This is my diary of my break in Italy last month. I've written it in the present tense - an affectation perhaps but the experiences seem to come alive when it's written as though it's happening now, I think....
February 18th 2008
The plane's late. It touches down at about 10.30 at night. At Capodichino airport I receive the keys of a hired five door Fiat Punto and find my way to the car park. Opening the boot needs input from a group of grinning Italian boys who are admiring the perfectly ordinary-looking car next to it. Having further expanded their grins by trying to get into the passenger seat, I try to come to terms with the gears - as expected, on the wrong side, arranged in an inside-out format. Driving on the right isn't the issue - sitting on the left is the issue.
Not too smoothly, I nose out of the car park and drive carefully round the block, searching for the sign to the motorway towards Salerno that I've so often seen from the Sorrento-bound bus. In the dark, everything's unfamiliar. Now I'm making for the centre of Naples, cursing loudly.
In a wide elegant square lined with hotels, I'm considering parking and asking for a room in one of them when I spot a sign to the airport. I head that way, in my relief cutting up a lone fellow-driver as I turn left across his path. I get my first good hooting-at.
I almost miss it again - a tiny turning on the right, almost an alley-way, signposted to the A3 out of Naples. At twenty-five miles an hour, I leave the city behind.
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"Keep always on the right after Pompeii," Tina has said. "Or you'll end up in Salerno." She makes it sound like a fate worse than death.
And here I am, at Salerno and by the looks of it on my way past it to somewhere called Giove. I hastily veer into a little turning off the dual carriageway, marked "Centro". I stop to phone Tina. She sounds exhausted but resigned to my stupidity.
I have to follow the coast road out of the centre of Salerno. It will take an hour, maybe more.
Wrestling with the unfamiliar gears, I follow my nose and the signposts begin to read "Costiera Amalfitana". Out of the other side of Salerno and on to a narrow pitch black road which seems to have been designed by an engineer inspired by a length of coiled string. The sea is on my left and to my right the rocks that have been dynamited aside to make the ledge I'm driving on. Round a steep bend I encounter a parked car to my right. There's a minor impact as my wing mirror clips it. I hear a tinkle as something rolls away into the darkness. Guiltily I drive on up the forty-five degree angle of the hill.
(Later I discover that it's the Punto's mirror casing that went - I don't notice for a day because the mirror face is undamaged, only the wiring is exposed and has to be taped up with a polythene bag to keep it dry.)
The journey takes me through Cetera, Maiori, Minori, to Amalfi. After Amalfi I start to feel more confident. The road is more familiar, wider, and finite. As I pass through the tunnel at Furore at about 12.30a.m. I feel I'm coming home. I - and the Fiat - have made it to Praiano, both more or less intact…
February 19th 2008
The day after I take up residence in the apartment next to Tina, she has to go to her mother's for two days because her uncle has died suddenly. Hospitably she invites me to go with her, but I say no, I want to go to Paestum and her mother needs Tina's undivided attention.
It's a lovely day, cloudless and sunny. I walk down the road to the Miramare to see if N is in and to show him my prints. The sea glints as if it's summer, not February.
The gate clicks open to my pressure on the bell. Old S is in the courtyard. He greets me with cries of surprise, pleasure and welcome. A, who has had an email from me to say I'm coming to Italy, comes out, his face lighting up. N is out, it seems.
"We are going down to the other house". A means the Miramare. "You can come."
We set off, old S pottering on ahead. He unhooks a bag of cabbages from a door knob as we pass. At the hotel, A unlocks the side gate where a generator rattles and pulses. We go down narrow stone steps to a yard I've not seen before.
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Cages of rabbits blinking at us expectantly. A is taking handfuls of dry food from a sack and filling the hoppers along the front of the two rows of cages. Each cage is just big enough for one large or two or three half-grown animals.
A's father is in the darker half of the outhouse. I can hear chickens and see him collecting eggs.
Now A shares the cabbages among the rabbits. They eat with satisfied, half-closed eyes, and preen their sleek fur afterwards.
The air is full of the deafening roar of the generator, but no smell. The rabbit cages, including the floors, are made of wire mesh and the droppings fall below them, dry and odourless.
"For eating?" I mouth to A. The noise prevents normal speaking. He nods. I think about battery farming and cruelty to animals. But these rabbits seem healthy and even happy. They're safe, dry and among their own kind. They're breeding. Even though they have never felt the grass between their toes, are they being ill treated? I decide they are not.
The chickens strut and peck freely in their half of the shed. There's a cockerel with half a dozen hens. They seem to be laying freely.
I'm left in charge of old S while A disappears. Or is he left in charge of me? I watch the rabbits, wishing I had my sketchbook to hand. The old man continues to potter for a while, then leads me back up to the road. At the gate, A appears, suddenly angry with his father's querulous questioning. He strides away, back to the house.
I follow the old man. He has begun to go down the steep steps towards the cabins. He collects a pair of secateurs and begins clipping the shrubby hedge at the edge of the terrace.
I'm not sure what I should do. The sun is warm, the sea calm and blue, the sky luminescent. I sit on a stone bench and doze. I'm totally at peace, as usual at the Miramare. The sea's wash on the rocks, the sounds of people working, even the generator, now far above me and muted, the occasional blare of the Sita bus passing by on the narrow road, all the familiar sounds wash over me comfortingly.
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A is on the terrace above, fixing some electrical installation in the cabins. As I say goodbye he tells me that the weather will be changing soon. The ruins at Paestum are very interesting, but only in good weather. I would do best to go there tomorrow, if I'm going.
This spurs me into a decision. I'll drive to Salerno, along the coast road that I had to travel last night, and stay tonight in a hotel there. Then I can drive on and spend Wednesday in Paestum. Tina is away at the wake for her dead uncle tonight, in any case.
The sun is going down on a beautiful calm day as I drive off. In Cetara I pause and take photos of the town and its tower on the headland.
I realise that the towns on the coast road conform to a pattern: a tunnel to approach the outskirts, a view across an inlet of the Bay of Salerno, to towers on a rocky headland. The town climbing up the hill behind, houses clustered round the mosaic dome of a central church, a piazza in front of the Duomo and the civic buildings. From Amalfi to Maiori, Minori, Cetara, I drive, savouring the clear blue sunset-shaded sky.
At Salerno I take a wrong turning and head a few miles inland, find myself on a toll road and take advice from the attendant, an understanding, twinkling man who has seen more lost tourists than I have had hot pizzas, I think. I end up safely in Salerno and it's getting dark.
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Salerno is a busy port with a wide sea front. I drive along by the sea, looking for a hotel. Remembering that Tina was concerned that I might not find hotels open beyond Salerno at this time of year, I stop at the first one I see, a large modern block called the Grand Hotel, right on the sea front. It has a wide paved area in front of it, packed with smart cars, with a notice warning all drivers not to park in front of the hotel.
There isn't any room to park there, anyway, so I dutifully drive through to a dusty public parking area behind. Too late I spot the underground parking facility. I can't face the manoeuvre to unpark the Punto which I have now snugly positioned between a truck and some scooters., I regret having left my smart skirt behind in Praiano because this looks like a hotel with pretensions. A vast foyer lined with marble lies behind the revolving door at the entrance.
The Grand Hotel is inhabited almost exclusively by men in suits, on expense accounts, which may explain the price and the marble halls. It's nice to have a proper shower and a bath - luxuries not available at the apartment n Praiano. I take full advantage of all the facilities before venturing out into the nightlife of Salerno.
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I've been surprised to find that the hotel has no internet access. It is disabled, it seems - a situation that I also find in one of the other two hotels I visit in the week. The receptionist has given me a map of the town centre and I walk for 15 minutes or so into the middle of the town, find a public internet point and read my emails. I'm glad to find that even Salerno has its café district where Italians are promenading and sitting, in fur coats and woolly hats, outside in the street.
I find a restaurant open but empty and unnecessarily I book a table for later. Then I go for an aperitif in one of the cafes. It's a ritual that I enjoy, watching people and drinking a glass of red wine with bowls of pastries, nuts and slivers of cheese included in the price. I choose Il Castello d'Artiche for this and the nibbles are excellent.
I go back and claim my reserved table in the restaurant. There are now three other customers, probably regulars, three men at one table, who look curiously at me as I am seated by the owner at the table next to them. It's a small, homely place with a good menu.
I opt for spaghetti with sea food, which is excellent, and a large grilled fish with a mixed salad. I know the fish will be expensive ( it's sold by the kilo and that's always expensive and unpredictable in price.) White wine to go with the fish and taramisú after it comes to €42. When I turn down the offer of a complimentary limoncello, the owner offers me a free espresso instead. By that time the only other customers are a family of three including a grown-up daughter, who are cheerfully celebrating something, I'm not sure of the details - my Italian doesn't extend far enough. It's a pleasant evening.
Back through the almost deserted streets, I hurry because I've seen a beggar earlier on, being hustled away from the internet centre where he'd followed me with a wheedling request for money. The girl running the internet centre, a buxom, raw voiced, cheerful young woman, has given the young mendicant no chance to hassle her customers. I don't want to meet him or his like again in the dark deserted street. But like most people in Salerno this chilly night, he's found somewhere out of the wind to shelter in. I hope so, anyway.
