Due to the time shift between home and here we both wake up early in the morning. Today was no exception and we were awake at 5:00. I spent a few minutes obtaining our train tickets between Spello and Foligno. It is only about 3 or 4 miles walking but riding the train for 10 minutes will give us more time and energy to see the things we are interested in at Foligno. Last night we planned to catch the 8:30 train, but being awake so early we booked tickets on the 7:49 train.
We had our standard breakfast, cleaned up and headed out the door about 7:20am for our 7:49 train. I had mapped the walk to the train station while awake this morning - 0.3 miles - about a 7 minute walk. We were there before the 7:31 train arrived. We talked to some high school kids waiting to take the train to school. They said we could get on the train they were riding and it would stop at Foligno, but with the language barrier and our inability to find the schedule that said it would stop at Foligno we decided to wait for our 7:49 train. It was five minutes late, but it did drop us at the Foligno station as advertised.
Foligno is the town that St. Frances ran to with a wad of his dad’s fabric to sell to finance his rebuilding of the San Damiano church. His dad caught up with him and imprisoned him in his house for this act of defiance. We were on a mission to find the piazza where he sold the cloth.
We used AI to tell us the name of the piazza, then Maps to guide us there. Once there we took in the square and tried to imagine it 800 years ago with Francis there. Sally was sure she had read that there was something in the square marking this event. She started walking the edges looking for a plaque or something. I started the other way and stumbled upon two brass forearms sticking out of the side of the massive church that makes up one side of the square, clutching bronze sculpted to look like a draped piece of fabric. I called Sally over to enjoy our find.
We had failed at getting our credentials stamped last night in Spello. We were on the lookout today to have someone do it for us. We entered the massive Cathedral di San Feliciano to look for someone. It was about 8:45 and all was quiet. We walked around admiring the art and sculptures when we heard some voices below the alter. We found two people below us and asked if they could stamp the credentials of two perigrinos. They came up and led us to a back room, produced a stamp and stamped and signed our papers. We took a picture to commemorate the event.
Back out in the piazza we reoriented ourselves, checked our gps and found we were right on our route and started walking through this bustling large city. We stopped at a grocery store to add to our lunch and continued on our way. The city seemed to go on forever.
Our route lead us through an unusual looking object on the map. When we reached it we found it to be a castle constructed in the 14th century to protect Foligno from the armies that marched up and down the valley engaged in regional wars. It couldn’t have been more than 100 yards in diameter, but still had a keep in the center. People had made apartments of the interior dwellings.
A left turn after the castle and a few hundred yards and we abruptly left the city and entered the olive groves. For the next six miles we climbed and descended on dirt roads and paved roads, slowly approaching Trevi, the town high up on the hill. The weather was glorious. Sunny, high 50’s to low 60s.
About 2 miles from town, and about 500’ below it, we came across a small cafe, the Roxy Bar. We stopped to have a coke and rest a bit before the final push up to this hillside town.
Just half a mile from the town we were working our way up a path thru the olives and woods when we came upon what seemed like ruins worthy of Lord of the Rings. In what seemed like the middle of nowhere was this large stone arch with a wooden gate. Super cool.
The last half mile into Trevi is up a beautifully paved wide road with a magnificent tree tunnel. Absolutely gorgeous.
A piazza greets you as you walk into this ridge top town. We stopped, got cokes and sat at a table to rest and enjoy the waning afternoon sun. It was 2:30. (Remember, it is mid November. The sun sets about 5:00). As we sat relaxing a well dressed man approached us and began a conversation that seemed too familiar. My first thought was he was a pastor or something and was just very friendly and inclusive. Within a minute or two he mentioned coming to his apartment with him! Sally and I looked at each other across the table with surprise, saying something to the affect we already had a room at the hotel. He looked confused, then embarrassed. He checked his phone and asked our names. We were not who he thought we were. He was picking a couple up here in the piazza and assumed it was us. He apologized and began searching for the correct people.
We struck up a conversation with the only other people in the square, a couple from Niagara Falls, Canada. After 15 minutes or so we excused ourselves, wanting to get to our room to relax and then find some groceries for the next two days
Our next town Poreta, is rumored to have no food except for breakfast served at the room we rented, meaning we need tomorrow’s lunch and dinner and the next days lunch. We found our hotel down the far side of the town a bit. It was built in the 1400’s, the lobby once was a road into town with vaulted brick ceilings. We went for the cheap room (€80 a night), advertised as no view. We had amazing views all day hiking up here so we were fine with no view. What we didn’t expect was a room with no windows. Never experienced that before, but then, that is why we came.
After an hour’s rest and settling in, we returned to town, now slipping into darkness to find a grocery store and a restaurant for dinner. We walked much of the town and nothing was open. Each restaurant we visited said closed Mondays. Uh oh. That which we feared yesterday, Sunday, was coming to pass today. We met an Australian woman named Elise. She was kind and gentle and was happy to show us around and find something open. There was a small grocery open and she led us to it. We got to talking for the next half hour. She is an artist here in town for a few months working with another artist. We gave her our contact information in hopes of staying in touch.
In the little grocery we picked out what we could to get us through the next couple days. Four big bread rolls. Cheese. Sliced meat. Yogurt. Bananas. Cookies. Those were our choices. €19.80. With no restaurants open we had cheese and very thin sliced meat on a roll, a banana and a yogurt for dinner. The hotel serves breakfast, so we were counting on a big meal in the morning to send us on our way.
Now it was time to advance our planning. Issue one: Yes, it hasn’t rained since arrived. Yea, it isn’t going to rain for another week. How lucky can we be? But, rain is in the forecast for the following week. Issue two: The stages the guide book suggests are way too long, but there are not many choices to shorten them because there is no lodging between the suggested stops. Issue three: Sally’s artificial knee is not fond of long downhill stretches. Two days from now we have a 3,500 foot descent. What to do?
We have found bus routes around steep descents, rooms to hole up in during particularly rainy days (if the forecast holds, which it probably won’t) and secured rooms a couple days in advance at places midway through some stages. We are here in the off season and a lot of services are not operating. All adds to the challenge. Sally is a whiz at finding rooms, bus routes and alternates. We joke. I am a super tanker. Get me moving in a direction and I can’t turn to a new course. We are walking the Way of St Frances. No altering. No variations. Sally is nimble and quick. A speedboat flitting around finding possibilities and options to match our needs and conditioning. Nice to have her by my side, nudging me into new directions. Makes my head spin, but the results are always good.
Today as we walked we were marveling at the terrain, the birds, the weather, in short everything our senses could comprehend. It gives us insight to St. Francis. This landscape is eye opening, soul opening. We can begin to understand his love and connection to the natural world. Remarkable for the time he lived in when the natural world was something to be feared and fought.
Great pictures! It’s like. being there with you!
ReplyDelete