11. Italy - the sizzling south

Day 54, June 6th.  Mount Etna, Sicily – nr Palmi, Calabria, 16-32C, cloudy, sunny

Anyone arriving in mainland Italy via Villa San Giovanni, expecting to be immediately dazzled by the splendour of the world’s most culturally rich country, will certainly be disappointed, and possibly lost.

We dock in this transitory little port town perched at the south-western tip of Italy’s ‘toe’.  It might qualify as the country’s least edifying entry point, and is not easy to get out of.  But after navigating our way along a series of unmarked, potholed roads, through semi-abandoned and overgrown industrial estates, we find the autostrada and head north-east towards Palmi, and our first mainland garden stay.

It's only 45 minutes: but as we speed through and over mile upon mile of tunnels and bridges, catching fleeting glimpses of dramatic Calabrian mountains and lush wooded valleys crashing down into the sea, we remind ourselves that we’ll need to ‘slow down’ if we’re even to begin to appreciate this magnificent country.

Somewhere between Palmi and Tauriana, on a flat, agricultural plain near the sea, we find tonight’s accommodation.  Our host Pasquale and his daughter meet us at a crossroads; we follow their truck to our quarters: a well-tended field of lemons, olives and artichokes.  But it is just that: a field, fenced off from neighbouring orchards with dilapidated two-metre-high steel fencing, in typical Italian style. 

We enquire if they have a loo or a water supply; there is neither.  But they show us a rainwater collection tank with a tap, that we can ostensibly use for washing up.  It evidently hasn’t filled for a while: the water is yellow, stinking and rancid.

Later, having cooked and eaten, Ralph and I go for a wander in search of other potential water supplies.  At the edge of our little patch of land we spy a neighbour, through a fence.  He’s busy fixing a car in his garage.  We wave, he waves back cheerily; we ask in our finest (fast improving yet still awful) Italian if we can have some water for washing up. 

Within minutes, Antonio has erected ladders either side of his fence and invited all of us over, washing up and all.  We clamber over the fence and are warmly greeted by his wife Emma and son Luca, who enthusiastically welcome us into their house.  They are a hard-working, warm-hearted Italian family: Antonio used to work for Lamborghini in Bologna but found the pay didn’t support their accommodation; Emma is a cleaner by day and works in a pizza restaurant some evenings as well.

For the next few hours, the boys get to play with all of Luca’s toys, Ralph shows Emma how to solve a Rubik’s cube, Nina does our washing up in their sink, we all get to have a shower, Emma dries Ralph's hair with a hairdryer (boys don't have long hair in Italy apparently and is amazed by it) and we’re loaded up with food and supplies for our trip.  Their simple hospitality and generosity is humbling; we’re very appreciative. 

Day 55, June 7th.  Palmi – Tropea, Calabria, 24-34C, sunny

A reasonably good night’s sleep despite the orchestra of barking dogs: there are so many that the howling and baying eventually becomes soporific white noise.  In these parts, most Italians have dogs as guard dogs rather than pets; they live outside and fend off unwelcome human intruders as well as (depending on the region) foxes, wild boar, porcupines – and in remoter parts – Marsican brown bears and wolves.

A focussed morning of home schooling gives way to a slow, winding drive along the pretty but dilapidated coastal road to Tropea.  We stop for lunch and a swim at Capo Vaticano – a tiny coastal town blessed with heavenly bays of turquoise water and white sands which is just impossible to drive past with stopping for a dip in the sea.

We don’t get much further.  Tropea, meant to be an afternoon stop before heading further north and inland, is again just too lovely to leave in a hurry: ancient, cobbled piazzas bustling with cafes, restaurants and local shops brimming with Calabrian delicacies, all perched on sheer cliffs, with a slither of sandy beach running along the shoreline, some 50 metres below.

We find a campsite – no garden stays here – next to the beach.  It’s 2.30pm and the manager solemnly and steadfastly refuses to let us enter until 4pm.  It’s our first encounter with Italian campsite siesta rules: vehicle access and egress is strictly vietata between 1.30 and 4pm.  Not prepared to hang around in limbo for an hour and a half, we try the campsite next door: they let us in. 

We set up camp, swim and sunbathe, climb the steps into the town and potter through its streets, stop for drinks and ice-cream – suddenly our trip feels very unadventurous, yet equally – very civilised and welcome.  We’ll probably be back in a field before we know it. 