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20th February 2008
Breakfast at the Grand Hotel Salerno is a muted affair. The sun is slanting through the slats of the Venetian blinds and across the gold brocade tablecloths as the men in suits gravely pick out the miniature pots of jam to go with their croissants and bread rolls and pour milk on to their cereal.
I have misread the card in the bedroom that relates to breakfast and have already been served coffee there by a kind waitress who explains that breakfast in my room will cost me 20% more than the restaurant menu price, whereas if I go to the dining room it's included in the price of the stay. It's been so long since I've stayed in a hotel with room service, I should have remembered this universal rule. They don't charge me, this time, but I don't get coffee served to me in the dining room as well.
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In the car park where the Punto waits, I approach the car with sudden misgivings - at least it's still there. But has anything happened to it? I should have put it into the underground car park. Sure enough, on the bonnet there's an ugly scoring, about two inches wide, paint removed down to the metal, and deeply dented. I'm distraught. Then remember my collision damage waiver and tell myself to be philosophical. (It's only when I look properly at the documentation I signed for the car at the airport, two days ago, that I realise that this is old damage, recorded on the papers, perpetrated by a previous client)
Still fluttering from the apparent confirmation of my lack of responsibility in leaving the Punto in jeopardy all night, I gently accelerate and shoot backwards. Screaming quietly, I fumble for the brake and gear lever with both hands flailing. Lucky that the car that was close behind me last night has gone. I stop within inches of disaster. Dare I leave this car park? But I can't afford to spend my holiday in the Grand Hotel Salerno, so I pull my shoulders back, breathe deeply and tell myself that I am not really a waste of space in a car and I can do this.
I circle the one way system a couple of times and get on to the coast road again.
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"Just keep on going, with the sea to your right," Tina's advice was simple and it's effective. It's a long, dull, flat drive between pine forests edging the coast and a succession of tawdry motels and "resorts", all closed up for the winter, but at last the brown tourist signs are offering "Paestum" with a picture of a Roman arch.
I miss the direct route to the town and drive round three sides of the city wall to an empty car park which costs nothing this time of year because no-one is manning it. As I walk towards the entrance gate to the Graeco-Roman city I get a fine view of the two huge Greek temples at the seaward end of the settlement. In the distance there's another, near the ticket office. In between, low ruins of foundations, huge fallen dressed stones and pillars and a few tourists picking their way through the pathways among them. It's early and few people are about.
At the ticket office I have the usual gratifying conversation about my age as I try for a pensioner's reduction, forgetting that pensioners start at 65 in Italy so I have three years to wait. The smart young woman in the ticket office says all the right things about how young I look and I have to pay full price - good value - 8 euros for a ticket that lets me into the city and also its museum.
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The sun is high now. People are taking off their padded jackets, hats and scarves, to wander round the ruins and read information about the buildings whose remnants still stand. The three huge temples have been restored to some extent, I gather, but there has been much less restoration than in Pompeii or Herculaneum,
I come across a fenced off area where men with wheelbarrows and trowels are excavating the foundations of a house. As I pause to watch, one of them finds something in the dry soil, dusts it carefully and slips it into a polythene bag. Absurdly I feel privileged to have witnessed a sliver of the past brought into the daylight after who knows haw many hundreds of decades.
"Posso?" I wave my camera at the excavating men and they straighten up and grin.
"E molto interessante!" I gush.
"Si, si, lui é molto interessante, forse!" laughs the older one, pointing to the younger man. He smiles and is it my imagination or does he preen and pose a little?
"No, no, tutti! Tutto é interessante! Il lavoro!" I point the camera, snap the picture.
"Buon' lavoro, ciao" and I go on down the dusty path. I wonder how many artefacts lie in layers under my feet.
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Paestum's a huge site, a town, with a forum, a little theatre and these enormous temples which must have dominated the whole area, I'd have thought, even when the houses and shops were still standing around them. As I walk up to the seaward end of the site, where the oldest temples lie, the scale of the pillars becomes so impressive that I feel I have to do something other than take photos, even though photos are the most easy and accurate way of recording them. I perch on a fallen stone at a short distance from the Temples of Neptune and Hera and draw.
I only have a small sketchbook with me and the image soon becomes so large that I can only fit four and a half pillars on the page. I become interested in the worn stone details that have survived the 2,600 years since Paestum was founded by the Greeks, their weathered grooves and elegant Doric capitals outlined against the blue sky that has not yet begun to cloud over.
Very few other people are around and I don't find the usual obliging Japanese tourist to take a photo of me in front of this ancient structure to show the scale of it. I set my camera on self-time, perch it on the rock where I've been sitting, and rush over to the boundary fence of the temple of Hera. I try not to look too much out of breath and lean nonchalantly on the wooden strut of the fence.
Passers by glance up at me but I'm out of reach of curious art critics and happily work there for two hours. The sun begins to fade behind drifting clouds that foretell tomorrow's change in the weather.
Most other people seem to be strolling with their partners, except for an English family with a couple of precocious pre-teen children. The adults mutter to each other disapprovingly as they look up at me ("what would happen if everybody sat on these historic stones?"). But their attention is mainly on airing their knowledge of the technical terms of Graeco-Roman architecture as they field and encourage searching questions on archaeological themes from the children.
I used to know the parts of a Greek temple, when I was their children's age, but my patience with fact has worn thin over the years. I don't retain the details, just my awe in the face of the age and scale of these stones, the ritual and pageantry they've been used for, and the generations that have revered, assaulted, depended upon and finally neglected them.
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There's a very good web page on Paestum's history, with photos that are very like my own, and I'm posting its address here for you to look up, rather than plagiarising the work done by its compiler:
http://www.paestum.de/en/paestum.htm
On that page there is also a photo of the Church of SS Annunziata, an elegant peeling little baroque façade next to the pizza house where I go to fill a sudden void that opens up in my stomach when I finish drawing. I'm suddenly very hungry. It's three o'clock and Italians are either eating or resting if at all possible.
The tables are empty except for a lady of about my age who is immersed in her book. I'm brought a menu and I'm taken aback by the range of pizza toppings and the relatively low prices. I'm used to Amalfi Coast prices.
This eatery, in this tourist trap, provides a real pizza - not one of those cellophane wrapped, microwaved efforts that I've met in similar locations before. I eat well. I can't have wine, to my regret, because soon I'll be back on the road to Praiano.
A school trip of Italian teenagers makes a bid to take over all the remaining seats outside the pizzeria, chattering and laughing and teasing each other. Some of them are instantly aware that I'm not Italian and they start to greet me in English: "How do you do? How are you? Are you American? Are you English? Are you Aussi? Where do you come from?"
I'm tired and suddenly feel very English. My Italian language deserts me. I want to eat my pizza in peace. Luckily, the group decide it's too cold to sit outside and they all surge away, calling back chummily, "Goodbye" and "Have a nice day". I respond with "Ciao, á rivederci" and thankfully watch them chatter out of sight like a flock of exotic starlings.
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Before I leave, I want to use the other part of my 8 euro ticket and I cross the little piazza to the museum. I'm glad I did. Inside it's bright, modern and well labelled in Italian. This is a surprise and so different from the archaeological museum I visited in Naples in 2004 . There the mosaics and important finds from Pompeii and Herculaneum were displayed on the fourth floor with no signs to point the tourist towards finding them easily.
I find my reading of Italian is good enough for me to decipher most of the information in the museum here at Paestum and there are some labels in English too.
The pots in the museum are beautiful, sensual, bellied shapes decorated with pictures of figures of idealised beauty and ugliness, in terracotta, white and black. There are cycles of carvings from the peristyles of the temples and paintings and reliefs and paintings on whole tombs taken from the site. Statues and figurines are there, of all the periods of long history of Paestum, smiling their bland archaic smiles.
I spend a relaxed three quarters of an hour browsing in the museum. I buy the guide book in English,and wish I had the energy left to make some direct drawings of the items in the cases. But it's getting late and I want to drive back to Praiano in the light.
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I get back to the apartment next to Tina's at about six o'clock. We're both very tired. Tina has driven further than me, and she has had a much more stressful two days with her grieving relatives. She tells me about it over supper.
When I go into my apartment to get ready for bed, I'm aware of a strong smell - drains are blocked somewhere. I don't want to keep Tina up late, but she comes in and agrees that the problem is sewage based. Not much we can do tonight, though, so I put on my thick woolly socks, open the window and try to sleep.
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February 21st 2008
The rain on the balcony wakes me up at intervals in the night. Getting back to sleep is difficult because of the smell of drains that's wafting through the apartment. It's cold with the window open.
At seven I give up the idea of more sleep. It's very grey outside when I open the shutters. The heavy rain's subdued to a thin drizzle on the cold wind. A was right - I've done the best thing, going to Paestum while the sky was blue. But what can can I do on this grim grey morning?
The smell is overpowering and that's the deciding factor. (I've been a little spoilt by the splendours of the Grand Hotel, too, I must concede)
I dress and go and see Tina.
