Oh, for Pete’s sake!  Seriously?

The over-head advertisement inside the tram in Turin this morning is a large photo of a good-looking, young man in a tuxedo who is biting the shoulder of a totally naked woman. The text of this ad, translated loosely, suggests, “The lower your appetite, the more appetizing you’ll become.” 

Allow me to share something with you. Americans are often guilty of imagining that all young Italian women are curvy and voluptuous, and older Italian women are, well … plump. Not so.

Most of the Italian women I’ve seen on trains and trams in Turin, or walking down the sidewalks of Milan, arm in arm, weigh less than 110 pounds. I am pleased to dispel stereotypes whenever I can, and I have to tell you that the women of northern Italy, young and old alike, eat pasta every single day, and still maintain healthy physical proportions. A plus-size, full-figured Italian woman is not the norm here.

Of course, I can only speak of  the northern Italians, who, I am sorry to say, vehemently deny any similarity to or relationship with southern Italians. It’s a different planet down in the Mezzogiorno, they tell me. I can’t attest to that, as all my work has been in the north.

I am happy to report, however, that after six months of living and working in the land of gelato, polenta and focaccia, I still fit into my clothing and buckle my belt in the same slot.

I have to say, though, that chances are still very slim that a handsome Italian man will ever be compelled to bite me. I’d like to see him try!

Seriously, I really would.

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I am wandering through a quiet shaded alley in Florence. Up ahead, I see an older man down on his hands and knees on the cobblestones. He appears to be looking for something. As I quietly approach, he looks up, and with a smile, he beckons to me. “Guardate che è nato qui!”

I kneel down, head to head with the man, to see exactly “what is being born here”. A tiny purple flower with one leaf has forced its way up between the ancient stones and is blooming as if this dim alley were its own private Eden.

Living things are compelled to grow. They somehow manage to thrive on what they are given, however meager. Life finds a way. The Italians understand this better than some. It’s a good thing to keep in mind as this difficult year comes to an end, and a new one begins, don’t you think?

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A One-Minute Scottish vignette from the Travel Tales archive of 2023.

Walking on a remote, three-mile path between two villages in the Scottish West Highlands, I am caught in a sudden downpour for which I am definitely not dressed. The sky has opened up and I am completely drenched. I slog on through the mud, with less than a mile to go. Around the next bend, to my dismay, are seven very large, very wet highland cows blocking the path. Because of the steep acclivity on one side and the sharp drop-off of the brae on the other, I am unable to skirt around them. I talk to them calmly, asking them politely to step aside and let me through. They look at me and listen, not without sympathy, their eyes nearly hidden by their fringes. They answer in unison, “You. Shall. Not. Pass.”

They are gentle creatures, but they are huge; each one weighing over 1,000 pounds, so there is nothing for it but to turn around and go back in the direction from which I came. A few depressing yards into my return, I see up ahead an older woman stomping toward me. Her knit cap is pulled down below her ears, her anorak zipped up to her chin, rubber wellies up to her knees. She carries a plastic TESCO bag. When she is in front of me, I grimace and wish her a “Good morning”. With a stoic smile, she gives one curt nod and with typical Scottish understatement, adds, “A bit damp”.

Without breaking her stride, she continues on past me. She no doubt walks four miles a day just to pick up her mail, and it is not the first time she has been rained on. The cows probably know her by name and will move to let her through. I step in just behind her, timorously slipping through the herd of bovine hooligans in her wake, and arrive in the next village just as the rain stops.

Spend a minute or two in rural Scotland with lovely Scottish music and cows

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This article was first published in the travel section of the San Francisco Examiner. Seeing that byline was one of the most thrilling events of my life.

The Half-Star €50 a Night Very Basic Single

It’s my kind of place: a dim little room with a narrow, quilt-covered cot on one side and an ancient wash-basin in the corner. A window that opens. A tiny bar of green pine soap on a glass shelf, a starched white towel, cold and almost warm running water. It is on the second floor in back, just over the kitchen where I am awakened at 5:30 each morning to the smell of onions frying. It’s the pocket-sized attic room adjacent to the clank and rattle of the ancient machinery that drives the elevator up and down.

Minimal funds lead me to accommodations just a few grateful steps above the mènage a trente of the local youth hostel, but certainly well below the realms of concierge, sauna, fois gras and in-room mini bar. Sparsely furnished, almost comfortable, the guest room in which I invariably find myself has flowery chintz wallpaper peeling at the baseboard, creaking wooden floors that announce my every trip to the bathroom, and la pièce de résistance, a faded framed print of a speckled trout hanging above the bed.

Always traveling alone and on a laughably low budget, I experience curious situations never described, or even imagined, by Baedeker. He knows little of what we single travelers of genteel poverty encounter in our never ending quest to avoid that most heinous of commercial ruses – the single supplement.

Travelers like myself need a different guide book — a book of essential information and handy tips sorely missing from the current travel guides. Where is the sage advice for the lone, mature woman in well-scuffed orthopedic oxfords who operates primarily on daydreams and a pathetically low teacher’s pension?

I sit here now, in flannel pajamas, in a back alley room in Basel, gazing out into the early morning murk that fills the narrow cobbled lane below. I begin making a list of crucial questions that I would like to see addressed in the next travel guide I buy. For example:

• How to exit a loft bed on a bamboo ladder at three in the morning, without stepping into the bidet.

• Where to stash your suitcase in a 5’ X 6’ room and still be able to open the door in case of fire.

• How to manage a duffel bag, a parka and a back-pack on a narrow spiral staircase and why down seems quicker.

• Getting your money’s worth from a €12 shower.

• How to explain to the non-English-speaking desk clerk that the sheets are missing from your bed without having him interpret your hand-gestures as an invitation to party.

• Exactly how many varieties of liverwurst can you reasonably expect to be served at breakfast on a two-week holiday in Bavaria?

• Cardboard walls: Getting revenge in the morning on the Italian newlyweds in the next room. I mean – seriously? Come on, people! You have your whole lives ahead of you – pace yourselves.

• Shortening the distance between a second-floor bedroom and a first floor bathroom in an emergency.

• Developing one’s sense of humor and reflexes when faced with variable water pressure in the shower. ( eg coping with shampoo in your eyes in the third-floor shower when the man on the second floor flushes the toilet.)

• Mosquitos at midnight.

• Little known facts about the econo-model K-Mart voltage converter and how to yell “FIRE!” in seven different languages.

• Successfully coping with felons, winos, Italian soccer teams and other unruly neighbors in the corridor.

• Adventures in entomology. Keeping an inquiring mind when opening the drawers.

• How to determine the exact cost of bed and breakfast before moving in, including the extras: the €9 boiled egg, the €10 glass of jus de pamplemousse, towel rent, early breakfast surcharge, electricity tax, radiator use fee, etc.

• Tissue-paper walls: Is it homicide or passion in the next room and how to know when to call the police.

• Putting on your make-up under a 40-watt light bulb without emerging onto the street looking like an extra from the Rocky Horror Picture Show.

• Getting acquainted with the shower head on a flexible metal hose and how to twist it into submission

I could add many more entries to this list, but never mind. My attention has contentedly wandered. Here in Basel late last night, the noise of Winefest revelers and one rude saxophone flowed into my third story window for hours. Deep into a paperback adventure of Captain Jack Aubrey, I paid them no mind.

This morning, one pale shaft of sunlight falls into the shadow of the Rheingasse as I sip my milky coffee. One solitary spider hangs himself out to dry in the window. At sunset, a mist will rise from off of the Rhine and wrap the silhouette of Munster’s spires in a frayed shawl of gray. I will most likely be bent over a thrifty bowl of Zwiebelsuppe, optimistically counting a small handful of coins. I have to leave Switzerland tonight, before it devours my last cent, and head south for the delightful Italian combination of low-cost, high-carb meals.

