An American Explorer Discovers Italy
... and shares her photos, her travel notes - and what it was she looked for in every town
Slide shows in the living room used to be one of my greatest pleasures. My dad would click though the tray filled with slides of his garden or his latest paintings. Sometimes company would come, bringing their latest travel slides to show and to talk about. They seemed to be still under the spell of those faraway places, and by the end of the evening I felt I had been there, too.
So, the other day I was happy to find a computer file of photos that our daughter Amy had taken in Italy in the spring of 2005. The weather, she told me, was mild, neither too cold nor too hot. Lately I’ve been in the mood for travel — of the armchair kind. Perfect!
Amy said,
Paula and I used a tour guide company to plan our 2- week trip with 15 other people. We had a guide, and a bus and driver. We would drive to a town or city and have a set time to explore on our own before we went to the next. Paula and I decided what to see and do in each town.
Below is another Lake Cuomo scene, the Villa del Balbianello, where Casino Royal was filmed in the spring of 2006. In the movie, the villa doubles as a hospital where James Bond is recovering, and where the Swiss banker comes to get a code to transfer money.
Bellagio, the town shown below, is located where Lake Cuomo branches to the southwest, while Lake Lecco is off to the southeast. The tip of this peninsula is Punta Spartivento, “the point where the wind divides”.
I asked Amy what the Italians were like. She said,
They were very welcoming. Our Italian bus driver liked to make jokes and yell out the window at other drivers. The waiters and service people were accommodating and willing to help or answer questions. The atmosphere was very laid back.
Did she remember anything special about where she stayed?
There was a hotel room that was so small that the shower head was above the toilet. There was just enough room to stand in front of the toilet (with the lid down) to take a shower.
She also told me about the beautiful doors of Italy. I’m afraid I would be a slow walker, taking it all in.
Perhaps it was in Tuscany that Amy decided she could not photograph all that caught her eye. She says,
I was drawn to door knockers of creatures and characters. When I set out to take photos of them, I didn’t realize there were so many. After a while I couldn’t continually stop at every doorway to take a picture, so ended my mission.
Amy had lunch with her friend at this Venetian restaurant, below. Did she have their black squid pasta? I don’t think so, but she tells me,
I didn't have a favorite restaurant or food, but Paula and I made sure to have a different flavor of gelato in every town we visited, it was so delicious.
In May of 1909, Virginia Woolf visited Florence and then wrote about it to Madge Vaughn back home in England. Her words remind me of her wonderfully unusual book, Street Haunting.
Florence was lovely — more lovely than seems possible. We used to wander about along the river at all hours; or sit and bask on the hills. We talked a great deal — such talk as you and I might have in the small hours.
A thunderstorm. Irises purple against the clouds. And so to Arezzo.
Talking about talking — I found that in Shakespeare’s Othello, Bassanio says,
Gratiano speaks an infinite deal of nothing, more than any man in all Venice.
I’ve never been to Europe myself, but I think a visitor must begin to see art and design everywhere in Italy. I like this sculptural structure in a vineyard, below, with its wisteria-covered staircase:
I imagine turning around, to see this:
And what is Italy without Rome? In 1909, Anne Hollingsworth Wharton wrote in her memoir, Italian Days and Ways,
We strolled back through the blooming shrubbery to the Square of Trinità de’ Monti, and down those Spanish Steps of which we have read so much — great, wide steps, so many of them we have not the courage to count them, and of marble that is neither white nor gray but of a warm yellow tone with a dash of pink in it.
At the foot of the Spanish Steps are the vendors of flowers.
Hollingsworth goes on,
They tell us that no one ever realizes the vastness of St. Peter’s upon a first visit. However, it seemed immense to us, outside and in.
I had two more questions for Amy. If she could go back to Italy, where would she go? She said,
All the same places I visited when I was there, all the amazing places from north to south. Places like Lake Cuomo, Tuscany, Florence, Venice, Rome, Pompeii and the Southern coast. I'd stay in Rome a little longer; a couple of days wasn't enough time to explore it.
Finally, I asked, can you recommend any books by Italian authors, or any films?
Roberto Remigio Benigni, a director/actor, makes comedies. My favorite of his is the critically acclaimed movie Life is Beautiful, but it's tough to watch because it's a comedy/drama about the Holocaust.
To me, so much of Italy seems to be about doors. Some are open like the great bronze doors of St. Peter’s Basilica, and the shaded opening in the little vineyard building. But some are closed, like the residences behind the marvelous door knockers; and perhaps like the doors of the Villa del Balbianello on Lake Cuomo.
In any case, as the Italians say,
When fortune comes, open your doors.
Almost made me want to travel again!
Thank you for sharing a lovely trip.