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"I've decided to use the car today, go and see a bit more of Italy, maybe stay over somewhere. I hope you don't mind," - I feel a bit disloyal - "but the weather is so bad and I only have six days here…"
Tina shows what a good friend she is. "I was quite surprised when you came back here last night - I thought you might've gone on, seen some more of Calabria. Of course I don't mind. It's your holiday."
This time I pack my smart skirt to take with me. I look on the map and wonder how far north I can get in a day. Tina and I have looked at the TV weather forecast over breakfast and it's sunny in Florence.
But first I must see N, at the Miramare. He asked me to bring some prints of my paintings to hang in the cabins. I put my bag in the car and walk down the road in the drizzle. The men who are always fixing engines in the workshop opposite the Miramare no longer stare curiously as I come down the hill and cross the road to ring the bell.
The gate clicks open after a pause and I go down the steps to the little courtyard. A is there, dressed to go out. N appears after a moment, in working clothes. He greets me warmly and makes us coffee. He politely admires the prints and buys three. I'm surprised by the one he admires most - the beach scene. "That's A's girlfriend," I joke, pointing to the figure in a black bikini in the foreground.
I explain that I'm going to drive north today, maybe to Florence, maybe stopping at Perugia, which I've heard is an interesting mediaeval town.
"See you in May," calls N as I start back up the hill where the Punto is parked. I'm expecting to come back before I go home this time and tell him so, but in the end that's my last sight of the two brothers before my next trip.
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The road to Perugia is not quite direct. I've decided to go there because I've been to Florence before, in another life, and because Perugia is smaller and less daunting to arrive in without a hotel booked in advance, I think.
The first hour is spent getting to Naples on the A3. I take a wrong turning off the coast road at one point and find myself in the dockland district of Castellamere, driving up a one-way lane that turns out to be blocked without warning at the other end. At least ten cars have followed me. I get out and wave my arms about, looking foreign, female and foolish.
"Cosa fare?" I call to the men behind who are tuning up their hooters. "Sono inghlese!"
An understanding, calm young man comes to the rescue, gets out of his car and moves the barrier out of the way. Led by me, we all do a U turn up the other lane of the road, in the direction we came from, and I'm back on track.
The dual carriageway broadens out after Naples and I join the Florence-Salerno road. This is easy, I'm thinking. I stop at a service station twice for petrol and a panino. I know I have to strike out inland sometime after Rome. The old saying "all roads lead to Rome" has never seemed more true. Rome seems to go on for ever - turning after turning is presented. I'm quite scared of finding myself in the centre of Rome and I keep going.
In the event I do turn off too early and I'm on the way to Aquila when I realise it. I stop at a service station and ask advice as well as filling up. Most of the petrol stations are manned rather than self service. My poor bashed Punto attracts sad shakes of the head from the middle-aged men who fill the tank. I feel embarrassed and guilty, as though I've harmed a vulnerable creature.
On their advice, I turn round at the next toll station and soon I'm back on the right road. The last part of the journey seems interminable but at last I see Perugia's hilltop. The sun is going down. It's taken me seven hours to drive from the Amalfi Coast to Perugia.
I follow signposts pointing to hotels and I'm led down into a dank dip between hills within the town. I take one look, turn round and retrace my steps - I'm tired but this is not the spot for me. I've seen another sign, to "La Perusia Ristorante & Villa" and that's where I make my stop. It's a good choice.
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I book in and I'm apologetically charged two thirds of the room rate of the Grand Hotel Salerno by a charming young male receptionist. The receptionists get younger as one grows older, I'm finding. (I suppose that also goes for policemen, ticket collectors, traffic wardens and really just about anybody with a job.)
He hands over the key to a double executive room, which he explains is normally much more expensive but it's a very quiet time of year for the hotel. I make myself thoroughly at home in this big comfortable room. In particular I make full use of the huge bath in the ensuite bathroom .
Then I go across the courtyard to the restaurant. I'm too tired to go exploring Perugia tonight and I'm hungry.
The restaurant is in the Villa, an eighteenth century mansion that was the original building on La Perusia's site. The restaurant is quite stylish in an old fashioned way, with the usual gold cotton brocade tablecloths and napkins and an aura of extreme decorum.
I'm glad I packed my smart skirt this time.
There are a few other diners and the waiter is kept fairly busy, bowing from the waist and pulling chairs out, handing menus and gravely making suggestions to clients who hesitate over their choice. He is an elderly man with a very professional persona and a slight limp. He asks doubtfully, will I have wine, or sparkling water? Both, I say without hesitation. A large glass of red is brought - I've chosen gnocchi (potato dumplings in a sauce) and a lamb cutlet.
The food is perfect. I find the glass of wine very good, too, and it's a relief not to be driving anywhere afterwards. By the time I've finished the meal and the waiter is starting to smile and offer me another glass of wine (I've had enough, though) I've decided to stay a second night at La Perusia.
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February 22nd 2008
The weather forecast on Tina's TV was right. It's a blue sky, fluffy cloud morning with the promise of real sun to come. I'm up early, having breakfast in the Villa, where the upper floor is set out with the usual cereal and rolls, slivers of cheese and thin cut prosciutto and some very delicious pastries and cakes. A couple whom I've noticed in the dining room last night are already there and we have a chat. They're from Oslo and speak and understand some English. They're leaving to drive home this morning.
The receptionist (a different, equally charming and beautiful young woman) gives me advice on exploring Perugia, and a map to guide me, and I set off towards the Centro Istorico, the old town district.
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It's fresh bright weather and I feel lucky to be here, in this provincial town surrounded by people who are not on holiday but going about their everyday business. Being built on hills, Perugia has wonderful views from every open vantage point. I slip behind the post office, for example, and take photographs from the car park there. Normally you would see for miles but today there's a change-of-season haze in the valleys.
After five or ten minutes I reach an enormous archway. A narrow street leads further up the hill beyond it. This is the Arco Etrusco. There are sixteen gates into the city listed in the guidebook that I buy in a little shop just inside the archway.
Perugia's history extends back to the Etruscan civilisation that came before the Romans. It's thought to have been founded in about 600 BC. The Romans took over in about 200 BC and after Julius Caesar's death the city became the centre of a quarrel between Octavian and Lucian Antony, two of the brothers of Mark Antony. It was besieged and burnt down in 40 BC and rebuilt by Octavian Augustus afterwards. It became a Christian centre early on, a bishopric in about 500 BC and was the focus of a lot of political intrigue and conflict up to 1000 AD. My guide book, written by Francesco Frederico Mancini and Giovanna Casagrande, gives a full account of the long and turbulent history of the town, right up to the present day.
The streets that run between the Arco Etrusco and the main piazza of the city, Piazza Novembre IV, are very ancient. Via V. Rocchi is nicknamed "via Vecchia" ("the old street"). a parallel street, via Bartolo, was opened in 1378.
I come out of the shadows of the tall mediaeval palaces and into the wide space of the Piazza Novembre IV. The Great Fountain is not playing, but the sun is beginning to shine properly now and in contrast with the side streets there are a lot of people in the piazza. On the steps of S Lorenzo, the Duomo, sit dozens of students from the university, as well as sightseers like me. From the height of the steps you can see far off, down at the end of a wide thoroughfare past the Palazzo dei Priori, a hint of the distant view across the valley. People are scattered like ants in the piazza below me.
The architecture, so different from the baroque curlicues and tiled domes of southern Italy, is vertical, pointed arches and square towers aiming at the sky. The battlements along the facades, trefoil windows and gothic arcades on the upper floors of the palaces remind me of the architecture of Venice.
I spend a long time up there in the sun, drawing my own version of the picture that is on the cover of the guide book. Surrounded by the babel of voices, speaking in many tongues, I'm happy to be part of the tourist scene. I'm accosted by a couple of people who want to sell me things but they go off philosophically enough when I shake my head and go on concentrating on my drawing.
There's an exhibition of Pintoricchio's paintings showing at the Galleria Nationale di Umbria, on the upper floor of the Palazzo dei Priori. I'm tempted for a moment but once I go inside the cool hall to buy a ticket I change my mind. It's on till the summer. The sun is too good to miss.
I buy a very large ice cream and sit on a wall near the Great Fountain to eat it. When I get up to leave, I realise that my sunglasses, which I'd taken off and put down on the wall to take a photo, have already left, probably with the group of students who were chatting nearby. Last time that happened to me was exactly three years ago, I think, nostalgically, the first time I visited Sorrento on my own.
I go into one of the expensive shops off the piazza and buy a pair of sunglasses at sale price. They have strange flanges on the sides and I'm not surprised they're on special offer, but they fit, and I can't drive tomorrow without sunglasses. The sales girl is very helpful and tells me they look absolutely sweet.
Then I wander about the old city, following no particular itinerary. I know I'll be back. That's when I'll use my guide book, which has six different walks mapped out, with information on the churches and palazzos that are on the routes. But today, I just want to find my own way around and soak up the sun and the atmosphere. I walk and walk and make a great loop, coming across tiny alleys and streets full of window boxes of flowers, little churches that are certainly in the guide book, and other gates in the city wall. I follow my nose and find my way back to La Perusia before the sun goes down.
