Dante on the Move

Author: Jennifer Allsopp

  • ‘New Life’: From Pontassieve to Florence

    On my final day, I met a lovely couple who invited me for lunch and felt the warm embrace of the sun and of friends which filled me with new life. 

    I slept badly, waking up every two hours. I was worried about my broken toes and how they’d manage the 21 kilometres I would have to face to make it back to Florence and complete the ring of the Dante trail. The very prospect had seemed near impossible when I had shared my wish with Massimo Kyo and Alina in the tranquil oasis of San Pietro a Romena two weeks ago, and then again two days ago in the Hermitage of Santa Maria. Now I was so close and the end was in sight. Yes, I was doing it.

    I tried to summon up Virgil’s words of encouragement to Dante in canto 24 of Inferno when he becomes weary as they pass through the bolgia of the thieves:

    ‘“Now you must cast aside your laziness,”
    my master said, “for he who rests on down
    or under covers cannot come to fame;

    and he who spends his life without renown
    leaves such a vestige of himself on earth
    as smoke bequeaths to air or foam to water.

    Therefore, get up; defeat your breathlessness
    with spirit that can win all battles if
    the body’s heaviness does not deter it.

    A longer ladder still is to be climbed;
    it’s not enough to have left them behind;
    if you have understood, now profit from it.”’

    I would rise up like Dante and take on the steep climb up to the Convento dell’Incontro:

    ‘Then I arose and showed myself far better
    equipped with breath than I had been before:
    “Go on, for I am strong and confident.”’

    On my way out of the town at around 9am I stopped momentarily to watch a tall man pruning an olive tree on a ladder. It was a sunny day, perhaps the sunniest so far on the cammino. Despite this, I wore my long-sleeved black top in order to protect my new tattoo from the rays. The purple stencil had already started to disintegrate rendering the terracotta outline clearer. I loved it. 

    I went down the hill past the beautiful medieval bridge that had been damaged in the recent floods and stopped at an old bakery to purchase some pizza and fizzy water. The streets were bustling with people and, despite my fatigue, I found myself whistling in good cheer. 

    I passed a police officer who was giving a black man a car ticket and saluted Asia who I had met the previous evening in the tattoo parlour. A swallow flew inches from my face as I passed under the bridge which was cluttered with antique furniture. It looked like everybody was spring cleaning. There were up turned stools, desks devoid of drawers. Two sagging single mattresses framed the display on either side like columns.  

    It was nice to be walking along the river. The fresh graffiti contrasted with the muted tones of the brick walls. A man passed with a shopping trolly and a flight of joggers zig-zagged along the narrow path. I thought back fondly of running along the river Charles when I had lived in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and hoped that my foot wouldn’t give me too much bother so that I could be up and running myself again soon.

    To the right of the path was a sculpture of a man striding forth from a rock. I was reminded of the engravings that Dante sees on the terrace of the proud in canto 10 of Purgatory which are so lifelike that they seem to speak to him of acts of humility:

    ‘There we had yet to let our feet advance
    when I discovered that the bordering bank—
    less sheer than banks of other terraces—

    was of white marble and adorned with carvings
    so accurate—not only Polycletus
    but even Nature, there, would feel defeated…

    This was the speech made visible by One
    within whose sight no thing is new—but we,
    who lack its likeness here, find novelty.’

    Thus was the power of great art. 

    A sign said ‘no fishing’.

    Two men were fishing. 

    The water ran aquamarine. 

    I was saluting everyone on the path, including a new mother who was stroking her baby’s fine hair on a picnic blanket beside the river. The hawthorn petals were a perfect white and exuded an almond-like perfume. 

    The recreational path soon gave way to allotments which featured a variety of vegetables and flowers that were being carefully attended to by a diverse group of local citizens. It was the first time I’d seen yellow irises, and here was a line of Romagnolo artichokes in their characteristic bruised purple and green. 

    I crossed the river over an iron bridge. The pathway was perforated with little holes so that you felt you might fall down at any point. It reminded me of being scared, as a child, that I would slip between the staggered metal stairs at the council flats where my school friends had lived back in Milton Keynes.  

    I was slightly haunted by the size of the hill ahead of me and though it was only 10:15am, I was already hot.

    I stopped to check directions with a man who was cutting grass. It looked like he’d put henna on his hair the way some older Indian men do. It was a livid orange.

    The yellow broom smelt buttery and delicious.

    I passed a church on the right and took a wrong turn which afforded a beautiful view back over the city. I then retraced my steps to take the steep climb of the wooden bank off to the left of the road. The foliage was intruding onto the path in thick tendrils causing me to duck and dive. A spider web was suspended in the sunlight, diaphanous. 

    I could feel the weight of not having slept with every step up the woodland pass but the shadow of the trees was merciful. I was rewarded by the sight of a kaleidoscope of tiny flowers. Here some purple gromwell creeped along the ground, sending out long trails of dark green matt leaves sprinkled with gentian-blue flowers. And there were pink prongs of common sainfoin. I recalled how Dante described being drawn to beauty in Purgatorio, canto 18:

    ‘The soul, which is created quick to love,
    responds to everything that pleases, just
    as soon as beauty wakens it to act.

    Your apprehension draws an image from
    a real object and expands upon
    that object until soul has turned toward it;

    and if, so turned, the soul tends steadfastly,
    then that propensity is love—it’s nature
    that joins the soul in you, anew, through beauty.’

    As I exited the woods, I passed a tennis court which seemed unusually located on the rocky terrain. Two men were working out how to get a van along the path. The one who seemed to be in the more authoritative position was wearing blue overalls. Now it was nearly 12 o’clock and the sun was beating down on me. Soon I’d stop for my lunch of the remaining pizza. 

    But I didn’t have pizza for lunch after all. Instead, I chanced upon Matthew, an English man from Derby, near where I live, who was outside his house performing chores. His sweet dog Paloma had come to greet me and when I’d saluted her back in English, Matthew asked me if I’d like some water. 

    I gratefully accepted. 

    And this wasn’t just water, it was fizzy water – ice cold and from a Soda Stream.

    We soon got deep into conversation about all things Oxford where he’d also studied, and rowing, which I had not, and, with that, conversation turned into lunch. 

    Matthew was an environmental engineer while his Italian wife, Nicoletta, who he’d met at language school, worked in fashion. Florence in the summer was too busy for them with tourists, they said; they liked their hillside retreat. I was reminded of summers in Oxford when I would angrily ping my bell as foreign exchange students would stray into the cycle lane. I had been so lucky to live in Florence during the winter when the whole city had felt manageable and somehow my own. 

    Nicoletta had prepared a delicious quiche and focaccia which we ate with a salad and local pecorino cheese.

    ‘I’d offer you chedder, but that seems unfitting,’ Matthew quipped. 

    As I told them about my journey, I noticed that Nicoletta had tears in her eyes. She was a fellow Dante aficionado and was deeply moved by the fact that I had embarked on this pilgrimage. We began citing Lorenzo di Medici’s famous poems, finishing the sentences of one another:

    ‘How wondrous beautiful is youth, 

    yet fleeting, so soon gone, in truth!

    He who will, let happy be, 

    The morrow has no certainty.’

    I told her how instead of the Backstreet Boys I’d had a poster of Lorenzo di Medici on my wall as a teenager. She could relate. She explained that she’d just got round to unpacking a box of books including a compendium of Italian verse which she was devouring.

    There was a princess crown in a bowl with walnuts that belonged to their daughter who was named Florence Rose. They had lived in the house three and a half years and done a spectacular job of restoring it. It even had a bathtub! How very unItalian, came my immediate thought.

    Their ample garden was rich with almonds, walnuts, figs and cherry sized plums. There was a peach tree that Matthew had just planted beside their pool and rows upon rows of olive trees from which they harvested their own oil. The key to pruning them, Matthew explained, is to hollow out the inside so that the tree looks like a donut. I thought about my own short-lived time as an apple tree pruner on a farm in California. How I had romanticized and then so quickly come to detest that slow labour.

    I spent about an hour with Mathew and Nicoletta sitting on sunbeds by their pool chatting leisurely. Then, I took my leave, explaining that I had friends who would be waiting for me in Florence that evening. 

    ‘You must come back!’ said Nicoletta as I heaved back on my rucksack and headed down the dusty drive. I very much hoped I would.

    After a steep ascent up to the Convento dell’Incontro, I got my first sight of her. There she was before me once more with a skyline woven in orange thread: Florence, the most beautiful city in the world. There was the Duomo, San Lorenzo and Giotto’s tower. And there, somewhere in the hazy distance, were Alina and Kelsey who had travelled specially to Florence to meet me at the end of my cammino. 

    I thought I’d better get a move on, but at the same time something about today made me cherish each individual step. I was slower on foot not because of my broken toes, but because this was my last day of a three week long cammino and I knew how much I’d miss the tread. 