Day 56, June 8th.  Palmi – Marina di Pisticci, Calabria / Basilicata, 24-40C, sunny

Another refreshing night’s sleep despite the thumping live music coming from a bar next to our campsite, which upon closer inspection at nearly midnight, had all of five people in it.  We are evidently becoming inured to Italian nocturnal noisiness.

First stop today is a commercial post office in Tropea, where we spend several hours itemising and packing up a collection of 22 kilos’ worth of random items to send back to the UK, which have accumulated in the truck and are now taking up too much space. 

Moroccan rugs and lampshades, two kilos of Algerian Saharan sand, under-used clothes and shoes, turbans, trinkets, redundant maps and books – every item has to be itemised and cleared for acceptability through customs, before it’s accepted.  Strangely, the sand is accepted – but random pieces of volcanic rock and pumice from Mount Etna are rejected – we’re still not quite sure how that logic works.

We drive north-east, following the coast for a while then cutting inland, finally joining a motorway that weaves its way through the deeply forested mountains of the Sila National Park.  Perfect driving conditions: speed and scenery.

Past the not particularly exciting city of Cosenza, we drop down into a very hot, dry plain, heading towards the Ionian Sea now, having been swimming in the Tyrrhenian Sea this morning. 

The boys are busy with their usual routine of (a) enjoying the view, (b) chatting about what we can see, and (c) annoying us by (i) squabbling over the shared ‘pillow’ space in the middle seat and (ii) beating each other up.  So busy with these things today, that they’re greatly confused by the sea re-appearing on the right-hand side of the car, having been on the left-hand side when we left Tropea… a quick explanation aided by the map assures them we haven’t accidentally turned round and finished where we started.

It's 40C – too hot to stay inland, so we head for a beach campsite again at Marina di Pisticci and set up camp in a shaded spot, under a plantation of pine trees.  An urgent cooling off in the sea, followed by an excellent home-cooked supper: our standard tomato / basil / mozzarella starter, followed by fresh pasta with a sauce cobbled out of local fresh vegetables and cured hams.  It’s so easy to eat well in this country. 

Nina and I polish off a surprisingly good three-euro bottle of Calabrian ‘vino locale rosso’ that we bought this morning and prudently cooled in our fridge.  Delicious, although I snored, apparently.

Day 57, June 9th.  Marina di Pisticci - Albarobello, Basilicata / Puglia, 27-41C, sunny

Hot hot hot hot hot.

We spend a few hours home-schooling in the shade of our pine trees, helping Ralph with his (surprisingly difficult) algebra and Laurie with his geography. Laurie and I make a first attempt at fishing in the sea, having seen numerous locals out on the beach this morning with their rods. 

After a bit of 'faffage' sorting out a recalcitrant spinner rod, we’re up and running, wading waist deep into the almost flat Ionian, and casting far out into deeper waters.  But to no avail – one-off fishing in unknown foreign waters always is – it’s  just an excuse to pass the time doing something pleasurable.  We have no idea what we’re trying to catch, what lures to use, what time of day is best, or where best to cast.  We might as well blindfold ourselves and throw sharpened sticks into the sea, but it’s still good fun and nice to practice our casting somewhere we’re not going to get our hooks caught in trees.

After packing up, we head inland towards Craco – an ancient hilltop town that was steadily abandoned between the 1960’s and 1980’s, due to a series of landslides caused by faulty pipework and infrastructure, with a few earthquakes thrown in for good measure. 

Perched – like so many other Italian towns and villages – precariously atop a particularly steep-sided hill, Craco’s crumbling stone ruins rise defiantly above the arid foothills that surround it.  It’s a stone-grey heap of buildings, with pretty, intact arches, shadowy windows hiding long abandoned interiors and a couple of intact domes, clinging to the hillside, with its fine, square watch-tower above all, still presiding over the slowly disintegrating silence beneath. 

We stop the car by the side of the road that passes round the town. It’s all fenced off, but we have no desire to climb up.  It’s 41C and a ruthlessly hot wind is blowing; once again we feel like we’re in a hair dryer.  Laurie takes as many arty photos as his body temperature will allow, then we retreat to our – once again struggling – air conditioning.

Next stop today is Pisticci, a similar, but not abandoned town, perched atop yet another arid hill.  It is stifling today – and disappointingly, as we make our way up and down a series of steep hills, our temperature gauge starts to nudge upwards again – necessitating us crawling up the final hill to our lunch stop.