In the evening I make the mistake of trying a restaurant in via Vecchio which at first looks promising but which turns out neither to serve authentically good Italian cooking nor to be as cheap as it first looked. I should have stayed in for dinner. When I pay my bill next morning I find that "Ristorante La Villa Perusia" is no more expensive than the dive that I visited tonight. You don't always get what you pay for.
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February 23rd 2008
I’ve slept well in my executive room in Hotel La Perusia and I’m quite sorry to check out, after a good breakfast. I’m pleasantly surprised by the charge for dinner on the first night. It was a large, delicious two course meal with a big glass of good red wine, a bottle of sparkling water and an espresso, in very civilised surroundings, and it cost €28 - about £17 or $35. Perugia costs me two thirds as much as Salerno per night.
I decide to drive south towards Naples the pretty way today (my flight is tomorrow evening from there). I see on the map that I can go to Assisi on the way back, and then down a road through hills rather than a flat boring motorway, and join the A3 further south.
As soon as I get into the car I realise that my day off has done me good. My left hand no longer leaves the wheel to search in vain for a gear lever and my right hand goes to the gears with unerring accuracy. I know how wide the car is. I feel like superwoman, especially when I find my way straight to Assisi with no U turns.
Assisi at 9am is peaceful and empty except for big trucks cleaning the streets, the odd monk and a few early bird souvenir salespeople opening up shop. By the time I leave at 11am it’s looking more like the tourist trap I anticipated before I came. I spend two hours wandering happily among the many churches and the old streets and steps of this hilltop town.
The guidebook lists twelve churches altogether. There’s also a fort standing above the town. The book recommends spending at least three days there, and there is so much to see, I shall have to go back after this flying visit and take in some more of it.
I park on the outskirts, where later I realise that all the coaches park, and walk in. I realise too late that I could have driven right up to the Church of St Francis, this early in the morning, but I do like wandering about in places on foot, anyway.
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The first church I come to is St Chiara, a big one with a castellated tower and huge flying buttresses. I spend some time admiring it inside and out, and taking photos.
By the time I find St Francis’ Church the sun’s quite high and the white facade of the upper church is dazzling. The weather is perfect. Brilliant sun, no wind. So still that there’s a haze all over Umbria. There are wonderful views from this town, but my photos probably won’t show them.
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The church of St Francis has three levels, two above ground and the third the crypt where St Francis, the founder of the Franciscan order of monks, is buried. He was canonised two years after his death, and that year, 1274, the first stone of the church was laid.
I contribute all my small change (about €5) to listen to an autoguide which if I’d finished it would have taken about an hour to show me round the church. It’s good, but I don’t want to leave too late.
The upper church has a beautiful, gleaming white facade and inside there are systems of frescos by Giotto, Cimabue and other great mediaeval masters. The church was very badly damaged by an earthquake in 1987 so the lower series of frescos, on St Francis’ life, are in particularly good condition because they’ve been perfectly restored. (I remember the worldwide public appeal for money to help with this work) The upper frescos are on the New and Old Testaments and are not in such an intact state. The colours are the beautiful warm earth colours (umbers, sienas) of the Umbrian geology.
I stand looking over the parapet of the piazza in front of the topmost level of Chiesa S Francesco. The marble piazza on the level below has a line of tourists straggling up to the entrance on that floor. I imagine that in the summer months the geometric pattern of the piazza will be hidden altogether by pilgrims and tourists.
A trio of young Italians ask me to take their photo as they stand against the wide landscape beyond the parapet. In return, I ask them to photograph me as I pose in front of the vast façade of the church. I’m dwarfed by the structure, of course, but I want to remember the scale of the building.
You can just see me in the doorway - I should have stood against the white wall.
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I emerge from the town at the wrong level to retrace my steps back to the car park and as usual see parts of Assisi that people who read their guidebooks before they start walking around don’t usually see. At last I find the car in the now crowded car park and I’m on the road for Sorrento via Naples. I’ve phoned Tina and explained that I’m going to stay in Sorrento tonight and see my friends G and L, who separately have helped me, in the past, to sell my work.
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I drive south towards the Terni junction with the A1 autostrada from Florence to Rome, through lovely wooded conical hills with farms and hamlets crowning many of them. I stop once or twice to take photos but inevitably the most wonderful vistas are on fast stretches of roads that have no stopping places.
I pass the place where I turned off towards Aquila through the Abruzzo National Park, on my way north two days ago. I shall go back there soon. The scenery was becoming more and more beautiful as I went inland along that road before turning back to find the Florence-Naples autostrada.
It’s an anticlimax to reach the flat industrialised area round Rome, which stretches down towards the barren bare mountains near Cassino and Caserta. The autostrada leaving Naples towards Salerno feels downright dangerous, it’s so narrow, and every time I venture into the faster of the two lanes there I find a pair of headlights practically touching my bumper and have to withdraw hastily.
The journey from Assisi to Sorrento takes five hours including about 20 minutes for stops. Not bad, I think to myself, in a five-door Fiat Punto.
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I’ve booked a hotel for the night in Sorrento, through the internet, because so many hotels are closed for the winter that I want to make sure I have a room. The Hotel Eden is close to the Piazza Tasso and set back off the road - I’ve often passed it and thought it would be a quiet place to stay, so I’ve booked it for this one night. It costs ten Euros a night more than Hotel La Perusia, including off-road parking.
It’s the sublime to the ridiculous, and I realise how expensive a town Sorrento can be. The room is a quarter of the size and infinitely less well appointed than the palatial accommodation I enjoyed last night. There is a poky shower room, a view into a courtyard through the small window with a little table under it, a single wardrobe and a single bed. There’s a feeling of neglect about the place, compared to the usual spotless, well tended hotels I’ve been in.
One of the reasons I’ve chosen this hotel is that it offers free internet access. I’m told that this is out of action. My laptop tells me about a wireless connection there but I am not permitted to use it. I am not pleased.
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I shower and change and go out into the evening street. L is there in his shop piled high with paintings of every kind and all qualities. As usual, he is pessimistic about business matters but he’s surprised and seems pleased to see me again after only two months. We have an enjoyable gossip about mutual acquaintances and I admire some of the beautiful still-life pictures painted by one of "his" artists, whom I met at L’s private view party for him at the Foto Bar in December. Then on to G.’s shop, where she keeps my signed prints for sale. I’m pleased to see that one of them is on show under the glass counter top.
My last port of call is to the Internet Café where Luigi greets me with his shy smile and I spend an hour checking my emails and checking into my flight online. The Internet Café is classic ’70’s chic - all glass tabletops and chrome and blue lighting - and it’s open till later than the cheaper internet point round the corner in Strada Tasso. I have a cheese panino and a glass of wine there.
Finally, for old times’ sake, I sit under the canopy outside the Bar Fauno. There’s not much room outside the Bar Fauno tonight, though, because a Ferrari sports car is occupying half the space. Everyone seems very excited about the car and there are pastry cooks all round it, having their photos taken.
Over my glass of red wine and bowls of olives and nuts I phone Tina for a chat. She knows all about the Ferrari. It’s totally made of chocolate. I am amazed. A lorry backs up at ten thirty and the chocolate car is driven into the back of it. I wonder how it survives ignition without melting. Still wondering, I go back to my little room at the Hotel Eden.
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My last day in Italy for a while. I weigh up whether to go back and spend it in Praiano but I decide to make my way slowly back to Naples instead. I don’t want to feel rushed in Praiano and having a plane to catch is a recipe for feeling rushed.
It’s another blue sky day, not hot but warm in the sun. I decide to go and look at Vico Equense, a town on the coast between Sorrento and Castellamare. There’s a lot of traffic on the coast road, most of it heading towards Sorrento.
In Vico I search for a parking space but end up in an underground car park near the centre. The town square is full of families, mostly dressed in their best for Sunday lunch. I arrive there as everyone is having mid-morning coffees. The cafés round the fountain in the town centre are full and I give up the idea of having my own mid-morning break. Instead I go for a stroll round the town with my camera.
The sea is absolutely glassy still and the blues of the water and the sky are enough to break my heart with nostalgia for summer. I recognise the vertical cliff at the Sorrento end of the bay from a watercolour picture that Tina has in her living room. In this hazy atmosphere it’s outlined in silver grey against the sea and the sky, a dramatic plunge from the plateau to the water.
The view in the other direction is softer, with hills and white houses and hotels spreading across grey-green land. The blue water shimmers.
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In the summer Vico is a holiday resort with its share of hotels and tourist amenities but like everywhere else at this time of year it has taken its own character back for the winter. I walk round the town in a loop, taking in the memorial that stands on the Naples side of the town and the old Duomo, a baroque church with a small terrace overlooking the great cliff.
When I get back to the main square, there are tables free outside the café that was full before and I sit there and have an espresso. I’d like to have lunch here but I haven’t seen a restaurant open.
