Today was 13 miles walked and 400′ climbed. Totals are now 241 miles hiked and 24,800′.
Just one more day …
Okay, food is a big part of ours, and any hikers journey. We have been walking for nearly a week through the Rice Belt of Italy and have yet to have risotto! Also, this area of Lombardi is famous for goose dishes and we haven’t sampled.
Until last night! We found a great restaurant and thoroughly enjoyed a risotto dish (yum),
And goose breast.
Honestly, that goose breast would challenge any tritip for flavor and texture. It was excellent!
Today’s walk started with more fields of wind-damaged trees
When we passed a cornfield with signs of wind damage, it was time to do an internet check.
Well, about 6 weeks ago, a”super cell” passed through the area spawning multiple tornados! Wow! Again, we’re glad we weren’t here, then!
We are now about 20 miles directly south of Milan. The Milan Airport is about 10 miles north of Milan. Not surprisingly, we were accompanied by a steady stream of planes landing, every couple minutes.
Lunch: We typically bring our lunch fixings, bread, turkey, and cheese, etc, purchased the night before. Around noon, we’ll look for a shady spot and ideally a bench or table. As we passed through a town, we were searching for that “spot”.
No success, but there was a store along the way, so we stopped for some cold drinks, then found a shady spot near a small building that had a “purified water” dispenser. It was very quiet and shady, so down on the ground we went!
The bread came out, the cheese, the turkey … it was all spread out around us (as we sat on the shaded ground). As soon as everything was spread out, it seemed like HALF THE TOWN came to that little building for water!
There we were, these poor Pilgrims, sitting on the ground, trying to eat a morsel of food. Somewhere between hilarious and embarrassing is what we felt!
It tipped dramatically to hilarious when one of the locals went to his car and brought out a huge roll of paper towels. He gave it to Diane.
After trying to say, “thank you but no thank you” in Italian, we gave in and took a few. We gave the roll back. He then unrolled about 20 sheets of paper towels and gave them to us. Then he tried to give us the whole roll!
Bill, using sign language, explained that we are hiking the Via Francigena and cannot carry them! He finally relented! Those, poor starving Pilgrims…
We wished we had a film of the whole affair. Quiet shade, half the town showing up, then the generosity. Only on a Camino!
Ciao for now!
It’s a good thing you guys are burning so many calories walking! Lol 😆 of course, I don’t think that’s ever been your problem with all the walking, swimming and biking, that the two of you do. Just another glorious day in paradise, eh?
Hi Willow! Yep, we’re doing our best to burn calories so that we can consume them! It’s our job … we do it well!
And all the company that you had for lunch! They probably thought, all those poor homeless people. What great memories
Willow, We think that maybe that gentleman with the paper towels thought we were destitute … on the ground with our meager crumbs spread out. Our only defense is that we thought we sat down in a very quiet, deserted part of the town. Apparently, not so!