It’s Sunday – so everything’s shut – but Nina works a miracle by finding a restaurant in the middle of Pisticci that is (a) open and (b) delightfully cool, opening on to a narrow, cobbled side street, but with its vaulted interior burrowed into the mountainside behind it.  Pizza and pasta are both on the menu, but Ralph sagely points out that the pizza oven won’t be lit – it’s only lunchtime.  He’s right, helpfully saving Laurie from dashed hopes and disappointment.

Fully sated with excellent local antipasti and fresh local pastas, we head on to our final stop of today’s sweltering sightseeing – the city of Matera, which lays claim to be one of the oldest inhabited cities in the world. 

On days like today, it’s arguably the perfect sightseeing spot: (a) awe-inspiring, with ancient rose-grey houses fronting onto cool caves, hugging the sides of a steep valley that suddenly gives way into a cavernous gorge; (b) it provides shelter and cool – ancient people really knew how to build cool buildings, long before concrete came along and necessitated air-conditioning; and (c) not too touristy, but touristy enough to have ice cream shops that are actually open on a Sunday.  Literally couldn’t ask for anything more.

Once Laurie’s consumed nearly the entirety of a memory stick in the camera, we load up and drive towards Albarobello, tonight’s home.  En-route, we pass through the bucolic, rolling countryside of the Terra delle Gravine national park, complete with little farmsteads, immaculate dry-stone walls, fields of cows, and the odd patch of gentle, mixed woodland.  It feels rather like a very hot, very dry version of Yorkshire.

Camping around Albarobello is difficult; once again no garden sharing options are available so we opt for the ‘quieter’ of the town’s two campsites – still a large, motorhome-filled affair, complete with swimming pool (most welcome) and 1980’s disco and function room (less so).  We park under the shade of intensely sweet-smelling small-leaved limes, unpack, and dive in the pool. 

Exhausted and having been unable to buy provisions for camping tonight (Sunday meaning literally every shop we’ve passed in the last 150km has been shut), we make grateful use of the campsite’s soulless but surprisingly OK café.  Boys get pizza.  Everyone happy.

Day 58, June 10th.  Albarobello – Lecce - Albarobello, Puglia, 28-37C, sunny

Last night’s dog chorus was particularly tiresome, when combined with the heat in our roof tent.  Correction: the temperature is perfect for Nina, just about bearable for the boys, and furnace-like purgatory for me.

Day trip south to Lecce today: a warm-yellow limestone profusion of Baroque architecture that has deservedly earned it the title of ‘Florence of the South’.  Look at the photos!

The drive to and from Lecce is about an hour and a half – a long way for a day-trip, but worth it.  The countryside around Lecce is flat, agricultural and sweltering, but near Albarobello, we climb up a steep, wooded escarpment and drive the final 15km through cooler, dry-stone walled farmland, filled with an abundance of ripe cherries, almonds and olives – and dotted with the occasional cluster of Trulli houses.

Trulli houses are Albarobello’s speciality: aesthetically enchanting, single storey dry-stone houses, white painted to the roofline and crowned with immaculate, conical dry-stone rooves, usually with a white painted pinnacle at the very top.  Originally store huts or farm dwellings, their thickness, lack of windows and conical interiors keeps them cool in the summer and warm in the winter.  Another example of ancient building techniques doing a far more effective job than modern day concrete or steel.  Again, look at the pictures.  We took a lot...

Back at the campsite, the boys take approximately four seconds to leap into the pool, while I take the car to nearby garage to get a slow puncture fixed (as it turns out, just a valve in need of replacement – ten euros – a rare, good result). 

Whilst I’m away, the pool attendant has told Nina and the boys they need to wear swimming hats in the pool.  This has not been well received.  Not being fans of inconsistently enforced petty rules, we discuss briefly and decide to ignore this little directive and continue swimming – feigning a combination of ignorance and / or a sudden allergy to swim hats.  It works: the attendant watches on, but keeps her counsel.

Day 59, June 11th.  Albarobello – Monopoli, Puglia, 28-35C, sunny

First stage of truly ‘heading north’, and away from the sweltering south.  Delightful as it is, we couldn’t live in southern Italy – it’s just too damned hot. We might have been here during a heatwave for the past week, but the southern Italian heatwaves are now a normal, multi-annual event.  

We stop in nearby Noci (pr. ‘Nochi’) to visit the food market today and stock up on camping provisions – including the acquisition of a basil plant, soon named ‘Bazy’ by the children.  At our last campsite the boys developed major 'camper envy' when some nearby travellers had displayed not one, but two live basil plants on their table at supper time.  Until this point, we’ve been making do with fresh basil bought in the markets, which lasts for one day if we’re lucky.  Not any more.  The addition of Bazy to our travelling family means we’ll always have a fresh supply to garnish our caprese.