I walk back to the car park entrance and realise that what looked like a hotel nearby is actually an enormous restaurant, called Pizza á Metro (Pizza by the Metre) with a pizzeria in one hall and a more general restaurant in another enormous dining room. Waitresses and waiters are hurrying among the tables, some pushing trolleys bearing rectangular pizzas with multiple toppings, others pulling sweet trolleys.
There are hundreds of people eating here: couples, families, a few single people like myself. I order a local dish (so the menu announces). It turns out to be a very large lamb cutlet, juicy and perfectly cooked in herbs. I treat myself to a delicious lemon pudding afterwards. The bill, about €12 (£8 or $16, including the cover charge for bread and a large bottle of sparkling mineral water, is the best value I’ve had all week.
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I have to be at the airport by 5.20 at the latest, to give back the car. I have a couple of hours in hand and on impulse I stop along the road between Vico and Castellamare, at a forlorn beach resort with a tattered flag and an uninviting beach of rocks and gravel, below the road. I just want to be near the sea for a little while before I go home. It’s a desolate place. Remnants of last year’s holiday-making litter the beach - a child’s shoe, a ragged towel.
And now I come across a deck chair with its legs in the margin of the water. It’s facing the wrong way so I drag it out and turn it to look out at the horizon. I sit in it and look out to sea. Between two rocks a white yacht is sailing slowly on the horizon. My last photo of the holiday is that view.
February 19th 2008
The day after I take up residence in the apartment next to Tina, she has to go to her mother's for two days because her uncle has died suddenly. Hospitably she invites me to go with her, but I say no, I want to go to Paestum and her mother needs Tina's undivided attention.
It's a lovely day, cloudless and sunny. I walk down the road to the Miramare to see if N is in and to show him my prints. The sea glints as if it's summer, not February.
The gate clicks open to my pressure on the bell. Old S is in the courtyard. He greets me with cries of surprise, pleasure and welcome. A, who has had an email from me to say I'm coming to Italy, comes out, his face lighting up. N is out, it seems.
"We are going down to the other house". A means the Miramare. "You can come."
We set off, old S pottering on ahead. He unhooks a bag of cabbages from a door knob as we pass. At the hotel, A unlocks the side gate where a generator rattles and pulses. We go down narrow stone steps to a yard I've not seen before.
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Cages of rabbits blinking at us expectantly. A is taking handfuls of dry food from a sack and filling the hoppers along the front of the two rows of cages. Each cage is just big enough for one large or two or three half-grown animals.
A's father is in the darker half of the outhouse. I can hear chickens and see him collecting eggs.
Now A shares the cabbages among the rabbits. They eat with satisfied, half-closed eyes, and preen their sleek fur afterwards.
The air is full of the deafening roar of the generator, but no smell. The rabbit cages, including the floors, are made of wire mesh and the droppings fall below them, dry and odourless.
"For eating?" I mouth to A. The noise prevents normal speaking. He nods. I think about battery farming and cruelty to animals. But these rabbits seem healthy and even happy. They're safe, dry and among their own kind. They're breeding. Even though they have never felt the grass between their toes, are they being ill treated? I decide they are not.
The chickens strut and peck freely in their half of the shed. There's a cockerel with half a dozen hens. They seem to be laying freely.
I'm left in charge of old S while A disappears. Or is he left in charge of me? I watch the rabbits, wishing I had my sketchbook to hand. The old man continues to potter for a while, then leads me back up to the road. At the gate, A appears, suddenly angry with his father's querulous questioning. He strides away, back to the house.
I follow the old man. He has begun to go down the steep steps towards the cabins. He collects a pair of secateurs and begins clipping the shrubby hedge at the edge of the terrace.
I'm not sure what I should do. The sun is warm, the sea calm and blue, the sky luminescent. I sit on a stone bench and doze. I'm totally at peace, as usual at the Miramare. The sea's wash on the rocks, the sounds of people working, even the generator, now far above me and muted, the occasional blare of the Sita bus passing by on the narrow road, all the familiar sounds wash over me comfortingly.
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A is on the terrace above, fixing some electrical installation in the cabins. As I say goodbye he tells me that the weather will be changing soon. The ruins at Paestum are very interesting, but only in good weather. I would do best to go there tomorrow, if I'm going.
This spurs me into a decision. I'll drive to Salerno, along the coast road that I had to travel last night, and stay tonight in a hotel there. Then I can drive on and spend Wednesday in Paestum. Tina is away at the wake for her dead uncle tonight, in any case.
The sun is going down on a beautiful calm day as I drive off. In Cetara I pause and take photos of the town and its tower on the headland.
I realise that the towns on the coast road conform to a pattern: a tunnel to approach the outskirts, a view across an inlet of the Bay of Salerno, to towers on a rocky headland. The town climbing up the hill behind, houses clustered round the mosaic dome of a central church, a piazza in front of the Duomo and the civic buildings. From Amalfi to Maiori, Minori, Cetara, I drive, savouring the clear blue sunset-shaded sky.
At Salerno I take a wrong turning and head a few miles inland, find myself on a toll road and take advice from the attendant, an understanding, twinkling man who has seen more lost tourists than I have had hot pizzas, I think. I end up safely in Salerno and it's getting dark.
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Salerno is a busy port with a wide sea front. I drive along by the sea, looking for a hotel. Remembering that Tina was concerned that I might not find hotels open beyond Salerno at this time of year, I stop at the first one I see, a large modern block called the Grand Hotel, right on the sea front. It has a wide paved area in front of it, packed with smart cars, with a notice warning all drivers not to park in front of the hotel.
There isn't any room to park there, anyway, so I dutifully drive through to a dusty public parking area behind. Too late I spot the underground parking facility. I can't face the manoeuvre to unpark the Punto which I have now snugly positioned between a truck and some scooters., I regret having left my smart skirt behind in Praiano because this looks like a hotel with pretensions. A vast foyer lined with marble lies behind the revolving door at the entrance.
The Grand Hotel is inhabited almost exclusively by men in suits, on expense accounts, which may explain the price and the marble halls. It's nice to have a proper shower and a bath - luxuries not available at the apartment n Praiano. I take full advantage of all the facilities before venturing out into the nightlife of Salerno.
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I've been surprised to find that the hotel has no internet access. It is disabled, it seems - a situation that I also find in one of the other two hotels I visit in the week. The receptionist has given me a map of the town centre and I walk for 15 minutes or so into the middle of the town, find a public internet point and read my emails. I'm glad to find that even Salerno has its café district where Italians are promenading and sitting, in fur coats and woolly hats, outside in the street.
I find a restaurant open but empty and unnecessarily I book a table for later. Then I go for an aperitif in one of the cafes. It's a ritual that I enjoy, watching people and drinking a glass of red wine with bowls of pastries, nuts and slivers of cheese included in the price. I choose Il Castello d'Artiche for this and the nibbles are excellent.
I go back and claim my reserved table in the restaurant. There are now three other customers, probably regulars, three men at one table, who look curiously at me as I am seated by the owner at the table next to them. It's a small, homely place with a good menu.
I opt for spaghetti with sea food, which is excellent, and a large grilled fish with a mixed salad. I know the fish will be expensive ( it's sold by the kilo and that's always expensive and unpredictable in price.) White wine to go with the fish and taramisú after it comes to €42. When I turn down the offer of a complimentary limoncello, the owner offers me a free espresso instead. By that time the only other customers are a family of three including a grown-up daughter, who are cheerfully celebrating something, I'm not sure of the details - my Italian doesn't extend far enough. It's a pleasant evening.
Back through the almost deserted streets, I hurry because I've seen a beggar earlier on, being hustled away from the internet centre where he'd followed me with a wheedling request for money. The girl running the internet centre, a buxom, raw voiced, cheerful young woman, has given the young mendicant no chance to hassle her customers. I don't want to meet him or his like again in the dark deserted street. But like most people in Salerno this chilly night, he's found somewhere out of the wind to shelter in. I hope so, anyway.
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20th February 2008
Breakfast at the Grand Hotel Salerno is a muted affair. The sun is slanting through the slats of the Venetian blinds and across the gold brocade tablecloths as the men in suits gravely pick out the miniature pots of jam to go with their croissants and bread rolls and pour milk on to their cereal.
I have misread the card in the bedroom that relates to breakfast and have already been served coffee there by a kind waitress who explains that breakfast in my room will cost me 20% more than the restaurant menu price, whereas if I go to the dining room it's included in the price of the stay. It's been so long since I've stayed in a hotel with room service, I should have remembered this universal rule. They don't charge me, this time, but I don't get coffee served to me in the dining room as well.
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In the car park where the Punto waits, I approach the car with sudden misgivings - at least it's still there. But has anything happened to it? I should have put it into the underground car park. Sure enough, on the bonnet there's an ugly scoring, about two inches wide, paint removed down to the metal, and deeply dented. I'm distraught. Then remember my collision damage waiver and tell myself to be philosophical. (It's only when I look properly at the documentation I signed for the car at the airport, two days ago, that I realise that this is old damage, recorded on the papers, perpetrated by a previous client)
Still fluttering from the apparent confirmation of my lack of responsibility in leaving the Punto in jeopardy all night, I gently accelerate and shoot backwards. Screaming quietly, I fumble for the brake and gear lever with both hands flailing. Lucky that the car that was close behind me last night has gone. I stop within inches of disaster. Dare I leave this car park? But I can't afford to spend my holiday in the Grand Hotel Salerno, so I pull my shoulders back, breathe deeply and tell myself that I am not really a waste of space in a car and I can do this.
