Southern Italy
The temple of Hera. Standing in the ancient ruins of Paestum founded in 600BC in Salerno, Southern Italy.
Southern Italy has a very different vibe to to the North, more rural, simple farming communities, and of course the ever present whisper of the Camorra in the background, especially Naples and all points South.
The Amalfi Coast
The Amalfi Coast is famous for its beauty. A 50 km road winds along the clifftops between Salerno and Sorrento.
South of Rome we headed for Naples. We were still greeted with great generosity, both solicited and spontaneous. John from Blackpool, who was caretaker for a campsite on the coast, stopped us and offered free accommodation overlooking the sea. It was, of course out of season. Hot showers, bliss. I won’t lie, getting clean was sometimes a bit of a challenge on this leg of the journey. Free accommodation was the bonus but it came without any facilities.
Rats And Tuna
Towards Naples, after a few punctures and delays, we were getting desperate for an overnight stop. We were traveling through rather flat farmlands full of the Mozzarella buffalo. Mozzarella di Buffalo Campania is a protected product specific to this area and considered the queen of Italian cheeses. Eventually we cycled into a farmyard with our usual optimistic question. It seemed that the farm was part of a cooperative and there was no farmer in charge to give us permission, just a bunch of rather disinterested workers.
They gestured to a deserted farmhouse and said we could sleep in there. It was dilapidated and dirty but at least out of the wind and we set up in one of the rooms to cook fresh tuna from the market over our petrol stove. That night rats as big as cats jumped in and out of an old chest of drawers in our room and scurried around the floor. We were so tired we just got up, slammed all the drawers in the chest to trap the rats and went to sleep! Not perhaps the most comfortable night, especially when the farm workers pitched at 5.00 am to liberate the feed from the back of our bedroom. No wonder the rats were huge. We were sleeping on their regular larder.
The Olive Cellar
Perhaps the most memorable of our farm staycations was north of Naples. We pulled into a farm yard with electronic gates. Very fancy we thought. The farmer was alarmed at our homeless plight and proceeded to clean out the olive cellar to make room for 4 of us, bikes and all. He took us on a tour of the farm which included a huge barn with a toilet in the middle but no plumbing, and an old donkey shed down a steep mud path. With the help of a mime involving toilet paper and a lot of grunting we worked out that behind the donkey shed was the communal toileting area. The toilet in the barn was just for show. By now nothing surprised us when it came to Italian farmers and eccentricity so we smiled and nodded. That night we were ushered into the home and treated to lashings of pasta, pickles and raw pork fat, a particular delicacy. I became vegetarian suddenly, but Dudley gamely ate and drank everything that was thrown at him.
There were barrels of wine lining the corridors and rooms of the house and Giuseppe was clearly trying to empty them in our honour. We crawled to our olive cellar in a very disheveled state only to find they had a guard dog at night which would not let us out even to visit the donkey shed! Next day Giuseppe, who could speak no English but had a reasonable grasp of German, insisted we could not leave as it was Sunday, and instead took us around the village to meet his mates and hear tales of daring do from the war. The fact they were on the side of the Nazis was brushed aside! Much drinking accompanied this progress which finished off back at the farm for another round of pickles and wine. Well I like to think we have strong constitutions but after this incredible hospitality we were all in need of medical treatment. We crawled away from the enthusiastically waving family the next day , into the nearest forest to recuperate from an excess of hospitality, with porridge and tea.
Drivers Comment
The walk up to the village high above Guiseppe's farm was a good chance to meet the locals. The most famous was the mad mass murderer that the village seemed quite proud of . We shook hands and moved on pretty sharpish.
Chris, Giuseppe and Mary Beth in the village square.
Naples
We were warned by pretty much everyone that Naples had a reputation and was knee deep in Mafia culture, theft and violence. We were however also told of a little known secret called Pozzouli, a small town west of Naples on the coast. Here there is a volcanic crater or Solfatara which gives rise to streams of natural hot water. The externally unpreposessing campsite had a pool fed by the hot spring ensuring a glorious hot swim any time of the day. They emptied it every night and refilled it to prevent algae growth. A faint sulphuric smell was a small price to pay.
Naples was a great place to shop, probably mostly stolen goods, but we did not linger. Leaving necessitated 10 km of bone jarring cobbles and the most aggressively unfriendly drivers yet. They parked and waited for you to cycle past then flung open the door in the hope of sending you flying. They did not even bother to pretend it was accidental. The only unfriendly Italians in the world live here.
Drivers Comment
We met Pia and Care, a Swedish couple, also on a tandem, who had cycled from Stockholm complete with trailer. Anyway they had to walk every single hill the length of Europe so we felt pretty smug!
South Of Naples
From Naples we travelled to the wonders of Pompei and Vesuvius The remnants of interrupted lives and fossilised tableaux were unforgettable. The magnificent temples of Paestum against the stunning background of the blue Mediterranean Sea.
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Pompei -
Paestum Temple -
Pompei -
Pozzoli -
Pozzoli Crater -
Pompei
Tandem Nightmare
We said goodbye to our American friends after Pompei. They were keen to travel in other directions. We were on our own again.
We were headed for Sicily and hoping for piece work when the free wheel mechanism on the back seized. Luckily we carried a spare and hitched a lift on a truck to a little mountain village with an auto repair shop. The mechanics descended on the bike and started disassembling it enthusiastically. The back wheel was clamped in a vice and the combined force of 6 muscle bound and excitable Italians was an unstoppable force. Unfortunately it was a force in the wrong direction and they managed to strip the thread. It was an anti clockwise thread and had to be turned the other way. Too late and all was lost. I flapped around and tried to keep track of all the screws and bolts which the local children delighted in running off with. Eventually all was reassembled but even more dysfunctional than on arrival. We were stuck.
Despondently our new friends gave us a lift to the train station and loaded the bike and us on the slow train to Brindisi. 3 train changes brought us into town at 10.30 pm but the bike had not made one of the transitions so we were without wheels and loaded to the eyeballs with panniers and tog.
Ciao
We took a bus to the campsite only to find it closed and the youth hostel refused to answer the door. Nearing midnight, physically and mentally exhausted and terminally depressed, we wandered to a patch of grass behind a large building where we set up our tent and fell over. Next day the excited chatter of a 100 children told us we had chosen to camp in the local school. We scrambled our stuff together before they called the police!
We scoured Brindisi for a new back wheel with no success. The clash of cultures between French and Italian cycling brands was still alive and well. They said we must fly one in. So the decision was made for us. It was time to leave Italy, its magnificent art and eccentric and generous people and we booked on the ferry for Athens the next day. Surely we could find a back wheel in the capital of Greece.
Total kilometers travelled 3506.
“Italy is a dream that keeps returning for the rest of your life”
Anna Akhmatova