Reading my notes again, I have to confess that I don’t really care about guidebooks or answers. If, in fact, I wanted ease and predictability when traveling, I would join the carefree package-tour folks, where there are few surprises, and where unpleasant events are not likely to occur. But I have always found that although I may read and plan my journeys weeks ahead of time, the fondest memories are always made up of what happens outside the itinerary -- the lost key, the overly friendly waiter, the foiled pickpocket, the missed bus, the desperate graffiti – “BABA! I want you!”, the cafe in the train station that specializes in “Honkey-Burgers”. Or the delightful museum sign warning “This door is exceptionally closed.”

The best moments are always the serendipitous, the unexpected – the half-star €50 a night hotel in Cologne at midnight after an 11-hour train ride where I find there is no shower, only a sink. And as I sit on the end of the bed in despair, I spot a very small refrigerator in the corner. It is loaded with icy Löwenbräu and a bottle of sparkling Sekt. A little sign says “For your plaesure of the guest.” Who needs a shower anyway?

The best remembered moment is the apologetic, “I am sorry, madam, we are fully booked … but … we do have one very very small room available for two nights.” This bijou room is, in fact, a re-furbished janitors’ closet, but it just happens to have a miracle view directly onto the Pont-St-Louis and Notre-Dame.

William Butler Yeats observed:

We that have done and thought,

That have thought and done,

Must ramble and thin out,

Like milk spilled upon a stone.

To thin out, I believe, is to be a stranger in an unknown land, where I always dress inappropriately, order coffee before dinner ( or worse, with dinner), and wait over an hour in the wrong line. A land where the alphabet appears inside out. To thin out is to fall asleep soundly on a lumpy mattress to the strains of a frenzied accordion from the bistro across the way with a smile on my lips. It is to accept each encounter with a dimly lit, precipitous flight of stairs, a surly desk clerk, or an indecipherable street sign as an opportunity for enlightenment and personal growth. I think it is the best we can hope for, to ramble and thin out, and then share the adventure with other lovers of the road.

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Returning to you from the Travel archive of 2024, a two-minute immersion in the Left Bank of Paris.

A giggle of long-haired girls is admiring the honeyed delicacies in the window of the Tunisian bakery. They are wearing the too-tight jeans and the cropped white T-shirts that are every mother’s nightmare.

The girls, in turn, are affectionately appraised by the thin, pale boys who come to the Quai Saint-Michel to buy their lab books at Gibert Jeune. Promises of clever conversation and short-term romance permeate the cool evening air.

This is the Left Bank, La Huchette, between La Place Saint-Michel and Saint-Severin. It’s a continual circus of the senses — delicious, dazzling, fragrant, that comes to life at the setting of the sun.

Multi-colored lights and intriguing possibilities tumble out into the narrow lanes from small Italian trattorias and intimate Greek bistros. Handsome dark-eyed waiters in starched white aprons are standing in doorways, seducing diners into their parlors.

The vitrines are decorated with geometric arrangements of bright tomatoes and peppers. Lobsters and less familiar crustaceans wait on mounds of crushed ice with their beady black eyes and waving antennae.

Balalaikas and accordions play sweet nostalgic melodies from old movies you saw long ago, making you hunger for something – you are not sure for what exactly, but you feel absolutely certain it can be found here in La Huchette tonight.

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A mildly disturbed older man is carrying a large sign and pacing back and forth in the piazzetta. The sign, loosely translated, says, “Every word of English you add to the Italian language is like a slap in the face of your mother.” Every man has his cause; this one appears harmless enough.

It is a brilliant Sunday in Bergamo, a small hilltop city in the Lombard region of northern Italy. Its 15th century, upper district, the Città Alta, is all quintessential winding cobbled streets encircled by sturdy stone medieval Venetian walls. One rides a little funicolare up the cliff to arrive at the Old Town.

I sit in front of the picturesque little hotel, Agnello d’Oro, at a sunny umbrella table, sharing a pizza with Gabi, a woman I met on the train today. A tall, lanky man walks by our table dragging a wheeled suitcase. He stops and smiles when he hears us talking.

“English!” he says. “Are you Americans?”

Gabi replies, “Belgian.”

I say, “I’m from California.”

He says, “Hey! Me, too! What town?”

“Santa Cruz,” I answer.

“You’re kidding! Me, too!” he says.

We discover he lives about a mile from me back home. How often does that happen? He joins us and eats half of our pizza. Then he buys another one to share. It is like an impromptu family reunion, and all three of us delight in it.

You have to wonder how these chance meetings happen. How can someone travel over 6,000 miles to a random, lesser-known city, sit in a small random cafe, on a random day and time and run into someone else from their own home town? What kind of planetary alignment has to be in place?

Actually, these coincidences happen more often than you would imagine. I have accidentally encountered travelers from Santa Cruz several times in Europe. I once bumped into a couple in the train station in Genoa — I had casually looked down at their luggage tag and introduced myself. Once I sat down to rest on the steps of a small church in Vienna and was surprised to see I was sitting next to my mom’s insurance man and his wife. We compared travel notes. And once I stood in line behind a man wearing a UCSC slug-emblazoned T-shirt in a “waffle house” in Amsterdam. He was a student at my old alma mater and lived just down on Ocean Street. Incredible.

In Spanish they have a saying: Dios los hace, y ellos se juntan. “God makes them and they find each other.” That old axiom most often refers to a rabble of drunken revelers.

Apparently it sometimes fits world travelers as well.

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A five-minute visit to the megalopolis of Milan, Italy, from the March 2023 Travel Archive. We all can use a good laugh right about now, I think.

A single jazz saxophone echoes lonely up the dark spiral of the stairwell from five floors below. The acoustics are perfect, the melancholy sound is captivating — if only it weren’t three o’clock in the morning. Apparently, the musician can’t sleep. So, we all have to share in his insomnia.

It’s a cold January in Milan. I’ve won a six-month Fulbright position here, and have finally found a place to live in this miasmatic city. It’s a very small room on the fifth floor, with a sliding glass door onto a tiny balcony. If I bend out over the railing and look left, I can see two trees and the passing bright orange trams. This one-room studio in a “residence” building costs more than half of my salary, which people tell me is a hell of a good deal in Milan.

To my dismay, the floors in all the apartments are ceramic tile with no carpeting, so every footstep overhead sounds like Tock! Tock! Tock! .... Tock! Tock! Tock! Tock! It sounds like they’re wearing wooden shoes up there and trying to get their steps in for the day. Sometimes they seem to be arguing and clog dancing simultaneously.

Then there’s the marathon bed squeaking that goes on several times a day in the apartment next door. Though I am the first to agree that this world certainly can use a little more love, I do find myself wondering if all this bed-squeaking and headboard banging activity is done in shifts by different couples or if it’s one couple trying to get into the Guinness Book of World Records. Pace yourselves, kids! Please.

Milan is the fashion capital of Italy, of course, and of the seventy apartments in this building, sixty-nine are occupied by very tall, ultra-thin models and would-be models, male and female and others indeterminate. They seem to all be teenagers, and are giggly and feral, yelling up and down the hallways at all hours — thus the box of 100 foam ear plugs I purchased yesterday.

The women I meet in the elevator every day wear size 2 – intimidating for someone like me who wears size ... well ... not size 2. I am not 5’ 10” tall and I haven’t weighed 106 pounds since I was in the seventh grade. Up close in the elevator, they all seem to have a BMI of 10, have long, narrow feet and wear cool clothing. Whereas I, in comparison, have square, wide Norwegian feet in sensible oxfords, and my clothing looks as if I’ve found it on the Goodwill reject pile. In short, amidst this group, I am a different species altogether — they observe me as if I were some kind of bug.

This sparsely furnished room does have everything I need: a place to cook, sleep, study, and do laundry ( by hand in the bathtub ). There’s even a clothes line on the balcony. The room is only 20 minutes from where I work — by bus, tram or walking it is all the same. The neighborhood has a little market, a bakery ( oh dear ), a cocktail bar ( uh oh ), a dry cleaner, a fruit stand and a pharmacy. Anything I need is close by and all for only 200% more than I would pay in California.

