Bonne Route

I am in a small town Lilande, on the Dordogne river.

Why? You may have read about my weariness of trains and my longing for the bike. Well, with my first income for several months on the cards (Tomas jacked me up with the sweet wine harvest job) I splashed out on a bike, and locks, and rad panniers that turn into a backpack and two bags.

And so I venture forth into Acquitaine, self contained, dodging the rain, feeling a little pain, (eating le pain, but that doesn't rhyme, I am discovering)

I'm intrigued by the prospect of the river valley turning into a gorge; much more so by the fact that this area is positively chokka with Neaderthal and Cro Magnon caves with their paintings and etchings and so forth. So I'm gonna go see them, of course. When I was little I dreamed about finding dinosaur footprints in hardened mud somewhere: this, I think, might be even more astounding.

On the other hand maybe I will feel like a man who has been a tourist for too long.




So far on the trip I have had two lovely encounters. One was a French couple inviting me into their house to watch the All Blacks vs Scotland, accompanied by sausage, bread, cheese, beer, then chickpeas, onions, barely cooked meat, wine, more bread, more cheese. Jaques was keen to practice his English "What do you think of the organisation of the cup?". Joele was more hardcore. "in my house," she said (in French), "you speak French". So I get frustrated and manage a few sentences an hour, but she teaches me a Moliere quote À vaincre sans péril on triomphe sans gloire.

In Sante Foy de Grande I meet Matt, an English guy who is in the middle of a years stay at Plum Village, a Buddhist community founded by Thich Nat Hanh. Worldly and kind, he is a fascinating character. I hope I see him again, perhaps when he is travelling the world as a clown.

Salut!

I'm in Bordeaux, the city (by the way, if you are french, the region we call 'Bordeaux' is called 'Gironde') staying with the charming Tomas and Eloise, who I met in Cudillero in Espana.

I love learning French. I finally get to use my nasal twang for some real phonemes!

I have just spent a couple of hours writing up my late August travels. Tonight we will go to sit by the vast tidal Garonne (maybe I will see some more Coypu) and probably drink red wine and eat pain et fromage (bread and cheese). Voila!

Roma Part 2

Day 2

I'm very tired. And the Vatican museum is not open today. I decide to stay another day and explore 'Renaissance Rome' tommorrow.


Day 3



I am waiting in the line - a short one by usual standards: only an hour or so. I happen to be standing next to an American tour group. It's good luck - the guide is young, jovial and informed. He surprises me with his knowledge of the Arab influence on the Renaissance*.

To be honest, I've stayed in Rome for an extra day to come to Il Museo Vaticani because of one thing - the Sistine Chapel. It doesn't dissappoint. I also wonder through halls and halls of Catholic loot and gain a real appreciation for the luminous and masterful Raphael.

Michaelangleo, Raphael... These names have now lost their association with 90's action figures, but the works of these artists do seem superhuman. It's amazing to me that the same person designed both this



and this as well.



Day 4
I'm hooked now and, inspired by a chance meeting, I spend one more day in Rome, which is more about meeting locals. A gathering of couchsurfers/hosts helps. Andrea is obsessed with films, particularly (like many others on the continent) those made by Stanley Kubrick. He's lived in Rome all his eighteen years and never been to the Vatican Museum.

Giadita looks at the skyscraper-free view from the Pincio and tells me "I don't mind that we aren't modern, that the trains don't work properly... I love this city."

And Carlo is annoyed that I won't get drunk with him. Thwarted, he takes us to eat a late-night Italian specialty (fried battered fish... sound familiar?) and disses my harmonica playing. The next morning I ask him if he stands by his criticism. "I'm very open" he says. "is that an Italian thing?" I ask, searching for my nugget of cultural knowledge. "No, it's a Carlo thing" he says.

*The seeds of the Renaissance were sown by the revitalising re-introduction of previously lost Greek and Roman classics. It was through Arabic scholarship and translation that the West regained contact with many of these texts.

Roma part 1

I walk the streets of Rome like a goggled eyed kid. This world is new to me. The marble steps worn smooth by ancient Roman feet, the names I know from textbooks carved everywhere: Hadrian, Marcus Aurelius, Constantine, Augustus... And then there's the renaissance Rome. And contemporary Rome.
To prevent my brain exploding, I plan to limit myself to focussing on the sights of Ancient Rome during my first day, and looking at Rennaisance stuff on the second.

Day1
The Pantheon is the most intact building from Ancient Rome. (If you have a good connection, try this great 'virtual tour')
It is also one of the more mysterious buildings. Even just three generations after it was built, the writer Cassius Dio could not state its original purpose.








Pretty soon it became a church, however and this helped it survive intact: it was left alone by the (christian) Goths and other invaders at the end of the Empire. It's been a church ever since and Raphael is buried there. I loved it's spacious dome, massive columns, (pictured) but most of all the awe it inspires.