    I didn’t put on an audiobook or music, I just wanted to be at one with my thoughts and reflect on what I had achieved: the highs and the lows, literally and metaphorically. 

    A fellow hiker who looked North American was walking the other way. I saluted her – she was as pink as I was in the afternoon sun. I noted that one of the cuts on my hand might be infected and applied some ayurvedic balm. A bright green caterpillar dangled on a thread.

    The descent was without shadow, a combination of brushland and road. I breathed in the sweet scent of wild sage as sweat accumulated in my philtrum and then spilled over onto my lips. I could hear the blood pumping in my ears. I couldn’t imagine doing this hike in the summer months.

    I was trying to walk on my heels as much as I could as the pain in my toes grew more insistent. 

    With each corner, Florence emerged again in all her splendor, framed by a variety of species of trees. I thought of Dante’s poem ‘Three women have come round my heart’ which he wrote from exile, longing for a view as close as this. 

    ‘They each seem sorrowful and dismayed, 

    like those driven from home and weary, 

    abandoned by all, their virtue and beauty 

    being of no avail. 

    For though we are wounded now, we shall 

    yet live on, and a people will return 

    that will keep this arrow bright. 


     And I who listen to such noble exiles 

    taking comfort and telling their grief 

    in divine speech, I count as an honour 

    the exile imposed on me; for if judgement 

    or force of destiny does indeed desire 

    that the world turn the white flowers 

    into dark, it is still praiseworthy to fall 

    with the good. And were it not that the fair 

    goal of my eyes is removed by distance 

    from my sight – and this has set me on fire –

    I would count as light that which weighs on me.’

    With each careful step I was just that bit closer to San Giovanni where I would lay my rose from Ravenna at Dante’s place of imagined return. It had gone a bit moldy in my bag if truth be told but it was the thought that counted. And over the last three weeks I had given this important step of my literary pilgrimage a lot of thought indeed. I was nothing if not a terrible romantic. 

    I had prepared well for the trip, but had I prepared myself for it to end? What would I do without that familiar sound of the cuckoo and the butterflies dancing before me along the path? The pretty purple wildflowers and all those hundreds of barking dogs?

    Florence felt so near that it was as if I could reach out and touch her, but she was still 10 kilometres away. I passed a shrine that someone had embedded in a tree and took a moment to make a wish before spontaneously embracing it. Then I stopped for a little rest. 

    I reached the first open bar at around 3pm and delighted in downing some more fizzy water. 

    Then, after half an hour more, I’d reached the river Arno. It looked like reflective glass. I thought about Giordano and his Monet Lake made out of mirrors. Anna, Massimo Kyo, Rossella, Enrico, Oliver, Paulo – what people I had met on my way!

    I passed a hedge of Japanese cheesewood whose flowers smelt citrusy and vibrant. I took a sprig and held it to my nose, inhaling every last hint of perfume. I picked some wild garlic and smelled the oil heavy on my hands. There was so much here you could make a whole batch of pesto, I thought. 

    I was getting into the suburbs now. I passed the Florentine Equine School and a Business Centre for Young Doctors which had a crest decorated with half of the Florentine lily and half of the Medici shield.  

    The landscape had flattened out and I heard children playing in a schoolyard. It was strange to use a zebra crossing and be amongst so many cars. I was now just over 90 minutes away and would reach the baptistry by five. 

    I caught sight of myself in one of the corner mirrors on the road. I hadn’t washed my hair in five days and my braids were fraying at the edges. But I looked well. I looked really well. As Dante had written over 700 years ago, this was a ‘vita nuova’, a ‘new life’!

    As I traced the path along the Arno, a form of blossom like sheep’s wool collected at my feet, causing me to sneeze. Some people were sunbathing next to the weir. I remembered running up there in those precious three months I had spent in Florence as a Visiting Professor. Someone was sitting on a plastic chair in the middle of the water, of course. A lone woman was kayaking down the river.

    I kept my eyes peeled, recalling the time I’d taken the group of refugee students to Florence and my co-facilitator, Mortezza, had spotted an otter in the bullrushes. 

    ‘It looks just like the emoji!’ Mihal from Venezuala had exclaimed.  

    I’d also spotted kingfishers several times.

    I retraced the path of the beginning of the cammino which I’d hiked with Alina at my side, recalling the same beehives, hens and the same random upturned table in the middle of a lawn. 

    My inner world had changed profoundly and my outer body too – I had thick calves and my behind seemed to have moved up an inch. But here much was the same. A young woman in fashionable sunglasses walked past me with a Calvin Klein bag; another woman with neon pink lightening earrings rode by on an electric scooter. Two female lovers sat opposite one another on a bench with their legs intertwined.

    And now I was in the city in earnest. The dum dum dum of music with a heavy base played out from somewhere to my right and several joggers ran topless in the sun. Tour coaches lined the streets with signs reading promises such as ,’Experience Pisa and Florence in a Day.’ I stopped to observe a lizard biting another’s tail.

    ‘Have you come far?’ asked an elderly gentleman.

    I had, I replied. 

    ‘Porca puttana miseria’ came his response, ‘good for you!’

    I passed the canoe club and the bridge off to Piazza Michelangelo from where, on several occasions, it had been a delight to watch the sunset. I passed through the remnants of the old city walls. 

    Florence had always seemed like such a small city to me, but suddenly it seemed so big.

    Here and there were grids covered by the familiar ugly orange netting. But now it didn’t mean that there had been a landslide, it meant roadworks.

    Two people walking with audio guides around their neck nearly walked into an open drain as they passed a stall selling suggestive aprons stamped with the statue of David. 

    I didn’t need a map now. I was on home turf.

    I passed the national library with its Dante sculpture and quote from his political treatise Convivio, ‘let this be new light’. Then came the Galileo Museum, shortly after which I turned right at the Uffizi galleries. Over the heads of all the eager street artists, I spied a second Dante sculpture which depicts him pointing at himself in a gesture of self-importance and pride. Here in stone, he has been bequeathed the laurel crown of poet that he so desperately wanted to return to wear in person before he had died, aged 56, in exile. I thought of his bones, lying in Ravenna. 

    From Palazzo Vecchio I weaved in and out of guide groups who were following umbrellas of every neon hue. Three people were eating the special Florentine schiacciata on the move. A little Canadian girl was playing with a wooden sword.

    ‘Whoosh,’ she cried out, ‘off with their head!’

    Under the stone arches, it was nice and cool. But I’d never been here when it had been so busy. It was heaving.

    The smell of leather hit me as I passed down the main street and I resisted the temptation to pop into my favourite lingerie stores. I couldn’t believe I was in reach of the baptistry, my final stop. 

    I was glad to have this final moment on my own. The last three weeks had tested me beyond what I thought I could endure physically and mentally and I felt happy and restored. 

    And with that, I turned the corner and there she was, the baptistry in her green and white marble.

    She stood simple and sublime.

    I thought of how struck I had been at the age of 15 when I had first seen the mosaics inside and of the copy of Christ’s head that I had rendered that was likely still situated in the paving of my old secondary school. I thought about the first time I had read the words of Dante and felt seen and understood in my sense of being lost. The sobs immediately came. I placed my hands upon the flank of San Giovanni and tucked the rose I had brought from Ravenna in the doorknob. Dante’s dream had been to return as a poet and now, in some ways, symbolically, I had brought him back.

    Turning the corner, Kelsey and Alina with whom I’d shared parts of the cammino were there to greet me with a huge hug. Kelsey had made me a laurel crown with roses which she placed upon my head – they smelt magnificent. Alina who was wearing characteristically fashionable unmatching earrings squirted at me with champagne in the traditional fashion of Italian graduations. I sent a picture to Giordano, the founder of the trail. 

    ‘Consider yourself a graduate of poetic passages in Tuscany and Emilia Romagna,’ he replied with a smiley face emoji.

    That word passages had come to mean so many things to me. Passages of the Divine Comedy, passages through place and time; the many passengers who had travelled with me.

    As I melted into Kelsey and Alina’s embrace I thought of canto 21 of Purgatorio when Virgil meets with his beloved mentor Statius and realizes that he is unable to hold him because he is but a shade. He says, in one of the most moving passages of the entire Divine Comedy,

    ‘“Now you can understand
    how much love burns in me for you, when I
    forget our insubstantiality,

    treating the shades as one treats solid things.”’

    I had been gone three long weeks, much of which I’d spent alone in the wilderness, and as I hugged my friends, I felt my body return to life. I thought of all the times I had been to visit friends in detention centres where we’d been banned from touching; I thought of the borders that divided us; of Tagore’s ‘narrow domestic walls’.  

    Alina untangled her face from my hair. 

    ‘A question’, she asserted.

    ‘Do you think, after all this, that Dante would have written the Divine Comedy had he never been a refugee like me?’