Surprisingly, I find I can easily live without having a TV, a washer, an ironing board, a toaster, a stereo, a microwave! And, in fact, I am learning to save and re-use stuff now – incidental pieces of string, rubber bands, plastic liner bags from inside cereal boxes. On my desk, a styrofoam tray that held ripe tomatoes in the market now holds a stapler and paper clips. A glass applesauce jar is a vase, and an empty apricot can with a bright label is a repository for pens and pencils. Even my cardboard shipping box with a colorful cloth thrown over it, has morphed into a bedside table. It is amazing how much you don’t need to buy.

I walked to work in the light snow this morning — snow like gentle, white bees buzzing lightly in all directions. The temperature was 30˚F on this winter day, but I chose to walk because the trams seem so crowded right now, what with everyone wearing layers of puffy clothing to keep warm.

The office in which I am housed is on via Montenapoleone, an upmarket boulevard rife with fashion outlets that read like the pages of Vogue – Ungaro, Valentino, Benneton, Hermes, Rolex, Ferragamo, Balenciaga, Prada, Fendi, Dolce e Gabbana — all rubbing shoulders. I stopped to look in one of the windows, and I realized that if my mom would send me $600, I could totally buy her a small silk neck scarf. From the bargain table.

When you stay for a while in a large foreign city, a life tends to build up around you. In the heart of this mega-metropolis, my neighborhood has become a cozy little village. I see the same people every day and I may not know their names, but I recognize them, smile, nod, say good morning – the woman at the vegetable stand, the postman at the office, the man who sits in the covered entry way each morning, the woman who feeds breadcrumbs to the pigeons in the square near the metro stop. In the Baby Bar on the corner, I am now on a first-name basis with the barista, “Ciao, Fernando! Come stai, bello?” All feels sort of normal.

I have to admit that I’ve been a terrible grump as I try to adapt to life in this huge Italian city. I’ve been in the throes of culture shock for a couple of weeks now, and I am so disappointed in myself. I am a well-experienced traveler, and presumed I was more sophisticated than this. But Milan is tough. The polluted air is scarcely breathable, the pace is mad, and any wine less than €25 a bottle may be adulterated, according to the Corriere della Sera newspaper. Certain weeks, the air is so poisonous, that all private cars are ordered to stay off the streets for an entire day. No cars can come into the city. Everyone switches to public transportation.

However, I think I am now starting to get my head above water. For the last three days, at least, I have actually gone out, and walked through the boulevards and parks. I’ve stopped thinking about the pollution and the traffic so much. I’ve stopped comparing US and Italian prices, and, best of all, I’ve stopped muttering! FYI: A primary symptom of culture shock is constant, sarcastic muttering to one’s self.

Walking out today the air was icy and crisp, and carried the sweet smell of new snow and equilibrium. I will end up loving it here. As my best friend suggested, “Just breath out, never breathe in, and buy yourself a large bouquet of flowers from the market every week.” I’ll be fine.

**The USIA, where Fulbrighters were hosted in Italy, was disbanded in 2000, though the Fulbright program still forges on. This piece describes my experiences from that era. It seems as vivid as yesterday to me.

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Originally posted in January 2023. Have a look at some of the bizarre things that can happen when traveling alone in southern Italy. Or anywhere, for that matter.

This guest house, teetering high on the edge of a sea cliff, is a low-rent, rickety bird’s nest sort of place, but it hasn’t fallen into the sea. Yet.

The journey begins in Sorrento, south of Naples, with a plan to travel slowly up the Ligurian coast. In late October, the Sorrentine Peninsula is decorated with bursts of scarlet bougainvillea, purple morning glory and pink oleander. Lemon and almond trees abound. Bright orange plastic nets are suspended like Day-Glo spider webs under gnarled olive trees to capture the green and black fruit as it falls.

The owners of this shabby place, who speak no English, are very kind. They have loaned me a pair of slippers to wear while my only shoes are drying out on top of the radiator, having been soaked clear through in a sudden afternoon downpour. How many tired feet have been propped up on this balcony rail at the end of the day over the past hundred years, I wonder. The view across the bay is of Naples and Pozzuoli kneeling in the dark shadow of towering Mt. Vesuvius.

It’s nine in the morning, on the rackety bus to Positano. The driver watches cartoons on an iPad mounted on the dash board, while simultaneously maneuvering around the triple-S, edge-of-the-earth turns high above the surface of the sea. The rocky cliff falls at least a million feet down into water as dark and deep as midnight. I realize I am less than two feet and a few seconds from death, should that tablet feature anything noteworthy.

Oh God oh God oh God. I suddenly find myself becoming very religious. I try to focus out the windows on the left side, where twisted cedars and tall pointy cypress line this high, narrow road and hundreds of unfamiliar orange blooms smolder in wild clumps up the slope.

In the back of the bus, oblivious to the danger, a jolly Swiss German group is laughing, yodeling and singing some sort of tramping-down-the-road song. The driver scowls into the rear view mirror, switches off his iPad and tunes a radio to some frenzied Tarantella-type music at high volume.

Thirty minutes of this death-ride on the high road of the Amalfi Coast and we descend safely onto the front porch of Positano, an ancient mountainside village with a small pebbly beachfront and narrow streets so steep they turn into stairs. The colorful homes tumble down the side of the mountain one atop the other, almost into the sea. I walk along the steep narrow, twisting lanes under a lush canopy of wisteria and lemon trees. I am with Greta, a timid woman I met on the bus and who had my arm in a vice-like grip for the last ten miles.

Greta and I don’t speak each others’ language, but have decided via hand signals that we should stick together. We visit the lovely Byzantine Black Madonna in the Church of Santa Maria Assunta. It is an object of devotion among the residents and a tourist magnet, but remarkable and well-worth viewing.

We then walk back down to amble through the high-walled neighborhoods below. Rounding a narrow corner, a young man approaches us and immediately unzips his trousers to display what he hopes might be of interest to two strolling women. Greta and I look at each other, shake our heads, roll our eyes and keep walking.

Not five minutes later, here he is again, pants undone, waiting to delight us once more with his anatomy. I stop Greta, reach into my bag for my camera and tell him to please just hold that pose a minute so I can get a nice photo to take home to my family. Not too keen on that idea, he scuttles off, presumably to find other unsuspecting females. I am sure there are enough women tourists in Positano to keep him busy all year round. If he had any brains he would set up a booth and charge €1 for a peek.

If you enjoyed this story, here is the rest of the journey north to the Ligurian Riviera including Portofino, Santa Margherita and Rapallo in four minutes.

https://sharronbassano.substack.com/p/the-ligurian-riviera-73e

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The Danube is the exact color and viscosity of used motor oil as it flows under the Erzebét Bridge in Budapest. Grime-stained and somewhat crumbling, the Queen of the Carpathian Basin looks as if it has not been dusted or swept since 1956 — except, of course, in the thrilling, exquisitely beautiful, highly-polished tourist sectors!

Step one block out of this sparkling district and you are in the real city, a totally different city that belongs to the Magyar, not the visitor. The contrast is striking and intriguing. The outer sectors lure you like Odyssean sirens into their market places and alleys. Explore with care.

Budapest, you may find, is best viewed on a walk after dinner, when streaks of golden lights from the grander hotels and municipal buildings cast their bright reflections into the dark river. It is sheer wizardry.

Here is an absolutely loony mis-adventure in the intriguing city of Budapest. It was touch and go, but I escaped in one piece!

Zorka and the Budapest Spa

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If you are standing on the hill and can see the lighthouse off in the distance, it means it is surely going to rain. If you are standing on the hill and you cannot see the lighthouse … then it is already raining. And that is how you determine what the weather will be on any given day in Scotland. If you have an aversion to getting wet, Scotland might not be the right destination for you.

So far this morning, I have walked about two miles on an easy, but muddy trail in what is called a ‘light highland mist’, which, as any outlander knows, means just slightly less than a downpour. But, as we all know, there is no such thing as bad weather, just the wrong clothes.

I know Scotland as well as my own native country, and am unfazed by rain. The dark skies suit me fine — the drenched, bright green hills, the smell of the fish, the water-weed, the wet sheep. I delight in the rainy songs of the kittiwakes and gulls that glide around the blustery sky — they don’t even know what weather is.