The Collosseo is spectacular but a bit sad... would we want people to revere our big tops, our cage-fighting arenas? I'm also reminded of the hands that built these monuments. The colloseum was built by Jewish slaves (or as the plaque inside euphemistically reads 'with booty from the Jewish uprising')

But listing the monuments I saw does't capture the experience I had walking these baking hot streets. Every Piazza (square) has an Obelisk, a statue, a column an arch or even a pyramid shaped tomb, all from Imperial days. So many, that guidebooks devoted to Rome must miss some out or risk being the size of an encyclopedia. Ancient debris - shattered statues and collapsed columns, litter the open spaces such as public gardens. Thomas from Bordeaux tells me that one can see a pile of broken amphoras in the (surprisingly picturesque) Tiber. I stumble upon Republic-era ruins that would be the pride of any other city purely by accident. Stray cats sleep there and are fed by a charity. Another attraction is Notte Bianca, a recent tradition. The idea is, basically, an all night party in the streets. Trains will run packed throughout all the night carrying revellers, including many familys, into the centre of Rome to wander from Piazza to Piazza, to be entertained by musicians, parades and acrobats. Highlights for me were dancing behind a batucada troupe along a street that runs through the ruins of the Roman Forum and learning "Bella Ciao" an anti-facist anthem-plus-love-song.

On leaning.

With the others heading back to their lives in the UK, I decide to be a tourist in Italy for another week or so, before making my way East to Bordeaux, to see friends and cut grapes. First stop is the nearby Pisa. The tower is cool. The other tourists are spectacular. At any one time, I can see at least three different individuals taking what one blogger calls the Obligatory-Dorky-Hold-up-The-Tower Photo.

Tourist information differs as to when the lean first happened. The 'Rough Guide' states that the lean was detected within a few years of the commencement of building, back in the twelth century, resulting in a long hiatus. The official plaque attributes the hiatus to 'unkwnown reasons' and implies the lean only began much later. Wikipedia agrees in part with the Rough Guide, stating that the lean was first noticed in 1178, when the tower was only five years old with three of a final eight levels completed. When building recommenced a century later after Pisa-Genoan wars a century later, the lean was (over)compensated for and the tower started leaning the direction it does today. Needless to say, if you are in Pisa, it's worth a look. The other buildings in Piazza dei Miracoli or "Square of Miracles" aren't too shabby either.



After an hour trying to hitchike out of a slightly grimy Pisa I give up and take the next train south to Rome. On the train I meet a young Roman student with an egyptian background and accent. Our conversation consists of him listing the English writers he likes. The romantics, the Modernists. He quotes Eliot's 'Hollow Men' for me. He doesn't like Bertrand Russell. Too analytical.

Lists have served me well for crossing the language barrier. One doesn't need translation, let alone grammar when listing proper names. He takes an interest in the little Pema Chodron book I carry and I teach him a simple meditation technique. It is a surreal experience, zooming accross the plains towards a city that was founded before humans got to Aotearoa, meditating with a new friend in an otherwise empty carriage.

It's after 2200 when we get to Rome and I half-hope my buddy will offer me a place to stay. Nope. On my own again.

The most Scottish Town in Italy

In the evening I almost miss my stop in Fornaci di Barga (the 'furnaces' of Barga). Hungry for English words, I had been absorbed into the very porous substance of a discarded Daily Mail. Fornunately, there to welcome me and signal to the conductor as I scrambled off where two of my three British uncles: Graham and Douglas... more family and friends are gathered at the rented farmhouse up the hill. We are having a little festa in Tuscany!

What happened at Barga? We regaled the birthday girls with gifts, we visited the picturesque, walled Lucca; we quaffed massive pitchers of cheap local wine. We ate fresh figs and aged cheese and salads with spelt. The boys attacked the Hungarian sausage I brought. We heard Uncle Douglas and Aunt Sarah blag their way through Italian conversations. We plaid the violence-inducing card game Racing Demon. We shivered in the mornings and sweated in the afternoons. We expolored a wild canyon and stared at dramatic skylines.



(Hillside Barga has two official claims to fame: having the second best shilloute and being 'the most Scottish' town in Italy. The first is due to its physical geography, the second, a history of 20th century migration to and from Scotland.)

It is great to have the chance to relax in the company of people I don't have to introduce myself to, to never once talk about day-jobs, and at the same time to be in this strange, beautiful, semi-wild landscape, with such an exciting culture and history.

And too quickly it seems, the week I spend there is over - it is almost time to leave.

I visit the duomo (town church) before I leave and note good signs for my future plans. The bas-relief above the door depicts the grape harvest, and inside is both a massive statue and painting of Saint Christopher - the patron saint of Barga, as well as travellers.

Frankfurt to Florence

The Zen retreat (in Aschaffenburg, near Frankfurt) is the usual mix of difficult work and unbounded joy, and worth the hitching oddesy to get there. The few days previous in Frankfurt also provided a few surprises, with a trade fair drawing multitudes to the banks of the Maim, and a thriving red light district right next to the bank which controls the Euro. Bad idea to go to the zoo though.

I miss my early train to Zurich (cheap online tickets have their drawbacks) but hitchwiki.org comes through again with a perfect hitching spot in the middle of Frankfurt and a gruff Turkish German provides me with a ride to Heidlberg, a hard house soundtrack and a salami the size of my arm.



I stay in Zurich (picturesque, smells of fondue) and get a train the next morning through the Alps to Firenze (Florence) The scenes are, as you would expect, incredible. But I also feel like it's a sort of overdose of scenery. It is, as Jerry Seinfeld put it once, as if somehow it is all happening on TV. I miss the bike, slow as it is. Even when hopping from petrol station to petrol station along the autobahn, I feel a closer connection to the landscape. Maybe it's the sense of danger of the hitching that keeps my eyes open.