  • ‘Visible Speech’: From Dicomano to Pontassieve

    The sun shone strongly on the rolling hills and I reflected on great art’s ability to speak in indelible ink.  

    I woke at 7am and ate breakfast with the construction worker from Udine and a colleague of his who was also staying at the B&B, Pino del Capitano. Coffee was served in a chipped teapot.

    We discussed Italian TV and the phenomenon of the velinas who are attractive women who serve at props in news and current affairs shows – showgirls, if you will. When I had started studying Italian in my teenage years, I had been struck by the sexism that dominated much of the culture, but I reflected that on my cammino I had encountered nothing but respect and chivalry. 

    I was worried about my toes which were swollen and painful from yesterday’s fall and so I bound them together once more with some tape and plasters that had been left to me in a first aid kit by Alina. Today I would walk tentatively and see how far I got. It was going to be a case of mind over matter, for sure.

    Ivan proudly showed me the lemons he had picked from his own tree. They smelt sweet and tangy at the same time. I was reminded of the citrus house in Oxford’s botanical gardens where I would sit and read as a student. 

    As I departed back up the valley, a line of mist like an airplane trail hung lightly in the sky. It was sunny but the air was fresh, or rather ‘frescino’.

    I love Italian suffixes such as ‘ino’ and ‘etto’ which denote something as small. ‘One’ renders its subject big and ‘accio’ makes it wicked. My Italian exchange partner Maurizio had called me ‘Jennina’ – little Jenny.

    I would miss speaking Italian on my return. Speaking a foreign language is like playing a musical instrument through which you get to express a different part of yourself. In French, I go by Jennifer; in Italian I am Jenny; and in Arabic I am Jen which means ‘ghost’.

    Kelsey, picking up on my international mindedness and desire to incorporate all my different linguistic personalities called me ‘Jenny-Jennifer-Jen.’

    As I passed down Via Garibaldi, there was a church on my left and an elderly gentleman attending to his roses. One of the gardens that lined the little path featured a tree decorated with easter egg wrappers and outside one house was an exercise bike. ‘Free to anyone who loves the planet,’ read the paper note.

    As I crossed the beautiful river, I realized I was limping. The pharmacy wasn’t open for another hour so I made do with Ibroprofen and carried on my way. On the road there were shards of a car’s wing mirror that glittered in the dawn light.

    I entered a café in Dicomano’s centre to grab a second coffee and got talking to three men in bright yellow nurses’ uniforms. I asked one of them about my foot. He said the same as my mum had, to lance my toes together, put my foot up with ice and rest. I told him that this wasn’t a possibility and that I had to continue. 

    ‘I see,’ he responded with a smile. ‘So, you grind your teeth and carry on, girl!’

    The gaggle of men sitting smoking outside could have been intimidating, but I wasn’t self-conscious at all. On the contrary, I felt welcome. There was a self-service laundromat and a shop called Meat Matters, both of which were yet to open. 

    I walked alongside the river for around 20 minutes. Some graffiti said, ‘all cops are bastards.’ There was a beautiful little allotment on the left and an avenue of cypress trees to the right. I crossed beneath a short railway bridge which even touched my head at five foot two. 

    A man was walking a ridiculously small dog in a gilet.

    I read a sign alerting me that I was on the Path of the Powerful Arno, also known as the ‘Path of Partisans’. In the Spring of 1944, the resistance to the Nazis had grouped together near here and walked to Florence which they would finally liberate on August 11th. I thought of one of my favourite Italian writers, Elsa Morante and her novel La Storia, which means both story and history. It narrates the life of a single mother living under Nazi occupied Rome:

    ‘Freedoms are not given,’ she writes, ‘They are taken.’ 

    It was hot and I was sweating as I left the river and mounted the rise out of the town. A school bus went up the hill and down again. I’d really come to appreciate nicely ploughed agricultural land; the brown earth was spilling up its guts, vulnerably awaiting new crops.  Someone had a boxing bag hanging in their garden.

    Today I felt like walking in silence. I was nearing the end of the cammino and every second was important. Every now and again a stone would get caught just under the front pad of my left foot, sending a shooting pain up my leg. But I was on the way of the partisan. What did I have to worry about, really? It hurt, but I could still walk and walk I did.  My right calf twinged. Perhaps I was overcompensating for my left foot?

    After yesterday’s multiple diversions, I kept religiously checking that I was on the right path. I saluted the town as a train chugged by, turning the corner into a silver cobweb that broke upon impact with my nose. 

    A flurry of flowers, a kind of sage I think, were covered in ‘cuckoo spit’. The phenomena actually has nothing to do with cuckoos or spit at all. The foamy liquid is caused by a type of bug called a froghopper nymph, also known as a spittlebug.  The insect feeds on sap found in plant stems and leaves behind blobs of this spit-like goo. 

    I saw a new type of butterfly – yellow and black in the middle, its wings became translucent at the ends. 

    There were white flowers with yellow middles, pregnant with pollen and I was happy to see the bees enjoying it. The shadow from the trees was merciful as I made my way up a steep uphill path. The sedimentary rock crumbled in clumps beneath my feet.

    I followed the navigator on my phone down a little path where the grass was really tall, stopping to pet two golden retrievers who accompanied me for a short while. One licked my hand which was salty from the sweat.

    A stack of abandoned beehives looked like filing cabinets on the hill.

    Though the sun was maturing in the sky, I resisted wearing sunglasses as I wanted to enjoy every bit of the view. I wished I hadn’t left my sunscreen behind and trusted that my cap would offer sufficient protection.

    A man was sat reading in a field of chickens. A tabby cat crossed the path in front of me, reminding me of my own cat, Dante, back home. 

    As I passed a vineyard, I realized something momentous. The vines which I had identified at the start of my walk as tortured souls from Dante’s wood of suicides now appeared to me as yogis mindfully stretching their limbs towards the sun.

    My depression had lifted and I felt quite transformed in body and spirit. 

    All the nettles of the region seemed to have assembled here from where they stung me through my leggings as I crossed the overgrown field. My boots were snagging on sticky weed and there was a landslide. Then the overgrown foliage transformed into a perfect lawn.

    I stepped in something only to release that it was the entrails of a dead deer. The back half of its carcass was a little further up the path. Flies were making a feast of it. What could have got it, a wolf?

    As I passed a series of small waterfalls, I noted the ferns that sprung up in fans like toilet brushes. The landscape felt almost tropical. A pock marked cliff face protruded onto the road.

    I crossed a rickety wooden bridge and a sign that led to the Poet Hotel. What I assumed to be a father and son were playing in the stream. 

    Three hours had passed since I had left and so I stopped to take some more pain killers, observing a plastic unicorn rocker and succulents on the wall.

    Accompanied by the sound of the stream I felt like listening to Neil Young’s Harvest, one of the few CDs I had bought with me aged 18 as I trekked through India and Nepal. 

    ‘Will I see you give more than I can take?
    Will I only harvest some?
    As the days fly past will we lose our grasp
    Or fuse it in the sun?’

    Silverlake Ranch emerged and I greeted 12 horses who were each stationed in their own field by a reservoir. 

    The church bell sounded out at 11.58am, two minutes early. A spider had caught a fly in its web and it was slowly disintegrating. And there sat the spider proudly on the top of the grass.

    I was about half-way to Pontassieve and my broken toes were feeling it. I would stop in the next village and assess the situation.

    I arrived in Galardo to the smell of woodsmoke and strings of drying laundry that lined the narrow streets. Someone had decorated the front of their house with purple and orange snapdragons. I took one between my fingers and made the familiar mouth shape: snap! Some mushrooms were colonising a tree. 

    I stopped at a bar overlooking the river and ordered a coke zero and tuna and tomato stracciata. The type of bread – salty and delicious – suggested I was getting near to Florence. I knew better this time than to ask for cheese, and it tasted all the better for it.

    The owner, Sofian, was from Tunisia and so we exchanged a few words in Arabic. He had turquoise eyes that were quite captivating. 

    ‘We get a lot of pilgrims who stop here on the cammino di Dante but also the Via Francesco. But you’re the only person I’ve met who has gone it alone. It must be tough, especially for a woman.’

    ‘Not really,’ I replied. 

    I explained to him about my broken toes and he suggested I take a lift to Pontassieve with a local guy who would be passing by shortly to pick up some wine. The wine was made in house. Next to the bar there stood a heavy metal corking machine.

    It was tempting. I was determined to walk the full way back to Florence tomorrow and I’d already done 15km today and climbed 75 floors. I could wash my clothes, catch up on my blog and be ready for tomorrow which would undoubtedly be a day full of emotion. Kelsey and Alina were going to meet me in Florence along with Professor Alberto Tonnini from the University where I’d taken up a visiting professorship in 2023.

    Otherwise, there was the train or the bus, counselled Sofian. I heard him on the phone explaining that there was a ‘pretty blonde girl who wanted a lift’.