Today I follow an unmarked path on the brae up behind and beyond the little seaside town of Oban. My guide is a small folded booklet of local ‘leisurely rambles’ — easy strolls for those of a ‘certain’ age who are, shall we say, less than athletic. Little books of this kind are available in any local office of tourism, and as a solo woman traveler of that certain age and fitness level, I always pick them up. The featured short walks are not that remote and are mapped out step-by-step, like going on a nature scavenger hunt. Today it’s a simple four-mile loop that goes something like this:

“Turn left onto Glencruitten Road on the south end of town, and go up the hill until you come to a sports field. Turn left and follow along beside the tracks until you pass three railway cottages. Continue through the gate, and stay on the path for about two miles. When you come to a stand of trees on your left, you will find a gate. Enter the gate, cross the long pasture and exit at the bottom of the hill. Continue along the fence one mile to arrive back in the town center.”

Lovely plan! The only problem is, on the gate there is a sign:

I sputter and sigh. Now, we know that if the bull is in the pasture with his cows, we are safe, he won’t trouble us. But if the bull is in the field alone, it is best not to enter. You say to yourself, I don’t actually see a bull, but he might be behind those trees. Is he with his harem today? Could I outrun a bull? Maybe there is no bull but the land owner just wants to discourage people from walking across his property?

So, as it sometimes happens on your walks in Scotland, you have had a nice little ramble, and now you have three options:

• turn around and retrace the way you have come - three miles

• continue walking north on the trail for four more miles to the next town and maybe take a bus back

• stay with the original plan and risk sudden acquaintance with a large, territorial bovine

It happens, and it’s often caused by that one little hiccup — you need to cross “private property” to get to where you are going.

Scotland has a very liberal ‘free access’ law — a law that allows the general public to cross through privately owned property ( a pasture, in this instance) to get to their destination. It is a legal right, but that doesn’t mean private land owners are always eager to comply. They often attempt to thwart passage across their land. They may have good reason.

The Scottish “Freedom to Roam” Act gives the general public the right to access mountains, moorlands, forests, grasslands, paths, pastures, waterways, the sea coast – whether they are owned privately or publicly. Visitors have the right to hike, ride horses, bicycle, camp and picnic any time, if they exercise that right responsibly. They are expected to respect the places they pass through and leave everything exactly as they find it.

According to the law, land owners must allow access except in the case of visitors who are doing something against the law such as disturbing the peace, poaching, allowing a dog to worry livestock, leaving trash and polluting water. Visitors are not to disturb protected wild birds, animals and plants, hunt, shoot, fish, or use any form of motorized vehicle for recreation or passage. And if the gate is closed, then close it when you pass through. If it is open, leave it open!

Some property owners, however, do not want to deal with the constant stream of walkers, period, and do find ways to hinder access without precisely breaking the law – such as posting warning signs about bulls in pastures – signs which may or may not be true, but that tend to discourage entering a gate or following a track. I share here three scenarios you might experience:

You are walking along a semi-rural route through Bannockburn, south of Stirling, and right where you are supposed to access a path, you find the land-owner has piled years worth of brush, tree branches and garden trimmings in the way. This pile completely fills the entry to the path, from one stone wall to the other stone wall, in effect, making passage impossible. But, where would you complain? And why would you? You are on holiday! A minor change of plans is in order, that is all.

You are walking above the small port town of Tobermory on the Isle of Mull, a lovely stroll high above the sea. Following the local walkers’ guide, you turn left to cross a large space of high grass to connect with a trail on the other side. A sign is posted “BEWARE OF SNAKES.” Snakes? Scotland has snakes? You have never seen a snake in Scotland, but are you going to walk through knee-high grasses, ignoring the warning? That field might be a seething nest of Indiana Jones quantities of venomous adders. So you simply turn around and look for an alternate way back to the village. Snakes or no snakes, you had a legal right to cross that field. But you accept that the landowner obviously does not want you on his property and knocking on his door probably wouldn’t change his mind.

On a lowland walk out of Melrose, your little rambling group is stopped mid-hike upon finding that the landowner is using the direct path to the Eildon Hills as a midden! All the muck from the barn and stable is dumped here at the trail head, creating a small mountain of cow and horse dung, with no access around it, as the surrounding land is very wet bog. He could have piled the poop anywhere, but he chose the middle of the path. Once again, foiled, you back up and find your way around both the midden and the bog, and eventually arrive for your dinner only an hour late.

Visitors rarely speak out, but local residents do seek action and can be quite successful. A few years ago a man purchased a stretch of ocean front property on Bay MacNeil in Ardnamurchan. He built a caravan site (RV park) and fenced it in securely, thereby blocking the public from descending the one and only path down to the isolated bay and preventing them from taking the long shore walk from Portuairk to the Ardnamurchan Lighthouse. In this case, it only took one frustrated and persistent local hero, my friend David, to raise a ruckus at the local Highland Council. As a consequence of his eloquent, compelling protest, a new footpath was soon built that gave access to the bay and to the long walk down the shore to the Lighthouse.

To sum up, let me say that Scotland is, as you know, home to some of the most impressive, easily accessible networks of hiking trails in the world. There are 32 posted long-distance walking routes, as well as 280 mountains over 3,000 feet high to climb. You will find hundreds of short trails – from creekside village footpaths, to coastal walks, to sign-posted forest trails, to epic climbs and wilderness treks. There is something for the strongest of climbers and for the elderly women out for a stroll, and everyone in between. And such breathtaking, awe-inspiring landscape it is, friends! Truly magnificent scenery on all sides.

Understand that I share these Scottish experiences, not to complain. I recall these occurrences simply as a reminder that wherever we choose to go in the world, our day rarely plays out the way we plan it - even in Scotland, the most rational, predictable, easy-going, warm and friendly place I have ever explored.

The one sure thing about travel is that there is rarely a sure thing. And that is, of course, why we go, isn’t it? If we wanted predictability we would as well stay at home!

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On the ferry crossing the English Channel, I ask the older gentleman working at the canteen:

“May I take my lunch out onto the outdoor deck?”

“Course ye can, lovey, tyke it out. Ye wanna try, my sweetheart?”

“Excuse me?”

“Ye wanna try?”

“I’m sorry … try what?

“A try, my girl, ” he says, handing me a metal tray.

It was my first European journey, I was alone and I was ready to “try” anything! I wandered in a daze through six different countries. I didn’t know where I was, nor what was happening half the time. And I was captured forever.

Over the span of twenty-five years, I returned to various lands in Europe twenty-two times, only missing 2011 and 2019-20 for obvious reasons.

I realize that a sensible woman would have put her forty-five year’s of hard-earned income away for her retirement, but I chose to spend it all on solo travel. An investment in the Bank of Joy.

Now, of course, I live on a perilously low budget — my wealth lies only in memories and stories. But what a great life I’ve had. I have no regrets.

A little traveling melody from Abby Newton and Alisdair Fraser - cello and fiddle. Click three times

I have a section on 🌿Leaves that is all short Travel Tales. I never offer advice such as where to stay, how to get there, what to eat, or what to see. My micro-stories are vivid descriptions that are meant to immerse you into the middle of things and allow you to see, feel, listen to, and taste what it is like to BE there. And to experience the odd, unexpected and often very funnny situations one must find a way out of … or into.

The journeys are mostly throughout Italy, but also to Paris, Budapest, Scotland, Sardinia, Orkney, Algiers, Luxembourg. Have a quick browse HERE and then pack your bag.

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This will conclude my little series of posts about Sardinia. I hope you have enjoyed traveling along to this unusual destination!

The restaurant dining room is no more than fourteen feet square. There are six tables and a forest of tall potted plants. The proprietor emerges from the kitchen and shakes hands with everyone in our group, kissing cheeks as if they are family members. Some of them may, in fact, be family members. He shakes my hand and welcomes me as the Professoressa, but leaves out the kissing part.

I am in Cagliari, Sardinia, where I will be helping English instructors learn new teaching methods. I am more than thrilled to be in such an exotic location, working with these lovely Sardi. I ask them to please call me Sharron, they say, “Yes, of course!” They continue addressing me as Professoressa.