I circle the one way system a couple of times and get on to the coast road again.
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"Just keep on going, with the sea to your right," Tina's advice was simple and it's effective. It's a long, dull, flat drive between pine forests edging the coast and a succession of tawdry motels and "resorts", all closed up for the winter, but at last the brown tourist signs are offering "Paestum" with a picture of a Roman arch.
I miss the direct route to the town and drive round three sides of the city wall to an empty car park which costs nothing this time of year because no-one is manning it. As I walk towards the entrance gate to the Graeco-Roman city I get a fine view of the two huge Greek temples at the seaward end of the settlement. In the distance there's another, near the ticket office. In between, low ruins of foundations, huge fallen dressed stones and pillars and a few tourists picking their way through the pathways among them. It's early and few people are about.
At the ticket office I have the usual gratifying conversation about my age as I try for a pensioner's reduction, forgetting that pensioners start at 65 in Italy so I have three years to wait. The smart young woman in the ticket office says all the right things about how young I look and I have to pay full price - good value - 8 euros for a ticket that lets me into the city and also its museum.
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The sun is high now. People are taking off their padded jackets, hats and scarves, to wander round the ruins and read information about the buildings whose remnants still stand. The three huge temples have been restored to some extent, I gather, but there has been much less restoration than in Pompeii or Herculaneum,
I come across a fenced off area where men with wheelbarrows and trowels are excavating the foundations of a house. As I pause to watch, one of them finds something in the dry soil, dusts it carefully and slips it into a polythene bag. Absurdly I feel privileged to have witnessed a sliver of the past brought into the daylight after who knows haw many hundreds of decades.
"Posso?" I wave my camera at the excavating men and they straighten up and grin.
"E molto interessante!" I gush.
"Si, si, lui é molto interessante, forse!" laughs the older one, pointing to the younger man. He smiles and is it my imagination or does he preen and pose a little?
"No, no, tutti! Tutto é interessante! Il lavoro!" I point the camera, snap the picture.
"Buon' lavoro, ciao" and I go on down the dusty path. I wonder how many artefacts lie in layers under my feet.
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Paestum's a huge site, a town, with a forum, a little theatre and these enormous temples which must have dominated the whole area, I'd have thought, even when the houses and shops were still standing around them. As I walk up to the seaward end of the site, where the oldest temples lie, the scale of the pillars becomes so impressive that I feel I have to do something other than take photos, even though photos are the most easy and accurate way of recording them. I perch on a fallen stone at a short distance from the Temples of Neptune and Hera and draw.
I only have a small sketchbook with me and the image soon becomes so large that I can only fit four and a half pillars on the page. I become interested in the worn stone details that have survived the 2,600 years since Paestum was founded by the Greeks, their weathered grooves and elegant Doric capitals outlined against the blue sky that has not yet begun to cloud over.
Very few other people are around and I don't find the usual obliging Japanese tourist to take a photo of me in front of this ancient structure to show the scale of it. I set my camera on self-time, perch it on the rock where I've been sitting, and rush over to the boundary fence of the temple of Hera. I try not to look too much out of breath and lean nonchalantly on the wooden strut of the fence.
Passers by glance up at me but I'm out of reach of curious art critics and happily work there for two hours. The sun begins to fade behind drifting clouds that foretell tomorrow's change in the weather.
Most other people seem to be strolling with their partners, except for an English family with a couple of precocious pre-teen children. The adults mutter to each other disapprovingly as they look up at me ("what would happen if everybody sat on these historic stones?"). But their attention is mainly on airing their knowledge of the technical terms of Graeco-Roman architecture as they field and encourage searching questions on archaeological themes from the children.
I used to know the parts of a Greek temple, when I was their children's age, but my patience with fact has worn thin over the years. I don't retain the details, just my awe in the face of the age and scale of these stones, the ritual and pageantry they've been used for, and the generations that have revered, assaulted, depended upon and finally neglected them.
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There's a very good web page on Paestum's history, with photos that are very like my own, and I'm posting its address here for you to look up, rather than plagiarising the work done by its compiler:
http://www.paestum.de/en/paestum.htm
On that page there is also a photo of the Church of SS Annunziata, an elegant peeling little baroque façade next to the pizza house where I go to fill a sudden void that opens up in my stomach when I finish drawing. I'm suddenly very hungry. It's three o'clock and Italians are either eating or resting if at all possible.
The tables are empty except for a lady of about my age who is immersed in her book. I'm brought a menu and I'm taken aback by the range of pizza toppings and the relatively low prices. I'm used to Amalfi Coast prices.
This eatery, in this tourist trap, provides a real pizza - not one of those cellophane wrapped, microwaved efforts that I've met in similar locations before. I eat well. I can't have wine, to my regret, because soon I'll be back on the road to Praiano.
A school trip of Italian teenagers makes a bid to take over all the remaining seats outside the pizzeria, chattering and laughing and teasing each other. Some of them are instantly aware that I'm not Italian and they start to greet me in English: "How do you do? How are you? Are you American? Are you English? Are you Aussi? Where do you come from?"
I'm tired and suddenly feel very English. My Italian language deserts me. I want to eat my pizza in peace. Luckily, the group decide it's too cold to sit outside and they all surge away, calling back chummily, "Goodbye" and "Have a nice day". I respond with "Ciao, á rivederci" and thankfully watch them chatter out of sight like a flock of exotic starlings.
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Before I leave, I want to use the other part of my 8 euro ticket and I cross the little piazza to the museum. I'm glad I did. Inside it's bright, modern and well labelled in Italian. This is a surprise and so different from the archaeological museum I visited in Naples in 2004 . There the mosaics and important finds from Pompeii and Herculaneum were displayed on the fourth floor with no signs to point the tourist towards finding them easily.
I find my reading of Italian is good enough for me to decipher most of the information in the museum here at Paestum and there are some labels in English too.
The pots in the museum are beautiful, sensual, bellied shapes decorated with pictures of figures of idealised beauty and ugliness, in terracotta, white and black. There are cycles of carvings from the peristyles of the temples and paintings and reliefs and paintings on whole tombs taken from the site. Statues and figurines are there, of all the periods of long history of Paestum, smiling their bland archaic smiles.
I spend a relaxed three quarters of an hour browsing in the museum. I buy the guide book in English,and wish I had the energy left to make some direct drawings of the items in the cases. But it's getting late and I want to drive back to Praiano in the light.
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I get back to the apartment next to Tina's at about six o'clock. We're both very tired. Tina has driven further than me, and she has had a much more stressful two days with her grieving relatives. She tells me about it over supper.
When I go into my apartment to get ready for bed, I'm aware of a strong smell - drains are blocked somewhere. I don't want to keep Tina up late, but she comes in and agrees that the problem is sewage based. Not much we can do tonight, though, so I put on my thick woolly socks, open the window and try to sleep.
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February 21st 2008
The rain on the balcony wakes me up at intervals in the night. Getting back to sleep is difficult because of the smell of drains that's wafting through the apartment. It's cold with the window open.
At seven I give up the idea of more sleep. It's very grey outside when I open the shutters. The heavy rain's subdued to a thin drizzle on the cold wind. A was right - I've done the best thing, going to Paestum while the sky was blue. But what can can I do on this grim grey morning?
The smell is overpowering and that's the deciding factor. (I've been a little spoilt by the splendours of the Grand Hotel, too, I must concede)
I dress and go and see Tina.
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"I've decided to use the car today, go and see a bit more of Italy, maybe stay over somewhere. I hope you don't mind," - I feel a bit disloyal - "but the weather is so bad and I only have six days here…"
Tina shows what a good friend she is. "I was quite surprised when you came back here last night - I thought you might've gone on, seen some more of Calabria. Of course I don't mind. It's your holiday."
This time I pack my smart skirt to take with me. I look on the map and wonder how far north I can get in a day. Tina and I have looked at the TV weather forecast over breakfast and it's sunny in Florence.
But first I must see N, at the Miramare. He asked me to bring some prints of my paintings to hang in the cabins. I put my bag in the car and walk down the road in the drizzle. The men who are always fixing engines in the workshop opposite the Miramare no longer stare curiously as I come down the hill and cross the road to ring the bell.
The gate clicks open after a pause and I go down the steps to the little courtyard. A is there, dressed to go out. N appears after a moment, in working clothes. He greets me warmly and makes us coffee. He politely admires the prints and buys three. I'm surprised by the one he admires most - the beach scene. "That's A's girlfriend," I joke, pointing to the figure in a black bikini in the foreground.
I explain that I'm going to drive north today, maybe to Florence, maybe stopping at Perugia, which I've heard is an interesting mediaeval town.
