It’s never a good idea to arrive anywhere on a Sunday. Especially in a Catholic country.
The world and his wife were out and about in the beautiful little town of Pizzo on the instep of Italy. The north coast of Calabria.
The toe of Italy now?
What is this obsession with toes?
Pedro squeezed – with millimetres to spare – between two large Mercs parked at a corner at the beach car park.
‘Sono proprio stanco!’ he admitted.
And I agreed. I was cream crackered and hadn’t really slept for 48 hrs plus the driving had added up to around 600 miles.
I’d had to keep forcing myself to stop. I came close to the crash barrier on a couple of occasions, driving with my eyes shut.
Which is, as we all know, the only way to drive in Italy.
Pizzo is one of a string of pearls down this coastline which include Tropea and Scylla. A great place to tour as there are airports at Reggio in the toe and Terme in the ankle. Next time you have a week to spare get a one way hire car and give it a go.
I first came here with my leg in a brace and had second thoughts about its verticality. Now I noticed there were Tuk Tuks to take you from the main square at the top to the lower town with the beach, which was where I was staying.
I got chatting to Guy from Belgium who was making his way home too after about six weeks on a powerful Honda.
He told me he didn’t like the Balkans much. Especially Serbia where he’d felt distinctly unwelcome. I’d just watched a documentary about how the First World War started and I could imagine there was still a lot of resentment on many counts.
An interesting man. He’d introduced supermarkets into Cote D’Ivoire and later to Romania after the regime changed.
‘Ex Stasi guys would flock in and fill the boots of their Mercedes. But it was the ordinary people that would queue and buy just a small bar of high quality soap. That got me. They wanted a piece of the west. But that was all they could afford.’
He said that Romania was one of the most beautiful countries he’d ever known and the people also.
Are your ears burning Vlad?
Basically I just dossed around for a couple of days. Aurelio served me a superb octopus salad and a glass of white wine.
And in the evenings I drank Campari Spritz and watched the comings and goings of the locals.
I got my washing done with the help of Gabriela who laughed at me because I couldn’t work out the washing machine.
‘Dio mio!’
And I should have gone in the sea but it was raining and I didn’t fancy it.
Forse domani?