As it is my first night here in this grand, almost tropical city, the senior teachers invite me out for a special treat. They are taking me to dinner at a very small local restaurant, one that is “so secret that tourists never discover it,” they say. A hidden treasure. It’s a warm, balmy evening, the light breeze carries the fragrance of tangerines, the tang of seaweed and fish. We stroll a while through small serpentine back streets until we come to a nondescript door with a miniscule brass plaque that whispers Ristorante Canne al Vento.

The rather formal waiter hands out glasses of Cannonau, Sardinia's signature red wine, and menus that are single xeroxed sheets just for this evening’s fare. It is in Italian only. My command of the language is serviceable, but not great – which is fine, as the teachers want to practice their English with me anyway. Let’s see, what do we have…?

Ricci di Mare……………….. raw sea urchin? Ah…no, thank you.

Zuppa di trippa………….cow stomach soup? I don’t think so..

Bistecca di Cavallo……..horse steak? Definitely not

Cordula con Piselli……sheep intestines with peas? You’re kidding, right?

Piedini di Maiale…………….pigs feet? Maybe next time.

Now, friends, you only have to look at me to know I am not a fussy eater, but I am beginning to get nervous. Is there anything here I have ever even thought of eating? How embarrassing.

Lumache……………………….snails? Euw.

Fave crude… raw fava beans the size of golf balls? Tempting, but no.

Polpo con patate………….a salad of octopus and potato? Pass.

Seppie en su tinta….……cuttlefish cooked in its own ink? Yeeeks!

Finocchio……………………..fennel? Now you’re talking! This I can eat!

Sanguaccio…………………blood sausage? Uh..No.

Peccorino con pane …sheep cheese and bread? Okay! Good. Whew!

They all place their orders and then each one looks over at me in anticipation. Which of these culinary delights will the Professoressa choose? I order the cheese,bead and fennel. They all appear dismayed. I have let them down.

Marina takes my hand. “Ma! Non è abbastanza! “ (It is not enough!) They all shake their heads and, all speaking at once, ply me with suggestions.

Fabio, a no-nonsense kind of guy, turns to the waiter, “Giorgio, per favore. Le lumache per la professoressa.”

“Prego, Signore,” the waiter nods and goes off to the kitchen.

Fabio, in order to augment my dinner of bread, cheese and fennel, has ordered the snails for me. I keep smiling. And drinking.

Fortunately, when my dinner arrives, I find that my snails are, happily, not of the garden variety, but rather they are large, buttered, spiral shells .…….. of pasta. Fabio nods and winks at me.

I could have kissed him. And probably did…

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The music playing in the breakfast room this morning is eccentric — one might even say schizophrenic. The following tracks are courtesy of the local radio station: Frank Sinatra, followed by Vivaldi, Michael Jackson, Tina Turner, Albinoni, Verdi and some ubiquitous, frenzied accordion scattered in between. It makes it a little hard to get into a groove, but it is actually a perfect backdrop to the strong coffee, the bread, the peccorino cheese, and the juicy blood oranges brought to my table to start the day.

I don’t begin my work until tomorrow, so the day is free for wandering and exploring. A poster is tacked to the lobby bulletin board for a special exhibit this month at the Bastione Cagliari: Strumenti di Tortura fra i Siecoli – “Instruments of Torture Down Through the Ages”. Cool. I will get over there this afternoon and see if I can learn something of a practical nature.

Cagliari is a strikingly exotic ocean-side city. The colorful, bustling capital of Sardinia, it is a cultural, educational, political and artistic center, well known for its diverse Art Nouveau architecture and monuments. It is also Sardinia's economic and industrial hub, having one of the biggest shipping ports in the Mediterranean and an international airport. For me, though, it is a heady, sensual setting, redolent of spicy fish, of fresh-baked bread and olives, of romance. The perfect place for a day dream.

All the Sardi I meet are, without exception, warm, kind and helpful. They are quick to assist, eager to talk and laugh. Whether bus driver, newspaper seller, desk clerk, waiter or teacher, they all seem to have a story for me. Okay, maybe they just want to practice their English, but I have never felt more welcomed. So much so that, somehow, I am able to deal amicably with the late dinner hour here. Ten o’clock is not so unreasonable when one is in fine company.

I feel I should give the would-be traveler in Sardinia, one fair warning, however. Speaking in general terms, and based on a very small sample, Sardis drive as if slipping in and out of consciousness. They are not the rabid, noisy, aggressive, crazed drivers one would find in, say, Naples or Boston, but more on the sleepy side or distracted, as if they simply forget they are at the wheel. I rode with six different drivers here, men and women, and quickly learned not to speak to any of them en route, and to keep my eyes closed. I count it as one of life’s miracles that I was not killed.

The Giants of Mont’e Prama

In 1974, two farmers plowing their field in western Sardinia unearthed a gigantic Iron Age carved limestone head. Subsequent excavations revealed a monumental necropolis complex, dating from 900 to 750 BCE. The giant head was the first of thousands of ancient sculptural fragments to be recovered by archaeologists at that site in the following decades.

The necropolis, which features individual tombs covered with stone slabs, included imposing statues of super-manly men, from six to more than eight feet tall. They are three distinct types of figures - boxers, archers, and warriors. This group of huge sculptures, is known collectively as the Kolossoi or Giants of Mont’e Prama.

Conservators have now reassembled twenty-eight figures from fragments excavated in the 1970s. New excavations starting in 2014 uncovered thousands of additional pieces, and at least eighty sculptures, including models of the tall stone towers called nuraghi.

In Cagliari, both the Cabras Museum and the National Archeological Museum offer spectacular exhibits of the Giants of Sardinia. And I have to say, the sculpted creatures look like visitors from other planets. Those eyes, ears, and weird tube-like projections hanging from their heads do not look like earthlings to me…

I worked with teachers in Italy for six months, and this short assignment across to Sardinia was most enlightening. Bill Bryson once said, “I can't think of anything that excites a greater sense of childlike wonder than to be in a country where you are ignorant of almost everything.”  Based on my brief first-hand experience, I agree whole-heartedly. I came to Sardinia to coach teachers, but I learned as much, if not far more, than I taught.

** On Saturday, I will re-post the last of these little Sardinian travel stories.

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This is Part 2 of a three-part travel tale. If you missed Part 1, see it HERE

The vertiginous road through the mountains has switchbacks as sharp as the crack of a whip. My bus is winding through the rugged steep countryside of central Sardinia on the way to the south coast. I have worked for three days here with a lovely group of English teachers in Nuoro, and found them absolutely delightful — warm, friendly, and ready to learn! My next training group is in Cagliari, Sardinia’s capital city on the south coast.

Sardinia has a variety of ecosystems – mountains, woods, plains, rocky coasts, wide sandy beaches and long stretches of largely uninhabited territory. I have heard it described as a micro-continent. The high landscape I travel through today is rocky and barren, covered with scrub. The road is good, though sinuous and narrow. I count the trees: a few wind-twisted umbrella pines, scattered cedars, lonely cypresses, a handful of palms and an occasional stand of immigrant eucalyptus. It is a little bleak, frankly. The gorgeous resort areas frequented by enthralled tourists are not anywhere near here, but rather all around Sardinia’s magnificent coastlines.

In a couple of the small towns we pass through, there seems to be a lot of unfinished building projects, possibly abandoned a long while ago. I get the impression of housing projects that ran out of money and stopped midway through their construction. The buildings that are finished and occupied, are large, square, postwar-style reinforced concrete, some low, some eight stories high, all entirely unadorned, unpainted. They seem to be designed with no sense of style or aesthetic in mind – just plain gray, multi-story boxes that provide shelter.

I see no evidence of urban planning. Buildings seem scattered, set up in any free space, facing any direction, like dice rolled out of a cup. I perceive no attempt at landscaping; often the construction debris has not even been cleared away. Some of the buildings seem to be falling into decay without ever having been completed! Where there are no buildings, there are cars, both running and abandoned, unsightly ravines, jagged cliffs, refuse heaps.