Ralph and Laurie devise a storage solution for him in the back seat, take responsibility for his watering and pastoral care, and make sure he’s always put under the car when we stop (and collected again before we set off) so he doesn’t fry.  Bazy appears to be a ‘he’, insofar as we can tell.

Next stop, the centre of Albarobello, to visit the town’s abundance of Trulli houses.  The rest of Albarobello is nothing special, but the handful of hillsides in the centre where these houses abound is like a different, lost world.  Nowadays, these erstwhile food stores and farm dwellings are all cafes, restaurants or boutique shops – catering to the tourists who mark this town as a ‘must-see’ destination in southern Italy. 

The place is endearing and the houses are immaculate, albeit it all feels rather like a museum.  But, we reflect, without the tourists, these houses would be as run down and perhaps neglected as their poorer cousins that we’ve driven past in the countryside.

We drive north to Monopoli, leaving a host of other highlights in southern Puglia for another time.  That’s the problem with Italy – there’s simply too much to see and do; even away from the big-ticket attractions (which we’re trying to avoid) the country is just littered with extraordinary cultural and topographical treasures. No wonder it attracted nearly 60 million foreign tourists last year.

We’re a little tired when we reach Monopoli – a combination of disturbed sleep, the relentless heat, and some equally relentless sightseeing.  Our car’s air-conditioning system has packed up again, so our first stop is an air-con centre on the outskirts: rather larger, smarter and more technically proficient than its equivalent in Algeria.  They identify a leak, fix the leak (with the world’s smallest O-ring), and re-gas our system.  Two hundred euros for an hour’s work – I think we got stiffed on this one, but air-con is an essential, non-negotiable item in this climate.

Enjoying our new fridge-like climate (the boys now complaining it’s actually too cold), we do battle with Monopoli’s erratic one-way system, and Google Maps’ equally randomised interpretation of it.  We finally find somewhere to park, walk, buy ice cream, sit in a bit of a heap overlooking Monopoli’s tiny ancient port, and buy more supplies for camping this evening.

Accommodation tonight is on the coast, a large, spaced-out campsite, nothing special internally but with access to the Cala Sottile, a tiny little inlet with a 20-foot beach, effectively a natural swimming pool off the sea.  Swimming, rock jumping and crabbing puts everyone in better spirits.

Supper tonight is another excellent caprese salad to start with – making full use of our new pet basil plant – followed by a rather novel but nonetheless excellent pasta dish with cauliflower, salami and garlic.  We are getting inventive.

Day 60, June 12th.  Monopoli – nr Capestrano, Puglia / Abruzzo, 28-34C, sunny

Long drive today.  We make the most of our campsite’s amazing swimming facilities before packing up and heading north towards Pescara, where we’ll turn inland towards the Tirino Valley, and L’Aquila.

Nina drives and puts her foot to the floor on the motorway; unusually, this means I’m in charge of finding a lunch stop.  I excel myself, finding a superb agriturismo restaurant just off the motorway near San Severo, albeit involving a mildly eyebrow-raising drive through an abandoned industrial estate to find it.  We sit down, don’t look at a menu, and food from their farm just arrives – home-made ricottas, mozzarellas, pecorinos, strachiatella, prosciuttos, fried aubergine and courgette balls, fresh bread, olives and olive oils.  They then ask us what we’d like for our main course.  “Siamo pieno!” we can just about muster in our Italian now.  We can’t believe anyone ever gets to the pasta course here…  

The coastal motorway to Pescara is fast, undulating and pretty – we drive through a solid 50 mile stretch of coastal hills, carpeted with vineyards in the valleys and forests on the hills, punctuated with regular towns and villages, all occupying their usual spots, delicately perched on the highest hills.  The reason?  Defence.  Italy as a unified country is only 163 years old; prior to that it was a mass of independent states, duchies and tribes – which fought each other with regularity over many centuries. 

From Pescara, we head inland on the motorway towards Rome, through wide, forest-clad valleys, surrounded by the surprisingly large peaks of the central Apennines.