    Within ten minutes, Maurizio had arrived. He was a gentle older man with a solid grey moustache who drove a green jeep. 

    ‘Sorry for the mess,’ he offered. ‘For me a car is a way to get from A to B and nothing more.’

    I offered him a drink and, with speed he downed a glass of rose. 

    I thought of Virgil seeking out a shortcut from him and Dante in canto 11 of Purgatorio,

     ‘to reach the stairs; if there is more than one
     passage, then show us that which is less steep; 

     for he who comes with me, because he wears
     the weight of Adam’s flesh as dress, despite
     his ready will, is slow in his ascent.’

    See, even Dante had taken it easy sometimes.

    In the car, Radio Capital, a Roman station, played out a solid mix of 90’s tunes. Maurizio explained to me that he was retired but still repaired cars with his son for a living. But today was May 1st, workers day, and so he was having a day off.

    As we passed the medieval bridge, he explained that a ‘bomb of water’, or flood, had hit the town on March 15th, causing damage to its foundations and inundating the football field. There were logs that had been carried by the surge still deserted on the banks of the river.

    ‘Luckily no one here was hurt,’ Maurizio sighed. ‘You hear the sound of water and you can’t do anything.’

    I thought back to Rossella and her animals, not all of whom had survived the floods of 2023. 

    Maurizio left me by the town hall in the old city and wished me well,

    ‘Be careful in Florence,’ he advised me, ‘the political rivalry of Dante’s day continues there today.’ 

    ‘Oh, there’s the local major,’ he said, waving, and then he sped on.

    I felt vindicated in my decision to dye my hair blonde which had clearly played a role in me getting a lift.

    I strolled around the old city walls and was surprised at the decent size of the town. There was a United Colours of Benetton and a shop that sold nothing but sewing machines. A man’s barbershop was full of beautiful antique equipment. I saw my reflection in the window – the top of my shoulders were red with sunburn.

    I climbed up a little side street that smelled of soap and up a very steep hill to the apartment where I would be staying that night, La Taverna di Caterina. There were orange trees on the terrace and a sweeping view of the city. 

    Caterina’s daughter Anna showed me the lovely flat which had a round table outside for writing. Inside there was an amazing selection of books including The Red and the Black by Stendhal and verses by Leopardi.

    I thought back to Stendhal’s romantic novel. 

    ‘A good book is an event in my life,’ he had written. 

    As I washed my face in the sink, I realized I had come out in spots from the constant sweating. There was a heatwave back in England my mum messaged me to say and I wondered if she had caught the sun too. 

    I did some writing, caught up on work emails and then wondered back into the town. 

    Since the start of my cammino, I had wanted to do something permanent to mark the adventure and my relationship with Dante, so as I passed a tattoo studio I tentatively walked in and inquired if they had any spaces.

    They did.

    I spoke with Massimiliano, the lead tattoo artist and explained something of my journey and intention. Then, as if by magic, out he whipped a copy of the Divine Comedy from his backpack.

    ‘I always carry it with me,’ he said, ‘here and there I read a verse or two.’

    It felt meant to be. 

    Together on an iPad we designed a simple outline of the baptistry where Dante had been baptized and where he had wished to return a poet and assume the laurel crown. It was more original that getting a tattoo of the Duomo which was very popular in these parts, Massimiliano said. His dad was from Florence. This was the first time he’d tattooed an English person. 

    Two other female tattooists, Asia and Claudia, were working and they were chatty and curious to hear about my walk and my blog. 

    Massimiliano had to go and collect his daughter and so I sat with Claudia who realized my tattoo. She inked the small design in a subtle terracotta colour that I associated with Florence.

    ‘You’re not thinking of your feet anymore,’ she said, as the needle buzzed across my arm.

    And then it was finished.

    ‘Now you’re more Florentine than me!’ Claudia announced. 

    I was thrilled with the finished product and celebrated by going to a sushi bar where I necked a platter of dragon rolls. 

    Underneath my jacket I stroked my new tattoo. It was a work of art, a testament to what Dante calls ‘visibile parlare’ or visible speech. A picture could say a thousand words. 

    ‘I see you,’ this tattoo seemed to say. 

    ‘I see the pain of exiles and I am committed to documenting it.’

    ‘I have walked 400 kilometres and more to re-see the beauty of Florence and there, tomorrow, may I find peace.’

  • Broken Toes and Tasteful Tiles: From San Godenzo to Dicomano

    I got lost four times and made the stupid decision to scale a towering fence. 

    Marcella, the owner of the Agriturismo Tenuta Mazzini where I had spent the night, came to greet me in the morning. She was on her way to work as a primary school teacher. I didn’t hesitate in exuding my passion for her place.

    ‘It’s a marvel,’ I said.

    I always felt a slight anxiety when I had not walked for a day, but I had slept amazingly in the comfy bed, and I felt well rested as I heaved on my backpack and set off down the road to Dicomano.

    It was 10.20am and the sun was shining brightly. The air was fresh. Two cows greeted me from an ample field. 

    The day’s walk began with the descent back to Dicomano where Dante was summoned for a political meeting during his exile from Florence. I’d been spending a lot of time with Dante the poet and so it was interesting to spend time with Dante the politician. It was here that he had sought to forge alliances between the Ghibellines and the White Guelfs of whom he was a member. Like many refugees, Dante had been multiply displaced. His brief stay in Bologna had been interrupted when the White Guelfs were barred from the city.

    I passed an excavator that was digging up the Earth as I wound down the road and stopped momentarily to pet a ginger tom cat.

    I followed a Dante trail sign off down a small, steep woodland path to the right and was soon kicking up the leaves again. I crossed a small, gurgling waterfall where the path split in two.

    I went left, which would transpire to be the wrong choice. 

    Conscious of not walking with my phone attached to my hand, I had tucked it into my sports bra so that it was fifteen minutes before I realized that I was very much off the beaten path. I was glad I was wearing trousers and not shorts as the brambles and trees assaulted me, leaving bloody snags on my arms and hands. I held onto the tree branches to heave myself up the bank towards the road. I’d thought about going back to where I’d lost the straight path but decided to carry on. The map suggested that in a few metres I would re-reach the road from which I could proceed my descent into the medieval town.

    Climbing up on my hands and knees, the mud collected beneath my fingernails. Nettles attacked my ankles and, as I passed a network of two waterfalls, my weight dislodged a huge chunk of earth from the ground.

    I assumed I had made the usual mistake of following an animal track. I passed through two olive fields and there was the road ahead of me, just a short way down from where I’d strayed. 

    I had basically done a 45-minute loop of the forest for absolutely no reason. If I had stuck to the path, I’d be eating pizza for breakfast by now but instead I was weary, thirsty and had no idea from whence I’d come. I paused for some water and let the blood dry in a thick smear on my hand. My knees were filthy from the climb.

    I passed through an open gate and exited onto a hill from where I could see the town before me. I had no idea what to do. The end was in sight and so I just kept climbing, trying to reach the road, my knees and knuckles deep in the foliage as if I were massaging the Earth. I wished I could just jump or fly over to the car park.

    Now all that stood before me and an espresso macchiato and pizza slice was a massive metal fence which was decorated, at the top, with a thick mesh of vertical barbed wire. 

    The road was right there, but as I stumbled around the fence’s parameter, I couldn’t find a way to cross. Two metal gates were tightly fastened with thick wire which I tried in vain to unpick, clumsily sliding my fingers between the holes in the gate. There was nothing for it, I couldn’t go through or under it: I would have to go over it.

    As I climbed up onto a wooden ballast, my bag pulled me back and so I threw my weight forwards, held tight to the fence and swung my leg over. The second one followed and I jumped down, only to land on the roadside with a thud, the full force of which shot up into my left foot. 

    The familiar pain immediately hit me and I knew I’d broken something. Luckily, from the quick survey of the discomfort, I deduced I had just damaged a toe or two. This was nothing like the agony of when I’d broken my metatarsal in Guatemala when headed out on a hike to locate the national bird, the resplendent quetzal. I took some Ibroprofen for the pain and carried on into the town centre where I’d spent some time yesterday in Dante’s footsteps. My hands were covered in a cocktail of mud and blood.

    It was 12 o’clock which meant I had spent almost an hour and a half scrambling around in the woods including 15 minutes trying to unpick the lock and 15 minutes working out how to get over the fence. I’d bruised my knee and cut my trousers on the barbed wire but I had made it back onto the road. A smartly dressed lady was walking past with her dog. 

    ‘Are you OK?’ She said.

    ‘Yes,’ I replied, though I wasn’t. ‘I just got a little lost.’

    I sat on the verge and ate an apple. Next time, I’ll take the road. I could have been well on my way to Dicomano by now, but as it was, I hadn’t even reached the starting point and the steep climb meant I’d exhausted at least half of my supply of water.