Let me admit that I know absolutely nothing about Sardinian socio-economic realities, but I rarely see in my travels such degraded and uninspired townscapes. I have no idea what is behind the disorder in this high, inland part of Sardinia. Unfortunately, I don’t have the language to be able to start a conversation and improve my education. One of the most important rules of travel, I have learned is this: As a visitor, I can observe and describe what I see, but I cannot – dare not, make presumptions or judge what I do not understand. How could I?

Our bus stops for fifteen minutes for a bathroom break and food. As I wait for coffee, I hear a very drunk gray-haired man lustily and dramatically singing to four uncomfortable teen-aged boys who are sitting in a booth. I think he may be giving them his entire repertoire. They smile weakly at each other and look for a way to escape the embarrassment, but they are very polite.

The mountains of the north-west and south-central regions of this large island are dotted with Sardinia’s mysterious archeological treasures, the nuraghi. They are circular, truncated towers built of dressed stone, for which, they say, “no parallel exists anywhere else in the world.” They were built in the late Bronze Age on high ground near villages, and had various functions, serving as watch towers, residences, defensive fortresses, places of worship. Some archeologists also believe they were a kind of status symbol – a family that built a nuraghe, was obviously a family of substance.

Ruins of these conical towers, some reaching the height of 70 ft. , appear throughout the entire region. Over 7,000 of them have been found on the island, and it is believed there were once more than 10,000. Today they are the national symbol of Sardinia and its distinct Nuragic culture. However, only a few of these sites are in protective custody or guarded. Sadly, as often happens, most all of them have been greatly diminished by both treasure hunters and by families who simply availed themselves of the stones to build their own homes or walls.

Here is a six-minute tourist’s-eye view of the dark, maze-like interior of a nuraghe. My explore of these dry-stone constructions was frightening and gave me subsequent nightmares, but if you are not claustrophobic, you may like it. Not sure what the language being spoken is, but it does not matter. Click the arrow three times.

The final part of my little view of Sardinia will be posted on Wednesday, September 25 - please come back to learn about the lovely Capital port of Cagliari!

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This short glimpse of the fascinating island of Sardinia was first posted in March, 2022. It is Part 1 of 3 parts - a introduction to a place few of us have ever seen.

It is ten pm and I am standing in the doorway of a rather shabby bus station in Sardinia under a dim streetlight. The night sky is absolutely clear, the wind is howling around the corners like restless spirits. The sign above the door says MACOMER, and I have no idea where that is.

I am on my way to Nuoro in the east central mountains to work with teachers. I have been dropped off in this place by the Azienda bus out of Sassari. The driver assured me that a second bus would come along to take me the rest of the way. No one told me I would have to transfer buses — or possibly they had told me, and I just didn’t understand. My Italian is not that great — my Sardinian is non-existent. It is getting later and later, darker and darker, and I am beginning to feel just a little nervous.

Not many are out at this hour, except for a contingent of lonely derelicts who are bellied up to the station bar telling long stories that, no doubt, they have told each other hundreds of times.

They seem to be drinking substantial quantities of filu ‘e ferru, a scorchingly raw Sardinian grappa. Filu ‘e ferru, which literally means “iron wire”, is the traditional drink of Sardinia, an acquavite, clear as water. It has an alcohol content above 40% and is said to “facilitate digestion and cheer the spirit”. I’ll bet.

It also seems to induce sinuses to drain and eyelids to droop. This drink, I have learned, was used for centuries as a drug and as a remedy against all diseases. It was first introduced by Catholic monks who set up their stills in the richest vineyard areas. They knew what they were doing, I’d say.

The genial young man behind the station bar is rubbing spots from the beer glasses and re-filling the racks with ‘Croc and Roll’ potato chips and ‘I Love You’ potato chips. A woman with a rain coat and a bad cough sits bundled up at a corner table, a wool scarf is on her head. Upstairs, over the bar, a band with an accordion and a tuba begins to practice. It is the kind of music one would expect to hear in Bavaria during Oktoberfest. Oom-pah, oom-pah, oom-pah-pah. Seriously?

I bought a bottle of water and was able to find the bathroom, so that’s good, but I am not certain of exactly where I am. I don’t know when, or if, a connecting bus really will come and if it does, am I standing in the right place? What’ll I do if it doesn’t come? How will I know which bus is the right one, and who will meet me when I arrive in Nuoro at nearly midnight? My language deficiency makes it hard to get answers. My agitation is rising.

But that is the thing about travel. Invariably, as soon as I am on the brink of panic, things have a way of righting themselves, of falling into place. I stand here with my bag, listening to oddly mis-located polka music, watching the stars disappear as a foggy mist blows in. Suddenly a coach pulls up right in front of me with a yellow sign in the window — NUORO. The driver greets me like an old friend, welcoming me in a language I don’t understand. I give him my ticket, and step up into a near empty bus. He hands up my bag.

When traveling, so many things are often out of our control and we always need to remind ourselves that it is smart to just wait, to relax and let go. We can’t always be in charge and that’s half the fun. Right?

By midnight, I have safely arrived at my destination. I step into a steaming shower that miraculously does not send water up my nose, down the wall or over the curtain, but actually functions as it should, melting away the last traces of anxiety. I climb into a narrow, sagging cot, comfortable and clean, and fall asleep in minutes. That is the thing about foreign travel for a single woman ( especially for a woman who does not know the language) – often a pinch of insecurity, a small dash of fear, followed closely by a friendly face, a bath and a bed. And it is all good.

I will re-post Part 2 on Saturday. Please continue the journey with me!

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A comedy of errors to brighten your day. Guaranteed 100% *schadenfreude from the travel archive of June 2023. Especially for my NEW SUBSCRIBERS.

The handsome waiter has dark hair and the melancholy eyes of a poet – deep, black, intelligent eyes with smudges of dark shadows around them. He looks like he’s been up all night pleasuring women. His subtle, but intense gaze almost makes me regret his reserved politeness. Snap out of it! He is waiting to take your order. Oh...right…let’s see…where was I?

Everything on the menu at this once-grande Belle Epoch hotel restaurant is a ticket on the coronary express: over-cooked vegetables, mega-doses of salt, fatty stewed pork, fried everything. All main dishes seem to be served under a layer of liquid red grease, heavily spiced and topped with sour cream and bacon. I order The Heartburn Special.

I assure you I am not a fussy eater. I am not averse to trying exotic foods, however my dietary restrictions often overshadow my desire for culinary adventure. Health concerns aside, meals in this comfortable, palatial, but now slightly seedy, spa-hotel are served with copious amounts of pleasant condescension by a large cadre of impeccable, formal waiters attired in smart blue jackets. Ten waiters for 15 tables stand against the wall, subtly watching the diners to anticipate our every need. This legion of liveried servers, the heavy white and gold china, crystal glasses, and mountains of over-sized silverware all attest to the prosperous, more opulent days of the 1890s.

The Magyar language seems to have zero correlation with English or with any other language I have learned to travel in. Aside from “telefon” and “posta”, all I get from staring at a sign is a head ache. I mean if you saw a sign that said,

Ne lépjen be ezen az ajtón

would you have a clue? I think not. I face words like “dohanyzas tilos” and “erkézés” and come up empty. I am not exactly dying of language deficiency, but am sorely wounded. It is all due, of course, to my lack of preparation, but Hungarian looks like Klingon to me, or the language of Mordor. I get through four days with only 7 emergency phrases in Magyar:

Yes (Igen) No (Nem) Sorry (Elnézést) Please (Kérlek)

Thanks (Köszönöm) Toilet (WC) Cheers! (Egészségére!)