We turn off towards Capestrano and L’Aquila and soon find ourselves in the quiet, almost entirely unspoilt Tirino Valley – following this cleanest of clean watercourses upstream to our accommodation spot for the next few nights.  Arriving at our campsite – another agristourisme spot – it appears shut; luckily for us some German campers who know the manager have reached the locked gates a few minutes before us, and are on the phone to him, persuading him to come and open up.  A few minutes’ later, Marco turns up – proudly sporting some bright yellow polyester tracksuit bottoms which look like the most flammable clothing on earth – and cheerily lets us in.

From their campsite – effectively an oak plantation (oaks are grown here to facilitate truffle growing, they have a symbiotic relationship) – we can see right the way up the Tirino Valley, towards the proud fort of Rocca Calascio, perched 1,000 metres above us upstream.   Huge peaks and ridges line the valley on both sides – but despite its scale, it’s all green. 

It's possibly our prettiest camping spot yet – and there are some serious contenders now. Equally importantly, we appear to have come far enough north for loo seats in campsites to be re-introduced.  For reasons unbeknown to us, in southern Italy loo seats seem to simply not exist.  This warrants a small celebration.

Marco tells us that the two friendly camp dogs will stay here overnight after he’s left, guarding the place against foxes, wolves and bears.  He tells us we should keep the gates shut; noting the sturdy steel wire fence that surrounds the land, we tell him that this won’t be a problem. 

After another caprese salad and another fine fresh pasta concoction, we settle down in our roof tent, enjoying the relative cool of the air, and go to sleep, listening to the dogs doing their work.  They are very busy.

Day 61, June 13th.  nr Capestrano, Tirino Valley, Abruzzo, 21-26C, sunny, cloudy, showers

 Just a little day trip today.  After our currently normal breakfast of yoghurt and granola, we pack up and drive 20 minutes up the valley and off the road, following a rutted track about a kilometre or so up to the Fattoria Valle Magica – literally the ‘Magic Valley Farm’, run by Ralph, a friendly middle-aged Northern Irishman who moved here nine years ago and built an organic, near self-sufficient farm, from scratch.

Alongside his son Lucian, who’s 11 and delighted for some English boys to play with, he gives us a tour of his farm.  Pigeons, rabbits, pigs for eating, chickens and ducks for eggs, turkeys to sell to ex-pats at Christmas time, guinea fowl and geese for ‘guard dogs’, sheep and goats for milk and meat. His vegetables growing abundantly in four-foot-high raised beds fertilised with donkey manure and operated on a ‘no-dig’ basis, inspire immediate envy.

He's an excellent guide – and, unlike so many of the guides we’ve met on this trip who are intent on claiming their particular domain is the oldest, biggest, best etc – he explains the challenges of farming here, his battles with hopeless and often corrupt Italian bureaucracy, the difficulties of getting locals on-side when his business is seen as a threat to them, and the impact of climate change that he’s already witnessed in this divine little valley since he moved here.  “It used to snow in these mountains in the winter.  Not any more.”

Tour finished; we feast on his freshly prepared Arrosticini – local Abruzzan lamb skewers – and continue chatting whilst the boys play with Lucian in his playground.  It’s an idyllic spot, but he’s candid enough to point out it’s far from an idyllic lifestyle.  As we leave, we wonder if it may get a little lonely up here – you need to be a special type of person to flourish here, despite the beauty.

Back down in the valley, we find a picture postcard spot on the banks of the Tirino River for Laurie and I to do some more fishing (having first bought a licence, of course) and for Ralph to do some painting.  The water is crystal clear and, thanks to the white sand on the riverbed, has a beguiling light turquoise colour, framed perfectly by the willows and reeds that line the banks.  There are trout here, but we don’t catch any – no matter.

Back at our camping spot, Marco enthusiastically prepares a platter of local meats and cheeses for us, whilst we take cover under his sheltered terrace as a rainstorm passes over.  The weather clears up before we go to bed, and we don’t notice the guard dogs tonight.

Day 62, June 14th.  nr Capestrano – Subiaco, Abruzzo / Lazio, 21-32C, sunny

A prompt start this morning and a hearty breakfast – two boiled eggs, toast and fruit all round. 

We’re canoeing up the Tirino this morning; this involves driving upstream for 15 minutes to meet our guide, hanging around a bit (so time for a singlo espresso for me and Nina), then driving back to the same spot we went fishing at yesterday, just three minutes from our campsite, to meet our boat.

It transpires these canoeing trips are organised in quite large groups; there must be 20-odd tourists of various descriptions, plus a lot of guides.  But our initial concerns are unfounded – having a guide in each canoe (plus two of us) means we can share the burden of paddling upstream on what is a surprisingly fast flowing river, and gives us more time to enjoy the scenery and the wildlife. 

