To the Hills, to the Hills

Unsurprisingly, we have no regrets at leaving Anzio although it did have a lovely ice-cream shop.  We head eastwards into Abruzzo, a mountainous region which is said to be very untouristy and judging by the paucity of campsites listed in our books it is too.   This is considered low season and we saw one site that doesn’t even open until mid-June.

It’s a region full of hill towns, often with access by steep narrow roads or long flights of steps.   Originally built for security of course, not just to be awkward.   Goodness knows how isolated people must get when they can’t negotiate the gradients.  Wheelchairs would be death-traps but it would be a quick way to go.   Naturally the way would be downhill.  Most of these villages seem to have no shops but it could be like rural Portugal where you have to be a local to know which house is really a shop.  These are villages to be parked outside of and walked into, or to be more accurate, up to.  

We’ve found a campsite with a restaurant, where the owner speaks very good English and our books show only one other site within about 50 miles.   It turns out there are a few others but they’re just not in our books.   This is definitely low season here in Abruzzo and our site has only one other van on it although there are about 90-100 pitches to be had.  Our guidebook says that when the site is full the facilities would be stretched.  No, it would be impossible.   Anyway, almost empty it suits us fine.

The scenery is magnificent and we manage to get the official walk map with walks graded from T for Tourist through E for Excursion to EE for what I thought was double excursion but is really Expert  Excursion.   EE requires equipment and is technically difficult so we decide Excursion is good enough for us as we have no ropes, crampons or ice-axes with us.  This is excellent walking country and we have a glorious walk through flower filled meadows in hot sunshine with snow-capped peaks in various directions.  Orchids and other alpine flowers in their tens of thousands flow as far as we can see.  Walks are very well waymarked although we did manage to lose the trail and had to resort to the good ol’ map and compass to get back to the van.

This area still has wolves and bears and after a second walk all in woods up to just above the snow line I can confirm that Bears do do doo-doos in the woods.  I once heard Bill Bryson saying that when he walked the Appalachian Trail he was warned that surprising a bear is the worst thing to do.  So he was told to sew small bells to the legs of his trousers so bears could hear him coming and to look for bear droppings.  Bear droppings can be easily recognised because they always have small bells in them.   Walking up a big slope takes us through the seasons from early summer almost back to winter.  Flowers which are producing seed at the bottom are just in bud at the top.  Trees in full leaf at the bottom often look different a couple of thousand feet up and of course it is a lot colder.  On the second walk, we started in hot sunshine at I guess about 70F+ (21C) and ended up wearing a sweater through woods in patches of snow.   6 hours this time and still no other walkers.   Strangely though, we both thought we heard faint snatches of music high up and coming from above us.  Perhaps it was those teddy bears having a picnic.

The following morning we set off for a scenic drive and a couple of miles from the site and much to our surprise there’s a bear crossing the road in front of us (strictly speaking a Marsican Brown Bear).  Fairly unconcerned, he looked at us and continued to amble into the trees as I got off a couple of photos.  Poor shots and bad light but bear photos for sure.  These bears are pretty thin on the ground and we were very lucky to see one.    It was not like an American Brown or Grizzly and only stood about 30 inches high at the shoulder but I still wouldn’t want to meet one in the shower block one morning.  

I know I mentioned hill towns at the top of this piece but I can’t get over how many there are.   In the southern Apennines there are more hill towns than you can shake a stick at and I must confess that after a while my memory holds most of them as a sort of generic hill-town mush.   It is just so different to what we see at home where villages shorn of their defensive requirements sit in the valley bottoms where water is easy to come by.  These Italian towns must either have springs in unlikely places or very deep wells.   We have moved further north, still in the mountains and this is also an empty and untouristy area which is really surprising because from the villages and towns to the countryside it is beautiful.  Good walking maps are available with paths clearly marked both on the map and on the route itself but they’re just empty.  By the time I write this we’ve done three mountain walks, one on a Sunday (3.5 hours), one mid-week (5.5 hours) and one on a Saturday (6 hours) and not met anyone at all.  Which of course is just how we like it.

We keep finding, or to be more accurate not finding, more things that were stolen: my multitool, Heather’s diary, a pencil case with a variety of pencils,  my spare glasses, head torches, possibly a cheque book.  Whenever we travel, I have a dummy wallet and this was in the van and ironically not stolen, but then it was in a pile of books which were obviously of no interest.  I think it’s reasonable to assume that normally when a man says he has to get a new wardrobe he means an item of furniture but I have the delights of clothes shopping to do.  In a spirit of bloody-mindedness I’ve not looked at anything here and Cox and Box my two shirts, one being worn and one drying.  I shall have to reconsider what travelling light means when I next get stuff out for a backpack trip.