Cominciare

I am five days into my walk and it is time to bring you all up to date, or as far as I can get in one sitting. Since this is not really a touristy blog, I do not feel obligated to give you a day by day, blow by blow description. But I've already travelled some seventy miles (about 125 km) into Italy and descended some 6,000 feet (2,000 meters). I do feel obliged to give you something. I did, after all, invite you along.

When I arrived at the Hospice Saint Bernard in Switzerland, about 100 meters from the Italian border, it might have been late winter instead of late spring. The pass had just been cleared of snow, a few days later than usual. The mountain-scape white. I recalled the photo from last year's final post, me atop the pyramid marking the highest elevation of the pass, blue sky, mountains dotted with snow, the lake reflecting it all. There was no sign of the pyramid this year. It is still there, just buried under ten feet of snow.

Though the pass had been cleared for vehicular traffic, the mountain path descending down to Aosta, 20 miles distant, was not passable at the highest elevations. Brother Frederic, the chief hostelier, recommended we descend on the road for a mile or so, until we passed an Enoteca. There, he said, the footpath would be clear enough for us to use. So Sunday morning, the fifth of June, Patrick and I bundled up with as much warm weather gear as we had, which was none, and braved the mid-thirties temperatures, about 3C, and blustery wind, and set about the start of this year's journey. I was in a polyester T, hiking sweater, and summer weight hiking pants. It is Italy in June, after all, and carrying additional weight for just a few hours of comfort didn't make much sense as I sat at home in California packing.

So I brrrr-ed my way down to the Enoteca, stuck my head in to ask whether the path was clear below, more to test whether the money for a few Italian lessons had been well spent than for any other reason, and took my first steps onto the mountain. We, Patrick, my friend with whom I walked last year, and Paul, an architectural photographer from London, traversed two narrow snow fields, and greeted late spring with pleasure.

In one of those coincidences common on these ancient pilgrimage trails, we had met Paul just more than half way into last year's walk. He is doing the Via Francigena (VF) as he can and was walking more lengthy days than Patrick and I. So our paths crossed for just one night. He ended a few stages before we did, and started this year's hike a few days before. As Patrick and I were having a coffee and hot chocolate in the Albergo across from the hospice the night before we started, Paul came up to the table and asked, "Don't I know you two from last year?" Yes, indeed!

So the three of us descended a quad-burning 1,000 meters together, Patrick and I planning to take two days to Aosta to accommodate my jet lag from the flight I had taken just the day before, Paul heading all the way to Aosta. The path did not waste much effort wandering across the mountain. It was mostly straight down. Brown turned to fields of wildflowers and then to grass and scattered woods as we made the tree line. Water that was ice just hours before tumbled across the trail. It got pretty hot. We shed sweaters and lost all thought of the gloves and other gear which, just an hour before, we had been wondering why we did not bring.

Trail signage was generally easy to follow. We only made one mistake and knew it when we ran into a skull and crossbones, a sure sign not to proceed. But we easily regained the VF and made it to Etroubles, just a few km before our day's destination, Echevennoz. Patrick and I stopped for lunch and Paul headed on to Aosta. He will be stopping in Lucca this year, we a few stages behind that. But it will come as no surprise if we run into him next year as we make our way to Rome.

The first day of walking is not really a thinking day. You are evaluating how your pack sits, how your boots feel, generally how the physical part of your preparations are playing out. Before heading out that morning, I had been quite concerned about the sciatica I had been experiencing before I left California and, of course, my feet. You who have followed me, either in my blogging last year, or in my stories from the prior six years of walking various trails to Compostela know that I have had really bad luck with blisters. My toes have not completely healed from last year's walk, lost nails not completely regrown. Though some blisters would pop up in the next few days, it was something else entirely that would assert itself and make my walk problematic. On this first day, though, other than the sore muscles from the steep descent, I felt fine.

Patrick and I stay in hostels, parish houses, monasteries, B&B's, hotels, restaurants with guest rooms, in dormitories or double rooms (letti separati, certo!), whatever works for our needs on the particular night and depending on availability. At the hospice, it was a 12 bed dormitory; in Echevennoz it was a double room in a bar/trattoria. 

The evening was one of good cheer as we dined with five French pilgrims, one man, Philippe, four women, two Genvieve's and two Isabel's, who were walking together for a week, and with Helen, from the Netherlands, who started in Belgium in May and expects to make Rome in August. We had met and dined with all six the evening before at the Hospice. This evening over spaghetti, veal in beef ragu, and red Val d'Aosta wine, there was that special 'Camino' ambiance as we got to know each other better, mostly in French and a bit of English, traded stories and asked really personal questions such as from one of the two Genevieve's at the table who was embarrassed to ask me whether men are like women and attach their not yet dry underwear to the outside of their packs so they dry in the next day's sun. Certamente!

I will leave it there for now. The next day was more of a thinking day and I'd rather start that as a new post.

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