Of course, you would be more prepared than I, with your sissy little electronic translators and menu scanners. Sure! Let them do the talking for you! I was, apparently, over-confident.

~~~

I am an experienced traveler, and I’ve always traveled alone, but I have to admit Budapest has been challenging, and today, upon leaving this city, I committed what could only be described as one of the worst gaffes ever perpetrated by a tourist. Or at least by me.

My suitcase was on the sidewalk as the taxi arrived. In my arms was a sturdy small open tote bag with travel snacks, a book, a sweater, and a re-corked half bottle of Tokay. The taxi driver picked up my suitcase and lobbed it into the trunk. When he tried to grab my tote bag, I shook my head and told him in careful English, “No, I want to hold my bag. I don’t want it to spill.” He growled and snatched it from me and overhanded it into the trunk. He yelled what could only have meant, “Hurry up and get in, you old bat.”

In the frantic drive to the station, swerving in and out of traffic with a driver who apparently had little to live for, the tote bag fell over and, as I feared, wine spilled onto the carpet of his trunk. Wine everywhere. He was furious. He was rabid. I feared he would bite me and I would need shots. Of course I could not explain to him that that was why I wanted to hold my bag in the first place. He called me a few severely insulting names. I didn’t need to know the language to understand what he thought about Americans and, in particular, about this one.

He was on the verge of striking me, but curious onlookers had crowded around, so instead he demanded HUF3,000! “Three thousand forint!” he yelled, shaking his fist. Actually, I think he may have been over-reacting just a bit, but what could I do? I meekly took out my wallet and counted out 3,000 forints from my wallet and mumbled apologies in five different languages, none of which he was even remotely interested in. He snatched the money out of my hand with a snort and tossed out a couple extra expletives for good measure, slammed the trunk closed and roared off. My knees were trembling so bad that I had to sit down for a minute. I was mortified by the scene I’d caused, and avoided eye-contact with anyone. The crowd dispersed, and I scuttled off to find my train car, lugging my wine-soaked bags, and making the apologetic noises of a town drunk.

Now, settled into my second-class seat, watching Budapest slowly fade behind me in the distance, I come to realize with both shame and gratitude that though my error caused me a lot of mortification and embarrassment, the fine was equivalent to only $9.

~~~

“I wanted real adventure to happen to myself,” said James Joyce. “but real adventure does not happen to people who remain at home. They must be sought abroad.”

What is this real adventure of which he speaks? For some, a real adventure might be a trek across an African desert, a journey up the Amazon by canoe, or diving in the Great Barrier Reef. For me it might be a possible dalliance with a handsome waiter ( wouldn’t be the first time, I admit), an entire menu of food I cannot digest, a language code that I cannot crack, or a narrow escape from the wrath of a (possibly) deranged cabbie.

All hearts don’t necessarily require a safari or a balloon ride to skip a few beats. Sometimes merely surviving a city — and getting to a train that carries one safely off to somewhere else, is adventure enough.

**Schadenfreude is the experience of pleasure, joy, or self-satisfaction that comes from witnessing the troubles, failures, or humiliation of someone else.

If this story of my Hungarian humiliation entertained you, you will definitely revel in my personal psychic pain in ZORKA AND THE BUDAPEST SPA

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From the archive of January 2023. I hope you enjoy this 4-minute journey. If you have read it before, thank. you!

The clock in the breakfast room has been stalled at 3:12 for several days. Time and tides move very slowly in the smaller canals of Venice in a chilly November. I sit at the table over a restorative bowl of caffe latte, a crusty ciabatta, unsalted butter and gooseberry jam. The entire front of my rumpled shirt is covered with bread crumbs.

I am basking in the minor victory of having been the first one down the hall to the shower this morning, just in time to head off the cigar-smoking Bavarian from Room 7. Scowling, he had shuffled back to his room, slippers flapping. At the pensione Mezza Luna this morning, we are the quick and the unwashed.

Last night a gondola rounded the corner of Rio Rimedio bathed in starlight just below my miniature third-story balcony. An accordion warmed the crisp winter air. A tenor was singing Santa Lucia, serenading six ecstatic Japanese gentlemen. Man! I love this stuff!

Do you ever just get little tears in your eyes when you are on the road? I mean, at moments when some old sentimental fantasy is somehow realized? Do you ever just say to yourself, “I am not going home. I am never going home,” and then try to figure out what you could sell or who could send you money?

I listened and watched until the final notes died away in the shadows. Then, suddenly struck by an unexplainable bolt of inspiration, I turned to that sagging, lumpy frame that has been impersonating a bed for the last four nights, torturing my aging bones. I threw the pillow on the floor , tucked in the sheets and blanket at the head of the bed, pulled them loose from the foot, placed the pillow down at that end and with great resolve climbed in. Ahhhh ... Un vero miracolo! It is a miraculously different mattress down at the foot! Jotting down this revelation in my notebook for future reference, and saying, “Buona notte” to the house cat who was crouching under the dresser, I slept like a woman with a clear conscience, for seven blissful hours.

I woke to the reveille of canaries that reside on the roof next to the clothesline. Thin sunlight poured into my tiny room. I lay there in heaven for a while, my bones at peace, listening to the boatmen making morning deliveries below – fruit, flowers, crates of mineral water. “Oyyy! Oyyy! Ao Hoyeee!” they call — a lively warning as they enter Rio Rimedio from Rio d’Angelo to avoid colliding around the blind turns of the canals. This is my eighth trip to Venice and, at my age, very possibly it is my last. I plan to spend this day taking time to walk slowly and really see, to fix it in my memory.

Three vignettes this morning:

Most of Venice is brick and stone; earth is scarce. On a quiet side street, I see a frustrated cat digging around in a planter box full of geraniums, round and round in circles he goes, stepping carefully over the blooms, looking for the simple necessity of a small patch of dirt.

Under a park bench I find scraps of a torn up photograph. I pick them up and put them back together like a jigsaw. A smiling couple embracing on a bridge. Apparently the romance is over.

Further down the street and around the corner, early rock and roll spills out of an open doorway of a workshop. A stone-cutter is carving names and ornaments into a tombstone to the incongruous accompaniment of the Coasters’ 1959 “Charlie Brown, He’s a clown!” Well why not?

In the small Trattoria Antica Sacrestia, the Pizza Margherita is crisp and creamy. The Pasta alle Vongole, sublime. The Fritto Misto al Mare, fish paradise on a platter. But the real reason I have lunch here every day is Vittorio, a most attentive waiter – a young De Niro with a soft voice and irresistible black eyebrows that join above his nose like the lyrical double arc of a blackbird in flight from a painting by Van Gogh. Oh, if I were only thirty years younger. Okay, make that forty. Yes, I am old, but not so old I cannot conjure up a romantic fantasy.

In the Piazetta this afternoon a solitary tourist in scuffed Adidas, camera bag slung around his neck stumbles erratically through the winter crowd as tourists in Venice do when simply over-awed by sheer iconic beauty. Mouth open, gazing up and down, he is in his own little world and is not aware of the young boy following close behind him on tip-toe. The mischief-maker mimics the wanderer’s pace and gait. Then another little boy, and a third, join quietly in the line behind the unsuspecting tourist. Soon there are five boys walking in a queue quietly behind him wherever he wanders, giggling silently, their hands over their mouths. People have stopped to watch this little prank. Finally the man turns around to discover the parade he is leading. He does a double take, sees everyone looking at him and is a good sport. He bends over in laughter, as everyone applauds the morning show. He applauds as well.

Venice is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400 bridges. Over the years I feel as if I have crossed each one of them. I have written page after page of the spontaneous delights there are to behold and experience in this small city of Titian, Vivaldi, Canaletto and high-carbohydrate foods. And, of course, it has all been told a thousand times or more by writers far more gifted than I. However, who else ever told you how to get a good night’s sleep in a sagging Italian bed?

As I end this ( perhaps my final ) paean to Venice, Queen of the Adriatic, I am reminded of the words of Walt Whitman: “… the powerful play goes on, and you may contribute a verse.”

For what they are worth, these Italy stories have been my verse among the powerful plays.

There are eighteen more short personal travel stories like this one in the TRAVEL archive. Have a little browse HERE in case you missed them. Several relate to Italy.

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A story from the travel archive of January 2023 — A four-minute walk in Venice for those who have traveled there — or those who hope to some day.

From the windows of the rooftop breakfast room this morning, I see plastic pin-wheels spinning in crockery begonia pots on the balcony. Across the narrow canal, bed sheets flap lazy on the clothes line, yellow plaster is peeling and flaking in the most aesthetic way. A tiny brown bird perches on the ancient pipes that project from the roof tiles.

