Onto the street once more, the sun rising unimpeded in its bright red glow an hour down the track. We were soon into the lower hills of the Apennines and for the first time being shown those masterpieces of nature from the distant mountains to the lower hills and valleys with crops mostly harvested from the fields preparing for their winter rest.
Signs for the route seem to be in disarray so it is becoming difficult to find any clues with some signs stuck on posts with bandaids, fading arrows, but mostly the arm waving of local Italians leads us to our destination.
We overtook a young resting walker who once rested, overtook us quickly, which not only shows the benefits of youth, but also of resting. At a crucial unmarked junction we asked a woman for directions but first asked her if she spoke either French, Spanish or German which we had fully covered. Quietly standing beside us was the young rested one who we thought might be of help because he spoke Italian – much better.
A lot of ‘once were’ professional bikers on the road today and there is always reciprocal greetings and arm waving between us. Great camaraderie exists as they show either awe for our attempt to walk to Roma, or wonder why we don’t simply learn to ride a bike. We are all very tired today – probably the hills and the sun partnering to challenge us, while many young women fruit pickers, maybe backpackers, were being happily tanned by the same fire in the sky.
Marco the engineer/architect turned chef from the nursing home is still our very special local supporter and is waiting for the time we can use one of his many Italian friends – thanks Marco.
We arrived at our new home in a small village where they have a/c that is not working; wifi that has technical difficulties; and no breakfast, so I’ll go looking for a cafe that has all three as I reconnoitre the start of our route for tomorrow after a rest. Five hours have passed – had wifi but lost it; we now have a fan to replace a/c and thanks to yet another Asian cafe owner, breakfast starts at 5.00am —— so life is good —— again.