"See you in May," calls N as I start back up the hill where the Punto is parked. I'm expecting to come back before I go home this time and tell him so, but in the end that's my last sight of the two brothers before my next trip.
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The road to Perugia is not quite direct. I've decided to go there because I've been to Florence before, in another life, and because Perugia is smaller and less daunting to arrive in without a hotel booked in advance, I think.
The first hour is spent getting to Naples on the A3. I take a wrong turning off the coast road at one point and find myself in the dockland district of Castellamere, driving up a one-way lane that turns out to be blocked without warning at the other end. At least ten cars have followed me. I get out and wave my arms about, looking foreign, female and foolish.
"Cosa fare?" I call to the men behind who are tuning up their hooters. "Sono inghlese!"
An understanding, calm young man comes to the rescue, gets out of his car and moves the barrier out of the way. Led by me, we all do a U turn up the other lane of the road, in the direction we came from, and I'm back on track.
The dual carriageway broadens out after Naples and I join the Florence-Salerno road. This is easy, I'm thinking. I stop at a service station twice for petrol and a panino. I know I have to strike out inland sometime after Rome. The old saying "all roads lead to Rome" has never seemed more true. Rome seems to go on for ever - turning after turning is presented. I'm quite scared of finding myself in the centre of Rome and I keep going.
In the event I do turn off too early and I'm on the way to Aquila when I realise it. I stop at a service station and ask advice as well as filling up. Most of the petrol stations are manned rather than self service. My poor bashed Punto attracts sad shakes of the head from the middle-aged men who fill the tank. I feel embarrassed and guilty, as though I've harmed a vulnerable creature.
On their advice, I turn round at the next toll station and soon I'm back on the right road. The last part of the journey seems interminable but at last I see Perugia's hilltop. The sun is going down. It's taken me seven hours to drive from the Amalfi Coast to Perugia.
I follow signposts pointing to hotels and I'm led down into a dank dip between hills within the town. I take one look, turn round and retrace my steps - I'm tired but this is not the spot for me. I've seen another sign, to "La Perusia Ristorante & Villa" and that's where I make my stop. It's a good choice.
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I book in and I'm apologetically charged two thirds of the room rate of the Grand Hotel Salerno by a charming young male receptionist. The receptionists get younger as one grows older, I'm finding. (I suppose that also goes for policemen, ticket collectors, traffic wardens and really just about anybody with a job.)
He hands over the key to a double executive room, which he explains is normally much more expensive but it's a very quiet time of year for the hotel. I make myself thoroughly at home in this big comfortable room. In particular I make full use of the huge bath in the ensuite bathroom .
Then I go across the courtyard to the restaurant. I'm too tired to go exploring Perugia tonight and I'm hungry.
The restaurant is in the Villa, an eighteenth century mansion that was the original building on La Perusia's site. The restaurant is quite stylish in an old fashioned way, with the usual gold cotton brocade tablecloths and napkins and an aura of extreme decorum.
I'm glad I packed my smart skirt this time.
There are a few other diners and the waiter is kept fairly busy, bowing from the waist and pulling chairs out, handing menus and gravely making suggestions to clients who hesitate over their choice. He is an elderly man with a very professional persona and a slight limp. He asks doubtfully, will I have wine, or sparkling water? Both, I say without hesitation. A large glass of red is brought - I've chosen gnocchi (potato dumplings in a sauce) and a lamb cutlet.
The food is perfect. I find the glass of wine very good, too, and it's a relief not to be driving anywhere afterwards. By the time I've finished the meal and the waiter is starting to smile and offer me another glass of wine (I've had enough, though) I've decided to stay a second night at La Perusia.
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February 22nd 2008
The weather forecast on Tina's TV was right. It's a blue sky, fluffy cloud morning with the promise of real sun to come. I'm up early, having breakfast in the Villa, where the upper floor is set out with the usual cereal and rolls, slivers of cheese and thin cut prosciutto and some very delicious pastries and cakes. A couple whom I've noticed in the dining room last night are already there and we have a chat. They're from Oslo and speak and understand some English. They're leaving to drive home this morning.
The receptionist (a different, equally charming and beautiful young woman) gives me advice on exploring Perugia, and a map to guide me, and I set off towards the Centro Istorico, the old town district.
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It's fresh bright weather and I feel lucky to be here, in this provincial town surrounded by people who are not on holiday but going about their everyday business. Being built on hills, Perugia has wonderful views from every open vantage point. I slip behind the post office, for example, and take photographs from the car park there. Normally you would see for miles but today there's a change-of-season haze in the valleys.
After five or ten minutes I reach an enormous archway. A narrow street leads further up the hill beyond it. This is the Arco Etrusco. There are sixteen gates into the city listed in the guidebook that I buy in a little shop just inside the archway.
Perugia's history extends back to the Etruscan civilisation that came before the Romans. It's thought to have been founded in about 600 BC. The Romans took over in about 200 BC and after Julius Caesar's death the city became the centre of a quarrel between Octavian and Lucian Antony, two of the brothers of Mark Antony. It was besieged and burnt down in 40 BC and rebuilt by Octavian Augustus afterwards. It became a Christian centre early on, a bishopric in about 500 BC and was the focus of a lot of political intrigue and conflict up to 1000 AD. My guide book, written by Francesco Frederico Mancini and Giovanna Casagrande, gives a full account of the long and turbulent history of the town, right up to the present day.
The streets that run between the Arco Etrusco and the main piazza of the city, Piazza Novembre IV, are very ancient. Via V. Rocchi is nicknamed "via Vecchia" ("the old street"). a parallel street, via Bartolo, was opened in 1378.
I come out of the shadows of the tall mediaeval palaces and into the wide space of the Piazza Novembre IV. The Great Fountain is not playing, but the sun is beginning to shine properly now and in contrast with the side streets there are a lot of people in the piazza. On the steps of S Lorenzo, the Duomo, sit dozens of students from the university, as well as sightseers like me. From the height of the steps you can see far off, down at the end of a wide thoroughfare past the Palazzo dei Priori, a hint of the distant view across the valley. People are scattered like ants in the piazza below me.
The architecture, so different from the baroque curlicues and tiled domes of southern Italy, is vertical, pointed arches and square towers aiming at the sky. The battlements along the facades, trefoil windows and gothic arcades on the upper floors of the palaces remind me of the architecture of Venice.
I spend a long time up there in the sun, drawing my own version of the picture that is on the cover of the guide book. Surrounded by the babel of voices, speaking in many tongues, I'm happy to be part of the tourist scene. I'm accosted by a couple of people who want to sell me things but they go off philosophically enough when I shake my head and go on concentrating on my drawing.
There's an exhibition of Pintoricchio's paintings showing at the Galleria Nationale di Umbria, on the upper floor of the Palazzo dei Priori. I'm tempted for a moment but once I go inside the cool hall to buy a ticket I change my mind. It's on till the summer. The sun is too good to miss.
I buy a very large ice cream and sit on a wall near the Great Fountain to eat it. When I get up to leave, I realise that my sunglasses, which I'd taken off and put down on the wall to take a photo, have already left, probably with the group of students who were chatting nearby. Last time that happened to me was exactly three years ago, I think, nostalgically, the first time I visited Sorrento on my own.
I go into one of the expensive shops off the piazza and buy a pair of sunglasses at sale price. They have strange flanges on the sides and I'm not surprised they're on special offer, but they fit, and I can't drive tomorrow without sunglasses. The sales girl is very helpful and tells me they look absolutely sweet.
Then I wander about the old city, following no particular itinerary. I know I'll be back. That's when I'll use my guide book, which has six different walks mapped out, with information on the churches and palazzos that are on the routes. But today, I just want to find my own way around and soak up the sun and the atmosphere. I walk and walk and make a great loop, coming across tiny alleys and streets full of window boxes of flowers, little churches that are certainly in the guide book, and other gates in the city wall. I follow my nose and find my way back to La Perusia before the sun goes down.
In the evening I make the mistake of trying a restaurant in via Vecchio which at first looks promising but which turns out neither to serve authentically good Italian cooking nor to be as cheap as it first looked. I should have stayed in for dinner. When I pay my bill next morning I find that "Ristorante La Villa Perusia" is no more expensive than the dive that I visited tonight. You don't always get what you pay for.
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February 23rd 2008
I’ve slept well in my executive room in Hotel La Perusia and I’m quite sorry to check out, after a good breakfast. I’m pleasantly surprised by the charge for dinner on the first night. It was a large, delicious two course meal with a big glass of good red wine, a bottle of sparkling water and an espresso, in very civilised surroundings, and it cost €28 - about £17 or $35. Perugia costs me two thirds as much as Salerno per night.
I decide to drive south towards Naples the pretty way today (my flight is tomorrow evening from there). I see on the map that I can go to Assisi on the way back, and then down a road through hills rather than a flat boring motorway, and join the A3 further south.
As soon as I get into the car I realise that my day off has done me good. My left hand no longer leaves the wheel to search in vain for a gear lever and my right hand goes to the gears with unerring accuracy. I know how wide the car is. I feel like superwoman, especially when I find my way straight to Assisi with no U turns.
