, I welcome the beach and the salty smell of the air and the flat terrain and the palms among olive trees and everything that’s so new and different about these few days along the coast. And I’m glad my foot held up invece di having to head home early. 

P.S. As the day wore on my foot got stronger and less painful. Amazing.

“Make sure you’re stretching your calf muscles,” wrote Theresa, my fiancée. As usual, she was right on. It’s funny how a sore foot becomes a sore calf which becomes a sore foot. As I massage deeply into my calf muscle I feel a twinge in the exact spot where my foot hurt.

When I say, “hurt” I mean exactly that. The pain is now mostly gone, thanks to Theresa’s stretching and also to PT Diane Gaidon’s suggestion of an Arnica gel massage. That means I’m back on the road.

The next question becomes, where to land on my original itinerary? If I pick up after Fidenza, where I left off, this is what the distances would look like, along with the guidebooks’ ratings:

• Fidenza to Fornovo – 34 km. “Challenging”
• Fornovo to Cassio – 19 km. “Challenging”
• Cassio to Passo Della Cisa – 19.5 km. “Challenging.”
• Passo Della Cisa to Pontremoli – 32 km. “Challenging”
• Pontremoli to Aulla – 32 km. “Challenging”
• Aulla to Avenza –  32.7 km. “Very Challenging”

The itinerary doesn’t sound brilliant for someone recovering from a foot injury. Essentially the walk takes pilgrims five and a half days through the mountains and down to the sea at the beachy area just south of the famed Cinque Terre. The route doesn’t flatten out until the little town of Sarzana, between Aulla and Avenza.

So that’s my plan for tomorrow. Take the train to Fidenza, where I left the trail, then take the train to Sarzana, waving as I go by to several of the towns on the original walking itinerary. When I arrive in Sarzana I’ll walk three hours on the hopefully flat terrain to Avenza. The next couple of days after that should give flat and foot-friendly walks that will help me get back on track for the hundreds of miles that still remain.

I don’t want to hurt my arm, too, but I’m reaching around to pat myself on the back for coming to Parma to heal up. It’s an entertaining town and a welcome and worthy substitute for my first love: walking. Even so, it’ll be great to be back on the road to Rome starting tomorrow.

I’ll leave you with a few random photos of lovely Parma.

  

April 29 — Rest Day: Parma

Out of humility and for a little fun I “buried the lede” in yesterday’s blog post. Burying the lede is a journalistic faux pas in which your hide the most important part of the story, making your readers dig to find it. Today there’s no way to hide the real lede: Ouch. I can barely walk. For details, see the end of yesterday’s post.

When I awoke today and could still barely walk I decided to interpret my misfortune as a message from the Via Francigena: “Cool your jets. Slow down. You’re in Italy, so spend some time looking around.”

That’s my excuse for picking up an ankle brace in Fidenza and hobbling to the train station for the quick ride to the important and interesting nearby town of Parma. I’ve checked into a hotel by the station here and will see how my ankle does overnight before returning to the trail.

In the meantime, it’s fun to be in a cosmopolitan Italian town with lots to see.

For instance, people dress stylishly here. Lots of high heels, leather jackets, gorgeous haircuts, scarves and eyeglasses. Here, yoga pants are so yesterday. I saw one woman in billowy calf-length pants. We’re near enough to trendsetter Milan that I predict we will see women wearing similar pants next year in Seattle, then the year after in New York and Paris. Or the other way around. And I’m a yoga pants admirer.

I’ve also discovered this amazing local cheese of Parma. Yes, it’s so hard it needs to be grated to be eaten, but I predict it will soon be sprinkled on pasta throughout the province. Maybe all over Emilia-Romagna!

Something else — they vacuum the streets here. I’d love to see this back home, where it would be a more pleasant way to clean up the used condoms and syringes in the ‘hood, a block or two from where I live. Attenti Mayor Murray.

What I really like is that everyone bikes here. Not like in Seattle where you have to be fairly athletic to bike the hills. Here on bikes I’ve already seen grandfathers in suits, grandmothers in skirts, grandfathers smoking cigars, women with rattan bike baskets lined with subtle prints, men in Armani overcoats, young women in short skirts and people of all ages in jeans and either leather or quilted down jackets. Plus people are riding silent and stealthy electric bikes, which seem to require no expenditure of effort whatsoever. And tourists. The hotel I’m at has free bikes available to any guest who’d like one. And whose ankle will allow it.

Though it’s an historic town, the ancient and esteemed university here gives the place a youthful vibe. Lots of school kids, lots of university students and many professorial types. A group of rowdy and too-drunk-for-this-early students is singing loudly outside this cafe as I write. Accompanied by real American jazz on the cafe’s loudspeakers the waiter says in excellent English that the students are graduating today.  This town is so much more than just cheese!

In fact it’s also a storehouse of medieval architecture. The frescoed Duomo is nothing short of stunning. Bas-relief sculptures on the adjoining baptistery are nearly 1000 years old. Those are just a couple of the historic treats to be seen here.

So I’m going to score Parma toward the top of my list of hidden Italian treasures, and rate it as a great place to cool your jets while walking the Via Francigena to Rome.

Day Two: Fiorenzuola d’Arda to Fidenza — 23 km (14.3 miles)

Today I learned many new Italian words:

• vescica — blister
• tamponi antisettici — antiseptic pad
• nastro chirurgico — surgical tape
• Mia gamba fa male — my leg hurts
• Ibuprofen — Ibuprofen
• Dove posso ottenere una bevanda? — where can I get a drink?*

Other than learning new Italian words, the day was spent in the countryside, playing hide and seek with the Italian A1 superhighway, an alternate mode of transport between Fiorenzuola and Fidenza, or for that matter between Milan and Rome. I twice crossed the freeway on sparkling new overpasses as our pilgrim route wandered among quiet country roads to find its goal.

I woke with a surprise this morning. I’d slept until 7:30, very late for a responsible pilgrim. After gathering up my things I headed first to a local cafe for breakfast and a “to-go” sandwich, then to a fruit store to top off my lunch sack. Then it was across the rail tracks and out of town, heading for my first goal of Chiarevalle Della Colomba and its 12th century abbey.

After the Abbey was the first crossing of the A1, followed by a series of farm roads, zigzagging through the countryside.

I stopped at a park in Castione Marchesi to eat my lunch, then continued on along more farm roads to another crossing of the A1. I saw no cows today, but I came to understand how omnipresent silage smells much the same as cow manure.

Thanks to its surprisingly-tall-for-in-a-small-town buildings, Fidenza soon became visible to the south. Somehow it look longer to get there than seemed necessary, but when I arrived I was rewarded with a visit to Fidenza’s Duomo San Donnino, built from brick nearly 800 years ago and a good example of Lonbardy Romanesque style (says the guidebook).

After that it was off to my room for the night for a shower and welcome rest.

Tomorrow the plains of Emilia-Romanga become a memory as the route heads for the hills. I’m ready for a change of scenery and am looking forward to some mountains.

*There’s a story inside that series of translations that goes like this: yesterday I developed a couple of non-serious blisters which I drained and bandaged right away. Today they were annoying and I couldn’t keep the bandages on so I tied one bandage — too tightly it turns out — with adhesive tape around my foot. This exacerbated a recent problem I’ve developed in which my foot decides not to allow me to stand or walk on it. Sadly, the pain became extreme about 8km (5 miles) from today’s goal. That meant three hours of hobbling rather than one and a half hours of walking. The good news is that after Ibuprofen and a good night’s sleep the pain completely goes away and I can walk again. The Italian words derive from a conversation at the very first Farmacia I could find in Fidenza.