Two guests come in for coffee, greeting us all — “Buon giorno”, with a German accent. Three young Japanese women in Hello Kitty T-shirts are consulting their electronic guidebooks for the day’s adventures. They dunk bread in their milky coffee, check their phones every two seconds, brush flaky bread crumbs off of their chests. A crotchety old guy in the corner, is reading Le Monde with an attitude, while the cat waits patiently under my chair hoping for one last lick of buttered toast.

Venice — “La Serenissima”, it is called, the most serene. There are no automobiles here, no buses, no scooters, no garbage trucks to offend the ears. Movement is by boat and cart and on foot. A lot of good-natured shouting and teasing occurs on the busy quays and in the markets. But in the less-traveled back streets, all is muted, fluid, winding.

Alone in these dim, quiet lanes and small sun-lit squares, I hear only the laughter of children, the cooing of doves, the rattle of pans and pots from second-story windows as families prepare their mid-day meals. I find myself walking softly so as not to disturb the peaceful rhythm of these private neighborhoods, and I wonder, momentarily, if I should be leaving a trail of bread crumbs in order to find my way back to the real world.

I was lost today for about five hours — a wonderful kind of lost. I discovered things I know I will never be able to find again – the Church of Santa Maria Formosa, the surly gray-stripe cat who thinks he owns the Campo S.Giacomo, a small damp shop that sells antique toys, a dark, covered thoroughfare with a straight-forward sign advising passers-by: “DO NOT PISS HERE”. Actually it seemed like a very convenient, unobtrusive place to piss, but I am a guest in Venice, and on my best behavior.

The sun is just now beginning to set behind S. Maria Della Salute church on its island across from St Mark’s square, and I am standing high above on a balcony attached to the church’s facade. The square below, evidently, is not the serene part of Venice. Zillions ( yes, zillions ) of tourists are wandering about taking selfies in a daze of pigeons. They seem to be desperately trying to capture the sight, sound, feel, smell and taste of this singular city on their smart phones to take back to Iowa and Osaka. The pigeons abruptly take noisy flight, an explosion of feathers and beaks, circling and flapping in formation about two feet above the heads of the squealing crowd, just to remind us who is in charge here.

Wealthy folks are lounging about drinking astronomically priced cups of coffee at Caffe Florian and Quadri, and buying Murano glassware ( much of it made in China) in small corner shops. Young folks with huge backpacks are trading travel adventures with new acquaintances on the steps of the Correr Museum, like wounded soldiers sharing war stories. A family pushes past me, the dad saying, “I could go for one right now! A Big Mac, chocolate shake and fries.” He’s been on the road one day too long, I’d say.

Two violinists are playing the Tarantella, Return to Sorrento, Strangers in the Night, and other songs tourists identify with and all seems perfectly right to me. I feel like Kathryn Hepburn in that ancient movie Summertime. You know the one I mean? A 40-ish school teacher on a long anticipated trip to Italy is looking for the romance of a lifetime, except that she feels too guilty when she finds it and runs away home. Guilt is not a word I myself can relate to, fortunately. Rossano Brazzi, here I am!

Ah, if only I could send you the smell of the cypress trees, the warmth of rough stone on the palm of my hand. I wish I could convey the flavor of the Veneto’s codfish stew with chick peas, and the exquisite colors of Bellini’s Madonna of the Trees. I wish I could write to you the sound of the waves lapping softly against the prow of a gondola as it slips into the Rio S. Polo in the moonlight.

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Oh, for Pete’s sake!  Seriously?

The over-head advertisement inside the tram in Turin this morning is a large photo of a good-looking, young man in a tuxedo who is biting the shoulder of a totally naked woman. The text of this ad, translated loosely, suggests, “The lower your appetite, the more appetizing you’ll become.” 

Allow me to share something with you. Americans are often guilty of imagining that all young Italian women are curvy and voluptuous, and older Italian women are, well … plump. Not so.

Most of the Italian women I’ve seen on trains and trams in Turin, or walking down the sidewalks of Milan, arm in arm, weigh less than 110 pounds. I am pleased to dispel stereotypes whenever I can, and I have to tell you that the women of northern Italy, young and old alike, eat pasta every single day, and still maintain healthy physical proportions. A plus-size, full-figured Italian woman is not the norm here.

Of course, I can only speak of  the northern Italians, who, I am sorry to say, vehemently deny any similarity to or relationship with southern Italians. It’s a different planet down in the Mezzogiorno, they tell me. I can’t attest to that, as all my work has been in the north.

I am happy to report, however, that after six months of living and working in the land of gelato, polenta and focaccia, I still fit into my clothing and buckle my belt in the same slot.

I have to say, though, that chances are still very slim that a handsome Italian man will ever be compelled to bite me. I’d like to see him try!

Seriously, I really would.

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A short tale from the Travel Archive. I hope you enjoy this day trip in Northern Italy.

I was introduced to my first glass of grappa last night, Nardini grappa made in the town of Bassano. The best grappa your money can buy, they told me. I felt like someone hit me in the head with a large mallet. Fortunately, I was drinking safely in my room at the time, or I might still be stumbling and muttering, lost in the poorly-lit alleys of Venice.

I had taken a day trip to the small medieval town of Bassano del Grappa – the town whose name I bear. It was a sort of pilgrimage, about one hour north of Venice. My name was displayed on the banks there, on the museum, on the shop signs and buses – even on the sewer lids. It felt like the town belonged to me.

I wandered about for hours, nosing around busy little shopping streets and arcades, and had stopped to take advantage of a park bench to rest my feet. Two floors above, in a building across the street, a pleasantly plump older woman was cleaning her windows. Suddenly she turned around and the tiny balcony became her stage. She began singing an aria in a rich, booming contralto to the pedestrians below. She waved her cleaning rag as delicately as a lace handkerchief as she sang, swaying from side to side, clutching the cloth to her more-than-ample breast for dramatic emphasis. When her song came to its lusty end, she was rewarded with sincere applause and whistles from the small crowd gathered on the street below. She bowed with great solemnity, turned, and continued polishing the windows.

God, I love Italy.

As with many northern Italian towns, Bassano was badly damaged during World War ll, and has been restored with much care. I stood on the charming *Ponte degli Alpini, a notable covered wooden bridge spanning the Brenta. The iconic symbol of the city, it has been destroyed and faithfully rebuilt many times since the 13th century. From my vantage point, with the heavy rumble of the waters rushing beneath, I saw homes on both sides of the river that still bear the scars of artillery fire in their plaster walls, left that way all these many years on purpose, I would imagine, as a reminder of their resilience.

Though Bassano has several war memorials, I found one to be particularly touching. In 1944, there was a rastrellamento or a round-up of the partisans in the area, which culminated in the hanging of thirty-one young Bassano men in the center of the town. The monument is on what is now named the *Viale dei Martiri , a circular esplanade with a view out toward Monte Grappa. It is a small park encircled by 31 identical trees. Each tree has a pot attached to its trunk filled with blooms, and on each pot is an engraved plaque bearing the name and photograph of one of these martyred sons and husbands. As I stepped from tree to tree looking at the faces, reading their names – Fabio, Lorenzo, Angelo, Gianni, tears clouded my eyes to think of the pain this town still feels and to see how lovingly they have remembered their lost ones for more than seventy years with this tribute.

I put my book down early tonight. By nine o’clock, I’d read the same page three times and still wasn’t taking it in, and, let’s face it, Thomas Mann is not that challenging. It could have been the second dram of grappa. Or perhaps that lone 40-watt light bulb dangling at the end of a cord from the ceiling was just no match for the full moon over the dome of Santa Maria Formosa outside my window. Maybe it was the enticing fragrance of the simmering cioppino coming from a restaurant across the canal that stalled my concentration. Whatever the cause, Mann slipped to the floor, forgotten, and I fell asleep in a monumentally sagging bed with a little smile on my lips.

* Ponte degli Alpini is a bridge dedicated to the Alpini, the Italian mountain infantry

* Viale dei Martiri is Avenue of the Martyrs. The monument is sited on the exact spot that the young men were executed.

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