    And that was how in the middle of the journey of my life, I found myself in a caged olive grove for the straight path was lost. 

    I hobbled to a bar and ordered the much craved for coffee and pizza. I removed my shoe and tried to wiggle my left middle toe. No, it wasn’t moving. The sellotape Alina had left me finally came in use. I used it to attach my broken toe to the ones beside it. We had evolved from three toes creatures after all: the three middle toes already moved as one. 

    I noted a urinal built into the cliff face next to a busy garage which had a wolf mural painted on the wall. 

    Five men were drinking beer in the café.  

    ‘Ok, let’s start again,’ I thought. It was 12.30pm.

    On the surrounding streets were quotes from Dante’s Paradiso that had been plastered to the wall and here was a map of the heavenly realms as he had understood them. One quote read:

    ‘The handsome image those united souls,
    happy within their blessedness, were shaping,
    appeared before me now with open wings.

    Each soul seemed like a ruby—one in which
    a ray of sun burned so, that in my eyes,
    it was the total sun that seemed reflected.’

    In the Divine Comedy, Paradise is depicted as a series of concentric spheres surrounding the Earth, consisting of the Moon, Mercury, Venus, the Sun, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, the Fixed Stars, the Primum Mobile and finally, the Empyrean.

    Back on the path, I passed a balcony on which stood a lady watering Calla lilies beside a hyper vigilant black cat. She smiled and wished me a ‘buon viaggio.’

    As I left the town, there was a cemetery on the left, sweeping trees to the right and, of course, the village football field.

    I followed the signage, making sure to check directions on my phone every five minutes now, and made my way up a steep concrete road. From a garage there emerged some antique porcelain sinks and toilets.

    I moved in and out of shadows, enjoying the litter of red leaves on the pavement that were the colour of Alina’s hair. Tom had told me yesterday that you could eat dandelion flowers and so I folded one into my hungry mouth. The entire plant is edible, from the flowers to the roots. It tasted bitter.

    I proceeded past a field of goats that came with a ‘beware of the goats’ sign and an agriturismo which was decorated at the front by a beacon of lemon trees. 

    The path had expanded out into a beautiful hobbit like landscape. I sat on a rock and drank some more water beside a prairie and a tinkling stream. A white butterfly with orange tips fluttered past, then a yellow one. Two black beetles were mating on my backpack. They were covered in red spots like inverse ladybirds. I noted that I was developing callouses on my hand from the rub of my hiking poles.

    I could see back down to the town in all its majesty. There was a house built into a tree which was surrounded by a cluster of bracken. The simple way to tell bracken apart from ferns is that bracken has a stem, and will come up singly. Ferns, on the other hand, generally don’t have a stem but rather always have multiple fronds coming up from one central point.

    I realized I was lost again and there followed an agonizing half hour hike up a steep bank that was littered with spiky horse chestnut seeds. I had somehow managed to drink all of my water and kept stopping to catch my breath. At one point, my cap was disturbed by an overhanging branch and I had to retrace my steps downwards some ten metres to retrieve it. It was a chalky blue and read, ‘Stay wild and free, protect our sea.’ I had purchased it from a Royal National Lifeboat Institute giftshop in Wales the previous summer.

    I thought of Will and Jo’s non-wedding wedding that I would be attending that weekend back in London. Their party theme was ‘under the sea’ and my friends at home had been feverishly making costumes, including one for me. 

    I stopped to pull out some horse chestnut spikes from my hands and finally re-found the path. It was 3pm and I’d only hiked some 12 kilometres and climbed nearly 120 floors but I was only about 6 kilometres along today’s 17 kilometre stretch of the cammino. My arms looked like I’d had a fight with the cat. I flicked an ant off my leg. 

    The path followed an ancient Etruscan way which was dotted with sign posts with orange cones on the top which resembled Asian hats. I trotted downhill now, my bag chafing under my armpits, enjoying the spectacular view to the right of the mountains in the sun. They were striped in shadow and light. 

    Two lizards were wrestling beside the bushes and the trees were squeaking in the light breath of the breeze. I really wanted some water. 

    Then I realized that in my stupor I had gone wrong yet again. It was a fifteen minute hike back uphill. Today was not my day. 

    It was tough on my knees and broken toes hiking downhill, but I was thankful to have finished the climb and grateful once more to Franco in Marradi for fixing my right hiking pole. A farm appeared to my left with goats and a horse. 

    I got lost for the fourth and final time, climbing nearly all the way up a really steep hill covered in scree only to backtrack. A cock crowed somewhere in the distance. It was 5pm.  

    An aloe vera plant emerged from someone’s garden and I was so thirsty I contemplated ripping off a leaf, opening it out and licking the sweet sap. The irises that decorated this lawn were purple and pink in hue.

    I ate some berries from my trail mix thinking they might have some moisture inside. The sun was beating down and I had my eyes peeled for an outdoor tap.

    Then, just as quickly as the thought arrived, such a tap appeared. It was accompanied by the outline of a dog and dog bowl but, water was water. I guzzled from the font and refilled my pouch. I held the water in a precious sphere in my mouth before I swallowed it. 

    I could feel that I was back in Tuscany because of the rolling hills, the soft golden light and the way the olive leaves seemed to glitter in the evening sun. The approaching dusk made the hills look matt and hazy.

    A bird sounded out like a car alarm. It was suddenly so tranquil. I recalled the words of William Blake from his poem Auguries of Innocence

    ‘To see a world in a grain of sand

    And a heaven in a wild flower,

    Hold infinity in the palm of your hand

    And eternity in an hour.’

    I watched a plane soar through the sky and was once again reminded that, this time next week, I’d be finished with walking and back to normal life. I wondered how normal my life could ever be after this adventure. 

    A tractor drove past, and I collapsed in the grass awhile. I was 20 minutes from my destination but my toes ached and I was exhausted from all the extra energy I had expended on getting lost today. I had been told by my French host Beatrice that there would be pesto pasta for dinner and I was sure that it would be delicious. 

    The final descent into Dicomano was stunning. Poppies once again lined the hedgerows coupled with thick clumps of thistles. A chorus of sheep bleated out in unison. 

    There was a horse medallion on someone’s house and statues of little angels and a chicken rendered in bronze. There was plenty of space for both me and the cars on the road. A chain of colourful beehives lined the hill like a Lego brick house under construction.

    Three men who were tending to a cement mixer said hello as I passed them and, embarrassed, I realized I’d been singing to myself the nursery rhyme The Grand Old Duke of York. Today had certainly seen me march to the top of the hill and march back down again. 

    Then came the familiar sweet waft of black locust or white robinia. A plough was stationed in the middle of a field, retired from the toils of the day. An elderly voice was shouting to a young child something about a horse and dirty trousers. 

    I was greeted by my host, Ivan, who called me ‘bambina’ and complemented me on my pigtails – they were cute but also practical hiking wear. Their bed and breakfast, Pino del Capitano sat in a beautiful Mediterranean garden that was decorated with colourful Portuguese tiles and sinuous sculptures. 

    That night, I dined on a delicious fare with a man working in construction from Udine who was also staying with Ivan and Beatrice. Unlike me, he was here for business, not pleasure.

    Ivan brought me some plasters and I lanced my toes together more forcefully. He was sympathetic since his own daughter was a hiker who had recently completed 45 days of the Camino de Santiago. He was 74 but seemed much younger for his friendly and exuberant demeanor. 

    ‘Every stone you see, every flower, that’s the work of my hands in the garden,’ he proudly explained.

    It had taken him 25 years to get it just right. 

    We must ‘cultivate our garden’ counsels the French writer Voltaire at the end of his satirical quest, Candide. After the day I’d had I enjoyed the peace. Too true, I thought, too true. 

  • The Art of Exile: From San Benedetto in Alpe to San Godenzo 

    I had an easy day, retracing Dante’s footsteps as a political exile who had a tumultuous relationship with his native Florence.

    My sleep was disturbed and, as I was sharing the dorm with an Italian couple from Bologna, Giuliana and Vittorio who had arrived late the night before, I finally made use of my pink EarPods to listen to some sleep hypnosis meditations.

    I had fevered dreams and was reminded of Dante who in canto 27 of Purgatorio passes through the wall of flames to Paradise, only to collapse with sleep with his guides, Virgil and Statius at his side:

    ‘Before one color came to occupy
    that sky in all of its immensity
    and night was free to summon all its darkness,

    each of us made one of those stairs his bed:
    the nature of the mountain had so weakened
    our power and desire to climb ahead…

    From there, one saw but little of the sky,
    but in that little, I could see the stars
    brighter and larger than they usually are.

    But while I watched the stars, in reverie,
    sleep overcame me—sleep, which often sees,
    before it happens, what is yet to be.’