Assisi at 9am is peaceful and empty except for big trucks cleaning the streets, the odd monk and a few early bird souvenir salespeople opening up shop. By the time I leave at 11am it’s looking more like the tourist trap I anticipated before I came. I spend two hours wandering happily among the many churches and the old streets and steps of this hilltop town.
The guidebook lists twelve churches altogether. There’s also a fort standing above the town. The book recommends spending at least three days there, and there is so much to see, I shall have to go back after this flying visit and take in some more of it.
I park on the outskirts, where later I realise that all the coaches park, and walk in. I realise too late that I could have driven right up to the Church of St Francis, this early in the morning, but I do like wandering about in places on foot, anyway.
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The first church I come to is St Chiara, a big one with a castellated tower and huge flying buttresses. I spend some time admiring it inside and out, and taking photos.
By the time I find St Francis’ Church the sun’s quite high and the white facade of the upper church is dazzling. The weather is perfect. Brilliant sun, no wind. So still that there’s a haze all over Umbria. There are wonderful views from this town, but my photos probably won’t show them.
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The church of St Francis has three levels, two above ground and the third the crypt where St Francis, the founder of the Franciscan order of monks, is buried. He was canonised two years after his death, and that year, 1274, the first stone of the church was laid.
I contribute all my small change (about €5) to listen to an autoguide which if I’d finished it would have taken about an hour to show me round the church. It’s good, but I don’t want to leave too late.
The upper church has a beautiful, gleaming white facade and inside there are systems of frescos by Giotto, Cimabue and other great mediaeval masters. The church was very badly damaged by an earthquake in 1987 so the lower series of frescos, on St Francis’ life, are in particularly good condition because they’ve been perfectly restored. (I remember the worldwide public appeal for money to help with this work) The upper frescos are on the New and Old Testaments and are not in such an intact state. The colours are the beautiful warm earth colours (umbers, sienas) of the Umbrian geology.
I stand looking over the parapet of the piazza in front of the topmost level of Chiesa S Francesco. The marble piazza on the level below has a line of tourists straggling up to the entrance on that floor. I imagine that in the summer months the geometric pattern of the piazza will be hidden altogether by pilgrims and tourists.
A trio of young Italians ask me to take their photo as they stand against the wide landscape beyond the parapet. In return, I ask them to photograph me as I pose in front of the vast façade of the church. I’m dwarfed by the structure, of course, but I want to remember the scale of the building.
You can just see me in the doorway - I should have stood against the white wall.
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I emerge from the town at the wrong level to retrace my steps back to the car park and as usual see parts of Assisi that people who read their guidebooks before they start walking around don’t usually see. At last I find the car in the now crowded car park and I’m on the road for Sorrento via Naples. I’ve phoned Tina and explained that I’m going to stay in Sorrento tonight and see my friends G and L, who separately have helped me, in the past, to sell my work.
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I drive south towards the Terni junction with the A1 autostrada from Florence to Rome, through lovely wooded conical hills with farms and hamlets crowning many of them. I stop once or twice to take photos but inevitably the most wonderful vistas are on fast stretches of roads that have no stopping places.
I pass the place where I turned off towards Aquila through the Abruzzo National Park, on my way north two days ago. I shall go back there soon. The scenery was becoming more and more beautiful as I went inland along that road before turning back to find the Florence-Naples autostrada.
It’s an anticlimax to reach the flat industrialised area round Rome, which stretches down towards the barren bare mountains near Cassino and Caserta. The autostrada leaving Naples towards Salerno feels downright dangerous, it’s so narrow, and every time I venture into the faster of the two lanes there I find a pair of headlights practically touching my bumper and have to withdraw hastily.
The journey from Assisi to Sorrento takes five hours including about 20 minutes for stops. Not bad, I think to myself, in a five-door Fiat Punto.
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I’ve booked a hotel for the night in Sorrento, through the internet, because so many hotels are closed for the winter that I want to make sure I have a room. The Hotel Eden is close to the Piazza Tasso and set back off the road - I’ve often passed it and thought it would be a quiet place to stay, so I’ve booked it for this one night. It costs ten Euros a night more than Hotel La Perusia, including off-road parking.
It’s the sublime to the ridiculous, and I realise how expensive a town Sorrento can be. The room is a quarter of the size and infinitely less well appointed than the palatial accommodation I enjoyed last night. There is a poky shower room, a view into a courtyard through the small window with a little table under it, a single wardrobe and a single bed. There’s a feeling of neglect about the place, compared to the usual spotless, well tended hotels I’ve been in.
One of the reasons I’ve chosen this hotel is that it offers free internet access. I’m told that this is out of action. My laptop tells me about a wireless connection there but I am not permitted to use it. I am not pleased.
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I shower and change and go out into the evening street. L is there in his shop piled high with paintings of every kind and all qualities. As usual, he is pessimistic about business matters but he’s surprised and seems pleased to see me again after only two months. We have an enjoyable gossip about mutual acquaintances and I admire some of the beautiful still-life pictures painted by one of "his" artists, whom I met at L’s private view party for him at the Foto Bar in December. Then on to G.’s shop, where she keeps my signed prints for sale. I’m pleased to see that one of them is on show under the glass counter top.
My last port of call is to the Internet Café where Luigi greets me with his shy smile and I spend an hour checking my emails and checking into my flight online. The Internet Café is classic ’70’s chic - all glass tabletops and chrome and blue lighting - and it’s open till later than the cheaper internet point round the corner in Strada Tasso. I have a cheese panino and a glass of wine there.
Finally, for old times’ sake, I sit under the canopy outside the Bar Fauno. There’s not much room outside the Bar Fauno tonight, though, because a Ferrari sports car is occupying half the space. Everyone seems very excited about the car and there are pastry cooks all round it, having their photos taken.
Over my glass of red wine and bowls of olives and nuts I phone Tina for a chat. She knows all about the Ferrari. It’s totally made of chocolate. I am amazed. A lorry backs up at ten thirty and the chocolate car is driven into the back of it. I wonder how it survives ignition without melting. Still wondering, I go back to my little room at the Hotel Eden.
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My last day in Italy for a while. I weigh up whether to go back and spend it in Praiano but I decide to make my way slowly back to Naples instead. I don’t want to feel rushed in Praiano and having a plane to catch is a recipe for feeling rushed.
It’s another blue sky day, not hot but warm in the sun. I decide to go and look at Vico Equense, a town on the coast between Sorrento and Castellamare. There’s a lot of traffic on the coast road, most of it heading towards Sorrento.
In Vico I search for a parking space but end up in an underground car park near the centre. The town square is full of families, mostly dressed in their best for Sunday lunch. I arrive there as everyone is having mid-morning coffees. The cafés round the fountain in the town centre are full and I give up the idea of having my own mid-morning break. Instead I go for a stroll round the town with my camera.
The sea is absolutely glassy still and the blues of the water and the sky are enough to break my heart with nostalgia for summer. I recognise the vertical cliff at the Sorrento end of the bay from a watercolour picture that Tina has in her living room. In this hazy atmosphere it’s outlined in silver grey against the sea and the sky, a dramatic plunge from the plateau to the water.
The view in the other direction is softer, with hills and white houses and hotels spreading across grey-green land. The blue water shimmers.
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In the summer Vico is a holiday resort with its share of hotels and tourist amenities but like everywhere else at this time of year it has taken its own character back for the winter. I walk round the town in a loop, taking in the memorial that stands on the Naples side of the town and the old Duomo, a baroque church with a small terrace overlooking the great cliff.
When I get back to the main square, there are tables free outside the café that was full before and I sit there and have an espresso. I’d like to have lunch here but I haven’t seen a restaurant open.
I walk back to the car park entrance and realise that what looked like a hotel nearby is actually an enormous restaurant, called Pizza á Metro (Pizza by the Metre) with a pizzeria in one hall and a more general restaurant in another enormous dining room. Waitresses and waiters are hurrying among the tables, some pushing trolleys bearing rectangular pizzas with multiple toppings, others pulling sweet trolleys.
There are hundreds of people eating here: couples, families, a few single people like myself. I order a local dish (so the menu announces). It turns out to be a very large lamb cutlet, juicy and perfectly cooked in herbs. I treat myself to a delicious lemon pudding afterwards. The bill, about €12 (£8 or $16, including the cover charge for bread and a large bottle of sparkling mineral water, is the best value I’ve had all week.
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I have to be at the airport by 5.20 at the latest, to give back the car. I have a couple of hours in hand and on impulse I stop along the road between Vico and Castellamare, at a forlorn beach resort with a tattered flag and an uninviting beach of rocks and gravel, below the road. I just want to be near the sea for a little while before I go home. It’s a desolate place. Remnants of last year’s holiday-making litter the beach - a child’s shoe, a ragged towel.
And now I come across a deck chair with its legs in the margin of the water. It’s facing the wrong way so I drag it out and turn it to look out at the horizon. I sit in it and look out to sea. Between two rocks a white yacht is sailing slowly on the horizon. My last photo of the holiday is that view.