Once on the water, all is supremely peaceful; we paddle gently upstream, admiring the sheer clarity and the colour of the water, the landscape, and the wildlife.  Moorhens huddle on their nests in the reeds or take their tiny chicks on darting visits between bits of cover, the odd trout flits beneath us, ducks dive, and we glimpse a few water rats, huddled on reeds or twigs, nibbling away at seeds they’re holding in their paws. 

Our guide, Hasim, definitely needs a little fact-checking.  Cleanest river in Europe? Well, it’s up there, but not quite.  Zero pollution issues?  Not quite, based on the scandals involving buried chemicals downstream near Pescara.  Etc. It is however, idyllically beautiful and clean.

We reach the furthest point upstream that it’s possible to paddle in, before the current gets too strong, and enjoy a quick swim.  Refreshingly cold – yes – but not glacial.  The return leg downstream is super-relaxing; no paddling required, the near total silence is wonderfully calming, we can just watch and admire the general loveliness of it all, and – of course – spot wildlife for Laurie to photograph.   

Back on land, we grab a quick espresso and ice cream at a nearby café – Nina in particular has got into her late morning espressos – then head up the valley to the Rocca Calascio – which involves a steep climb of about a dozen hairpin bends, taking us from 400 metres to 1,400 metres in very short order. 

We park as close to the top as we can – it’s still a decent trek to the summit.  The Rocca Calascio is a 1,000 year-old fort, built solely for military purposes, which was abandoned in the 1400’s after it was damaged in an earthquake.  What now remains of its vertiginous walls and watchtower, balanced upon an equally vertiginous piece of rock, is beautifully preserved, and provides a commanding, astonishing 360 degree view, with the lush, wooded peaks surrounding the Tirino Valley in the foreground, and ridge upon ridge of grey, rockier peaks of the Appenines, disappearing into the distance.

Still marvelling, we picnic on the remains of last night’s meat and cheese platter, with olive oil and fresh bread.  We then retrace our steps down the mountain, the boys lulled to sleep despite the hairpins, whilst Nina and I enjoy our prettiest drive of the trip so far – by some margin – through the Apennines to L’Aquila, and on to the Pescara – Rome motorway.

Even hitting the motorway, the views don’t diminish, as it carves its way round deep, wooded valleys, with olive groves and farmland nestled on the valley floor. 

We turn off for Subiaco shortly before Rome, heading for a pre-booked night in the Santa Scholastica monastery, just above the town.  On the way we drive through the charming town of Arsoli, significantly prettier and more sweetly fragranced than its name suggests.

We arrive at the monastery – an immaculate stone edifice nestled serenely in the side of a mountain, in true monastic style – in late afternoon.  Once checked in, we find their delightfully tree-shaded terrace, and – like all good philistines – immediately tuck in to the local monastic brew, whilst the boys paint, sort their photos and catch up on home schooling and diaries.

Our family room is basic but surprisingly comfortable – no boards for beds here.  To be fair, after nine night’s camping on the bounce, it feels like luxury to have the boys in a semi-separate room, and a loo we can access without climbing down a ladder.

Dinner in the airy, vaulted refectory downstairs is also surprisingly good – local rabbit, piglet and excellent fresh pastas.  The monastic wine is as good as the monastic beer – there can be no doubt that monks through the ages have kept themselves sane during their lives of sanctity with generous quantities of home-brewed booze.

Day 63, June 15th.  Subiaco - Rome, Lazio, 19-33C, sunny

Feeling suitably refreshed, if not quite as sanctimonious as one should do after a night in a monastery, we breakfast in the refectory (poor, especially after last night’s delights) and attach ourselves on to a tour of the working part of the monastery. 

It’s all in Italian, which – despite our recent advances – still remains largely unintelligible for us, especially when it’s delivered at speed.  We get the gist of what the guide is saying (old, monks, this bit added later, working well in the courtyard etc) but after 20 minutes or so, having seen and heard enough, we sidle away. 

We drive further up the mountain to the even more remote and vertiginous San Benedetto monastery, clinging precariously to a steep mountainside, looking down the steep, densely wooded Aniene Valley. 

But by now it’s 11am and we have a lunch date in Rome, with my half-uncle Jonathan and his family.  We are due to stay with Jonathan, his wife Martina and their daughters Victoria and Isabelle, for two days, for a welcome family catch-up, some civilisation, and another much-needed service for our car.