    But as Dante wakes eager for the journey ahead, writing, 

    ‘my will on will to climb above was such
    that at each step I took I felt the force
    within my wings was growing for the flight’

    I, on the other hand, was exhausted.

    Because of a landslide, I would have to retrace yesterday’s steps and take a longer improvised route round to San Godenzo. 

    Over a breakfast of sweet pastries, the hostel owner Gian Luca suggested I miss the first part and start back on the trail from after the landslide. 

    I didn’t need much convincing, so when Vittorio offered to take me halfway in their car, I agreed. 

    It would give me more time to catch up with work, specifically, a funding application I was developing to read Tagore with refugees in India. In one of his most beautiful poems in the collection Gitanjali, he describes a world undivided by borders:

    ‘Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high;

    Where knowledge is free;

    Where the world has not been broken up into fragments by narrow domestic walls;

     Where words come out from the depth of truth;

     Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection;

     Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way into the dreary desert sand of dead habit;

    Where the mind is led forward by thee into ever-widening thought and action

    Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.’

    It would be fascinating to see what refugees made of the world of this cosmopolitan Nobel Prize winning author. After Dante, Tagore was one of my favourite poets. 

    ‘Many people take public transport as they don’t manage after yesterday’, said Gian Luca reassuringly before he headed to the kitchen to make pasta for that day’s meal.  

    In the car, Giuliana and Vittorio told me a little of their work in music and events. 

    Soon we had arrived at Passo da Muraglione where Gian Luca had indicated to them to drop me but it turned out it was the wrong spot and I was completely off the Dante trail. I couldn’t ask the couple to drive me back another 30 minutes, and so I graciously accepted their offer to drop me directly in San Godenzo where they were passing through instead. From there it would be a three kilmetre walk up to the Agriturismo I had booked. I’d get a few steps in but the day would be my own to rest and recuperate.

    The car sounded out gospel tunes and many motorcyclists sped past on the road.

    ‘It’s the Spotify algorithm’ explained Vittorio. He’d liked one hymn and now the internet had decided he was religious. 

    In San Godenzo, I invited my hosts for a coffee and I had a slice of pizza, unsatisfied, once more, with my sweet breakfast. It was 10.30am. 

    I saluted the friendly couple and made my way to the abbey of San Godenzo in Piazza Dante Alighieri where the poet-politician had met with Ghibellines and White Guelfs in his first months of exile in June 1302 to try to forge an alliance against the Black Guelfs who had expelled him from the city.

    The convention brought together the noble families who were expelled from Florence and wanted to plan their return to the city by meditating on revenge. Dante’s name is signed in the attendance list.

    Walking around the abbey, I felt Dante’s political presence. I thought of all the refugees I knew who were committed to activism across borders. My friend Javid campaigned for women’s education in Afghanistan while an Albanian youth group I had worked with had started a campaign against blood feuds. 

    Although the 1302 convention did not lead to action, for more than 30 years, San Godenzo has commemorated this event during the ‘Dante Ghibellino’ festival, with a historical procession through the town streets. The celebrations culminate in awarding the homonymous prize to citizens who, during the year, have distinguished themselves for their civic commitment to San Godenzo, its territory and its community.

    As a political exile, Dante was excluded from a Florentine pardon in 1311, but another amnesty in 1315 would have allowed him to return. Unwilling to comply with the terms of the offer—admission of guilt and payment of a fine—Dante was again sentenced to death, this time by beheading rather than fire, the penalty now also applying to his sons, Pietro and Jacopo. 

    An additional provision stated that anyone had permission ‘to harm them in property and person, freely and with impunity.’ 

    Dante’s refusal reflected not only his great pride but also his better living conditions. While the first years of his exile had been brutal, by 1316 he was now residing in Verona as a guest of the Ghibelline ruler Cangrande della Scala. Having cut ties with his native city, he declared himself ‘Florentine by birth, not by disposition.’ Dante had learned how bread outside Florence ‘tastes of salt,’ but such bread was also not lacking as he sought out more abundant hospitality towards the end of his life. 

    Dante’s ‘overswollen pride’ is reflected in the significant time he spends with the proud in Hell and on the terrace of the proud in Purgatorio. Indeed, Dante presents pride as the foundation of sin by situating it at the base of Mount Purgatory. 

    In Purgatory, he walks alongside the proud souls who are forced to carry heavy loads:

    ‘I, completely hunched, walked on with them….for such pride, here one pays the penalty’

    Dante then reflects on the fleetingness of reputation and fame:

    ‘O empty glory of the powers of humans!
     How briefly green endures upon the peak-
     unless an age of dullness follows it…

     Worldly renown is nothing other than
     a breath of wind that blows now here, now there,
     and changes name when it has changed its course.’

    There is an irony here, since Dante is also explicit about his desire to bolster his reputation through the written word. 

    In Inferno, meanwhile, one of the most realistic conversational exchanges occurs between Dante and Farinata degli Uberti, the great Ghibelline leader in the battle of Montaperti, who died the year before Dante’s birth. Farinata is depicted in ‘the cemetery of Epicurus and his followers, all those who say the soul dies with the body.’ However, he is also guilty of the sin of pride, something we see through his rising out of a burning coffin, stubborn and defiant.

    ‘My eyes already were intent on his;
    and up he rose—his forehead and his chest-
    as if he had tremendous scorn for Hell.’

    Dante uses the meeting to discuss Florentine politics, engaging in vocal sparring. Farinata immediately recognizes Dante as a Florentine citizen from his accent: 

    ‘Your accent makes it clear that you belong
    among the natives of the noble city
    I may have dealt with too vindictively.’

    He then goes on to explain how he was responsible for the exile of many of Dante’s ancestors`:

    ‘When I’d drawn closer to his sepulcher,
    he glanced at me, and as if in disdain,
    he asked of me: “Who were your ancestors?”

    Because I wanted so to be compliant,
    I hid no thing from him: I told him all.
    At this he lifted up his brows a bit,

    then said: “They were ferocious enemies
    of mine and of my parents and my party,
    so that I had to scatter them twice over.”’

    While there is certainly no love lost between Dante and Farinata, there is a measure of respect. Farinata, called magnanimo, ‘great-hearted’, put Florence above politics when he stood up to his victorious colleagues and argued against destroying the city completely.

    ‘But where I was alone was there where all
    the rest would have annihilated Florence,
    had I not interceded forcefully’

    As the literary critic Auerbach has noted, Dante’s realistic and somewhat flattering depiction of Farinata shows his willingness to admire and work alongside his adversaries, something he did by uniting with the Ghibellines during the 1302 convention in San Godenzo. 

    Dante rebuffs Farinata’s insults by boasting that on both occasions when his ancestors were exiled, they returned:

    ‘“If they were driven out,” I answered him,
    “they still returned, both times, from every quarter;
    but yours were never quick to learn that art.”’

    The art referred to here is the art of exile. As Barolini explains, the above conversation references four cataclysmic events in Florentine politics of the thirteenth century, as Florence oscillated between Guelph and Ghibelline control until the ultimate defeat of Farinata and the Ghibellines at the battle of Benevento of 1266. 

    In effect, the dialogue lays out two sets of factional routes and returns. The first set of route and return comprises the 1248 defeat of the Guelphs by the Ghibellines, with the help of Emperor Frederic II, followed by the return of the Guelphs in 1251, after the death of the Emperor.

    The second set comprises the 1260 defeat of the Guelphs by the Ghibellines at the battle of Montaperti, where Farinata led the Ghibellines to victory with the help of the Sienese and Manfredi, Frederic’s successor, and then the subsequent defeat of the Ghibellines and return of the Guelphs following the battle of Benevento and the death of Manfredi in 1266.

    The abbey where Dante convened with Ghibellines of his own day featured a plaque to honour him and some stunning mosaics that had been added some time after he had congregated there.

    Outside the church someone had hung a banner saying, ‘possesion isn’t love.’

    I walked for half an hour up a hill to the Agriturismo Tenuta Mazzini where I was met by Filippo, the son of the owners who was out foraging for strigoli. He was walking alongside a woman carrying a wicker basket. Strigoli, or stridoli, are a spontaneous grass typical of the Tuscan-Romagna territory. The name comes from the screeches that two leaves emit if rubbed together. It is edible and often used in risotto or salads. It’s especially tender at this time of year, explained Filippo.

    There was a sign forbidding people from collecting mushrooms and chestnuts between the 1st of September and 31st of October but there was no mention of harvesting grasses. What’s more, the seasonal ban had yet to come into force.

    Filippo showed me where there was a local restaurant that served lunch, but the owners had provided spaghetti, tuna and tomato sauce so I made myself a meal that would serve as both lunch and dinner.

