Eva on the Via Francigena (and beyond)

Song of the Day: Simple Song — The Shins

“And you feel like an ocean / Being warmed by the sun)

A good song for an autumn morning walk along Lucca’s medeival walls..

I slept in this morning, figuring I’ve earned it given the number of mountains I have walked over since my last rest day). Even so, I was up before 8am, making myself my typical 4-egg French omelet for breakfast and throwing in another load of laundry.

At around 9 I headed out for a coffee, which I found at an upscale cafe just outside the Basilica San Frediano. I sat for awhile writing and then made my way to the Basilica, which was a bit austere. I also paid to climb up the campanile — Lucca is a city of towers so I had accepted that there would be a certain amount of elevation today. Interestingly, despite having climbed many bell towers in my life by this point, for the first time I got vertigo walking up this one. I think it was something about how rickety the first staircase was, and the fact that the narrow metal staircases wound their way up the cavernous interior of the tower. Either way, I was happy to be on the platform up at the top with a real floor, and with spectacular views over the entire city.

After making my way back to solid ground, I took a stroll along the city’s former defensive walls, which are now a large urban park. Ambling along, listening to Big Star and enjoying the warm autumn morning, I thought more about what I had written yesterday about my initial impressions of Lucca. In that post, I talked about the “eroding of local life” — it was specific word choice to say eroding rather than erasing. This is something I’m very familiar with from my time living in Trastevere — a very touristic area of Rome, which still had its local Trasteverini. The local culture was there, though it was not really visible to tourists. But if you knew what to look for you could recognize it — the old guys playing cards at Bar San Callisto every morning, the clientele at Mercato San Cosimato, the guy with the ponytail walking his three dogs every afternoon.

Lucca is lovely, and similar in a way. There are a lot of tourists, but there is plenty of life still here — the old men on their bicycles, the well-dressed couple with the poodle who know the waitresses at the upscale cafe, the men in suits walking on the walls talking business. Architecturally, it’s very Tuscan (obviously), and at its prime in autumn. I pondered for awhile the rise in tourism and my own role in it — as much as I consider myself a responsible traveler. It seems like there has been a real rise in check-the-box, instagram-everything tourism which, when done en masse, in the impacted cities makes it difficult for everyday life to continue. In turn this makes it hard to actually understand the culture of the place you are visiting — the real reason most people want to travel! It’s a difficult problem to solve, but I think the sort of “slow tourism” that something like a pilgrimage promotes can be a good way to address this — spreading the crowds (and economic benefits) to some of the smaller towns in the region.

After my walk I headed to the Cathedral, where I got a stamp, admired the interior, and spent awhile staring at the labyrinth carved into the marble of one of the outer walls. Labyrinths are tied to pilgrimage going back to the Middle Ages, as the act of walking a labyrinth was meant to emulate the experience of walking to the Holy Land.

Afterwards I took a nap (it is a rest day after all) before heaving out for a slice of almost New York-style pizza, which in all it delicious greasiness was fantastic. Then I went to check off one last thing from the tourist to-do list: claiming to the top of Torre Giunigi. The tower is famous because, unlike the other medieval-era towers in the city, this one has a garden of trees growing on top. It offered fantastic views out of the city and was a unique experience — I was glad to have made it over. Afterwards I needed to head back to the Airbnb to sort out some logistics, and then sat at a nearby wine bar to work on the blog.

In the evening, I met back up with Giordana, Corrado, Monique, and Alain for an aperitivo. They invited me to join them for dinner with some other folks for the hostel, who had booked a big table at a nearby restaurant.

When I look back on this pilgrimage, I think a lot of my memories will be centered around the morning (all of the sunrises and lovely morning walking) and the evenings. In particular, I have had so many interesting and lovely dinners, from the fondue in Les Hospitaux Vieux to the pilgrim dinner in Vercelli. This dinner was absolutely one for the books. In addition to the 5 of us from aperitivo, there were 3 French women named Paula, Bobbi, and Betty, the Dutch couple I met heading to Sarzana, and 3 Italian men named Eugenio, Domenico, and Enrico.

These three (especially Eugenio) were the life of the party, ensuring the conversation was light and laughter was near-constant on both sides of the large table. After a few glasses of wine, Eugenio insisted we sing a song he had written for us. Obliging, a waitress recorded video as we raised our glasses and broke out into song… fading away as we forgot the lyrics that had been scribbled on a napkin and passed down. He also asked me to draw a scallop shell (the symbol of pilgrimage to Santiago) on a placemat, which each of us signed and took a photo of. It was a chaotic but very fun few hours, and after a very sad and heartfelt goodbye to Giordana and Corrado, I weaved my way back to the Airbnb to prepare for the walk tomorrow.