    The apartment was spacious with a comfy double bed, quite a welcome contrast from yesterday’s basic amenities and a total bargain at just 45 Euros a night. There was a poster by Matisse and a copy of The Two Cherubs by Rafael from 1513. The latter is part of a bigger painting that features the Madonna holding the Christ Child, flanked by two saints. The figures are placed among the clouds, suggesting that it is a scene from heaven. At the base of the painting are the two winged cherubs, looking up at the scene from below.

    Outside there was a swimming pool that was overhung with wisteria. It boasted a view of the rolling hills. I watched as a nuthatch flitted from branch to branch then disappeared into the distance. 

    A lady staying in the flat next door, Cristina, had brought six cats with her and took them each out for a wonder on a lead. Milu was among the friendliest and we shared caresses on the grass.

    As I caught up on work, including meeting online with my PhD student Olivia who was doing research on asylum seekers’ reception in UK hotels, I recalled Dante’s words about how writing is a way to ‘make oneself immortal.’

  • Over the Misty Mountains: From Marradi to San Benedetto in Alpe

    I said goodbye to Pope Francis, was humbled by the kindness of strangers, and struggled over the staggering mountains.

    It’s common that Italian bars and restaurants have TV’s on in the background, so over a breakfast of a croissant and cake I watched as the news anchor looked back on Pope Francis’ life. There was no doubt about it, he had been an incredible man. 

    Although I’m not a Catholic, for all intents and purposes it seemed he had been a good Pope too.

    I recalled how struck I had been when he’d blessed arriving migrant ships in Lampedusa and washed the feet of refugees. The news reported that migrants, along with homeless people and individuals in prison, had been among those invited to his funeral. Pope Francis had also spoken out about climate change. He would be sorely missed.

    500,000 pilgrims had descended on Rome to pay their respects. Kelsey, who lived there in an apartment by the Colosseum, said that the atmosphere was electric.

    I reflected that Prince William looked handsome with a beard and wondered how the encounter between Trump and Zelensky would go down. I had watched the entire video of his ritual humiliation at the hands of Trump and Vance at the Whitehouse and was left with the feeling that I had witnessed an act of bulling and extreme abuse occur upon the screen.

    11,000 police and security officers had been mobilized by the Italian state. 

    I watched Starmer greet Meloni with a kiss on the cheek and was reminded of the cruel recent UN approval for offshore processing centres for asylum seekers, a policy the UK had borrowed from Italy. 

    Franco appeared from between two baby chairs.

    ‘Buongiorno!’ he saluted me. He was wearing shorts and looked almost German with his fair hair and skinny legs. 

    ‘Buongiorno,’ I replied. 

    ‘Ah yes, the Pope of the people, he was,’ reflected Franco.

    I thought of Dante’s tumultuous relationship with the Popes, many of whom he’d put in Hell where they were buried in the ground headfirst with their feet on fire.

    ‘O Simon Magus! O his sad disciples!
    Rapacious ones, who take the things of God,
    that ought to be the brides of Righteousness,

    and make them fornicate for gold and silver!
    The time has come to let the trumpet sound
    for you; your place is here in this third pouch.’

    In this canto, Inferno 19, the prostituting of the Church-bride by her Pope-bridegroom picks up and metaphorises the sexualized language of previous parts of the Inferno. This canto is the first of several indictments of the Church in the Divine Comedy. Indeed, it picks up on some earlier indications that Dante links the clerical establishment with the sin of avarice. In Inferno 7 he says that he sees cardinals and popes among the misers in the fourth circle:

    ‘ These to the left—their heads bereft of hair—

    were clergymen, and popes and cardinals,

    within whom avarice works its excess.’

    I was captivated by the news but I had to get moving. Today was a long one and starting at 9 was already a bit ambitious, Franco warned me.

    He noted that one of my hiking poles was broken and I followed his gaze.

    ‘I don’t suppose you have any glue or something to fix it,’ I asked.

    His face lit up. 

    ‘I have just the thing’, he said.

    My host disappeared into a back room with the broken pole and reemerged ten minutes later. He had completely fixed it. It was sturdy as the mast of a ship.

    ‘But how did you manage that?’ I questioned.

    ‘Ah, it’s a secret,’ came his reply. ‘A bit of magic and good will.’

    I was beyond grateful. I was also grateful that after I’d finished my third espresso macchiato Franco handed me a fruit juice bottled filled with espresso.

    ‘You’ll need this,’ he said, ‘it’s for the road.’ 

    One of the passes I would cross today was named ‘Hell’s Hill.’

    I tucked it into my bag, delighted.

    I carefully removed a tick from my stomach as I watched a lady place flowers in boxes outside her store from the window. I realized I’d left my glasses and moisturizer at a previous hotel and was grateful for my contact lenses and Vaseline which I applied to my chapped face instead. 

    And with that, I set off back into the mountains. I saluted Franco. He left me his number in case I needed anything. He had been another ‘trail angel,’ as Kelsey called them.

    Though I had enjoyed by brief interlude from the 24-hour news cycle during my cammino, now I listened to the BBC World Service as I ascended out of the town. The Pope’s funeral was about to start and I was curious about how it would be covered. 

    It was a sunny but fresh day and I’d known better than to wear shorts. It would be cold up in the mountains and so I’d put on my trousers.

    There was no two ways about it, the ascent out of the city was steep. My back and shoulders hurt today as well as my feet. Today was going be a beast. I could feel my calf muscles twinging to life. I’d done some gentle stretching the night before but this was a burn.

    The sweat dripped off my nose and my hands slid, sweaty, on my poles. I had only been going for 20 minutes!

    A few mountain bikers past who I saluted – it was a sport I’d never tried. Someone had laid stones at the bottom of a line of trees like a familiar cairn. 

    I’d felt on the edge of tears for the last few days. Maybe today would be the day.

    I drank water liberally since I was counting on stopping at the Hermitage to restock on the way.

    I was religiously checking directions. I really didn’t want to add time to what would already be a super long day.

    The radio informed me that there had been a bishop in Rome for over 2000 years and that there were 1.4 billion Catholics in the world. Pope Francis had spoken out against the wars in Ukraine and Gaza. He had said that ‘a pastor should never lose the smell of his flock.’

    50 heads of state and ten monarchs were in attendance. 40,000 celebrants filled St Peter’s Square and 100,000 more were crowded before large screens on the Italian side of the border. The Vatican was, after all, its own city state.

    Someone said that the Argentinian Pope had even been able to do the impossible, make Brazilians forget their football rivalry and connect across the border. He had been a champion of interfaith dialogue.

    Then came the 10am news bulletin. Trump’s administration had deported a two-year-old to Honduras in breach of due process. Of course he had. This is what I hadn’t missed about listening to the news. I felt sick at the thought to it and recalled the poem:

    ‘First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—
         Because I was not a socialist.

    Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—
         Because I was not a trade unionist.

    Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
         Because I was not a Jew.

    Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.’

    I followed the first of two detours that had been designed to avoid landslides, adding about two kilometres to my route. I dodged another group of mountain bikers, one of whom was topless. 

    It was very muddy on the path and I was immensely grateful for my poles to help me avoid a slip. Franco, you angel!

    There emerged a big rain cloud and the wind picked up.

    The radio continued with its commentary of Pope Francis’ funeral. 130 delegations were in attendance. Putin was not. He would have been arrested by international warrant if he’d set foot on Italian soil.

    Pontiff, I leaned, means ‘bridge builder’.

    In other news, North Korea had launched a new missile ship. What a world.

    A group of scouts came hiking towards me in the opposite direction. They saluted me cheerfully. Their backpacks suggested they were campers. I hoped for them as well as for myself that the rain would hold.

    I lost signal as I approached the Hermitage of Gamogna where an order of sisters lived and prayed. I passed two such nuns, one of whom was wearing a wooly hat, and they invited me to enjoy the church. The complex, a sign informed me, had been founded in 1053.

    I took off my cap as I entered the simple stone building and took awhile to sit on a pew and rest. It was incredibly tranquil. Before I left, I signed the prayer book.

    ‘With the wish of peace to all refugees and that I may complete this cammino,’ I wrote.

    I ate half of my controversial tuna and cheese sandwich in the pretty courtyard and refilled my water tank from an outside tap by which there was an abanonded toothbrush. I also drank half of the coffee that Franco had so kindly prepared for me. 

    Yum.

    A French couple were having a picnic and a couple of other hikers were making their way up to the church.

    It was 12.30pm. I followed the. prominent Cammino di Dante signs up to a field that was cordoned off with barbed wire – that’s not very nun-like, I thought. Then I crawled under it. My anorak was snagged. Would I regret this?

    I looked back at Oliver’s messages and texted him, waiting for his advice. There were footprints; somebody had come before.

    The woodland I entered was dotted with little wildflowers that looked like miniature violet pansies, and here was the familiar sprinkle of primroses.

    I exited the patch of woodland through another barbed wire fence, but this one, I noted, had a gate mechanism you could cross through and a sign that clearly indicated that livestock were grazing. I must have missed the gate in the previous fence. The nuns were ok after all. 

    Oliver had helpfully signaled to me where the path goes right off the road – it would be would be easy to miss – and up, up I went along a dirt path. 

    It was now 2 o’clock and I was about halfway. I was hungry. I ate some more of my sandwich. I was so grateful Franco for fixing my pole. Today’s hike would have been near impossible without it.

    The brooding clouds delivered the first spits of rain. I crossed a field with the sign, ‘Attention, wild bull!’ and crossed a pass called ‘Hell’s Hill’.

    I followed a man who was walking slowly with stick behind his back. We kept pace. I was about ten metres behind. The path was now lined with a brown brush-like plant. 

    It was still two hours to the waterfall. I wouldn’t get there before six, I realized.

    I was straddling the border between Tuscany and Emelia Romagna as I walked, observing stunning sweeping panoramic views of the mountains which were many shades of green. I stopped to observe from mushrooms sprouting on a log. Enrico would have known how to identify them. 

    A hawk swept across the landscape, crying out. This was the only sound I heard as I started the descent. 

    The cloud hung heavy in lines over the mountains and as I walked, slabs of sedimentary rocks came unstuck from the cliffside. I was trotting again down the steep bank. Patches of a new plant appeared. Was it a kind of hellebore?

    Now, as I passed a small permaculture plantation where two hippy-like women were chatting, I could hear the waterfall of Acquacheta. And then there it was: I got the first glimpse of the roaring tundra which spouted water from the top of the sky.

    Dante references this impressive waterfall explicitly in the Divine Comedy. In Inferno, canto 16, he writes,

    ‘And even as the river that is first
    to take its own course eastward from Mount Viso,
    along the left flank of the Apennines

    (which up above is called the Acquacheta,
    before it spills into its valley bed
    and flows without that name beyond Forli),

    reverberates above San Benedetto
    dell’Alpe as it cascades in one leap,
    where there is space enough to house a thousand;

    so did we hear that blackened water roar
    as it plunged down a steep and craggy bank,
    enough to deafen us in a few hours.’

    A young couple were cuddling on a bench beside the torrent and a family with two children were accompanied by a golden retriever. 

    ‘Let’s wait for mamma,’ said one of the children to the other, ‘it’s too slippery.’

    As I contemplated the abundance of water, my own tears finally came. I let gulped down sobs as I slid my feet through the boggy path. 

    I was alone and I realized stopping for a rest on a stone bench just how much my feet hurt. I had another bite of my sandwich. It was 4.30pm so I still had a good three hours of light. I pulled out my laptop to check where I was staying and let the happy family go on ahead of me.

    Once I was back on the trail I passed another couple. A woman cried out, 

    ‘Mamma Mia, the water shines like a crystal!’

    It did. At the bottom of the cascade the water collected in iridescent turquoise pools.

    Each time my stick got stuck in the mud I thought of Franco once more with enormous gratitude.

    Now wasn’t a good time to be alone with my thoughts and I was reassured by the cries of the children ahead. One of them had written ‘Forza Milano’ on a rock using a stone as a pen.

    I passed another smaller waterfall and a refuge to my left. I was entering a zone for protected fish, a sign informed me. 

    I crossed two rickety bridges and tried to ignore the cramps in my feet which were becoming intolerable. I was an hour from my hostel still and the path was now largly up.

    I passed a little girl with Barbie and a man on a vesper. A couple were taking a sausage dog for a walk. If they could do it, I could.

    As I arrived in the village, I passed two elderly bearded men who were selling eggs and honey. I had never been so happy to see a recycling bottle bank which announced that I had made it to the town.

    I passed a campsite up the windy hill and finally made it to my accommodation for the night, Ostello il Vignale. It was very basic, a room of bunkbeds with a shared old-school drop toilet and very thin blanket that would do little to keep me warm during the night. 

    The church bell sounded out six and with that, exhausted emotionally and physically, in the words of Dante when he is overcome in canto five of Inferno,

    ‘I fell like a dead body falls.’

  • Tuna and Cheese? From Monte Romano to Marradi

    A short walk today ended in a disaster when one of my hiking poles broke, and I made a faux pas ordering fish with cheese.

    I woke up for breakfast at 7am and was thrilled to meet Enrico’s wife, Daniela, who had returned from saluting the late Pope in Rome. After setting off early at 2am, she had only had to wait two hours in line. I thought of when the Queen had died and the epic queues I had witnessed on TV. David Beckham had spent a day among the plebs waiting to pay his respects to her. 

    I secretly wanted the Beckhams to become to new Royal Family. Though, in an early communist rebellion perhaps, I had cut Posh Spice out of my posters, she was now my favourite Spice Girl. I admired their family and the way she and David shared a mutual work ethic.

    Enrico and Daniela explained to me that their dog, Mia, with whom I’d shared cuddles the evening before, had been named after the song ‘Romagna Mia’ which had become a hit during the floods of 2023 to give strength to the local people. Their other dog, Cillian, meanwhile, was named after the Gallic for warrior.

    The Romagna people are definitely proud of their heritage. Their territory spans half of Emilio Romagna towards the sea and their language, or dialect, is quite specific. 

    Dante was sensitive to these vagaries in language as he wrote in his Latin treatise on language, De Vulgari Eloquentia. Written between 1303 and the first months of 1305, his work was perhaps the first published European socio-linguistic research.

    Over breakfast, Enrico and Daniela revealed that they were seasoned travellers who had visited over 100 countries, often to chase a solar eclipse. They had been to Sudan, Libya… I thought of the way my own parents had taken me travelling to exotic locations as a child. This was a real home stay alright. I couldn’t have felt more at home if I’d tried.

    I drank nearly a whole family pot of espresso and ate a banana at Alina’s recommendation to alleviate the cramps in my feet. I had a Zoom meeting with a student whose dissertation was on Chinese, UK and US medical care models which felt somewhat discordant from this place of Paradiso. Then I did some gentle yoga stretches and massaged my feet. Today was a relatively short day of walking but I still felt my feet resist.

    I slept for another hour.

    At 11 o’clock, outside, me, Enrico and Daniela took pictures. 

    ‘The sky is so huge it can reduce the pain of everyone,’ counselled Enrico.

    ‘You feel tiny and so do your problems. It is a tiny comfort for us to see the stars.’

    I hesitated, then went for it: I asked about how the two of them reconciled their love for science with religion.

    ‘Something was put it in motion,’ came Daniela’s reply.

    Although I was not collecting stamps in a passport on my Dante journey, Enrico gave me one along with a pretty star decoration that I would put upon my Christmas tree. 

    I was grateful beyond belief.

    Enrico walked with me the first kilometre to the Dante trail with his two dogs. At one point Cillian started barking in a frenzy and then, there it was, a deer! 

    Enrico identified it as a female as it had no horns.

    How wonderful. I’d only ever seen them in the wild in Salmon Lake in California. She skitted across the hills gracefully as if she were aboard my nephew’s pogo stick.

    It was nice to walk alongside Enrico. The family had two pilgrims expected that night and also a family who were returning. They had come last year during the cammino and were coming back to see the stars. I knew I’d also be back. Hopefully with my mum.

    There was the patch of woodland where he collected mushrooms, indicated Enrico.

    And here was the crest I would traverse today.

    At the crossroads, I turned left towards Florence and saluted Enrico. I put on my waterproofs and covered my bag thinking, suspiciously, that then it wouldn’t rain.

    I’d made the right decision to sleep a bit more. I would follow the crest and then descend into the valley of Marradi.

    I passed the church and I was back on the Cammino de Dante. A familiar cuckoo sung its heart out, seeking to attract the midday sun.

    I stopped to meditate on the view and sent my French friend Marie a Happy Birthday message. It had been too long since we’ve been in touch. 

    After 3 kilometres I stopped to dry the sweat off of my forehead. Had my face ever been this red? It had. At 15 I had been national karate champion and one of my unintentional tactics had been to scare the opponent with my red, sweaty face. Now my niece, at 12, was a green belt, taking on the mantle. It had been agonizing attending her recent karate competition. 

    ‘Don’t you dare cheer, Auntie Jenny.’ She’d warned.

    I’d had to put my hands in my mouth. As it was, she had come out with a gold and I had had a little happy cry in the carpark. 

    Kelsey sent me some videos from the lesbian conference she was attending in Rome. A gaggle of women were singing Bella Ciao and the chant, We Are All Antifascist!

    I thought back to singing Bella Ciao at my old school on one of the many occasions I had gone to visit to give talks to aspiring pupils. Lord Grey Could, went the motto. If I had got into Oxford, they would too. 

    I was relieved that my feet seemed OK. I would take it slowly and I had the delightful knowledge that, tonight, I would be staying at a pizzeria. 

    After an hour of walking, I stretched out my feet as my nurse mother had advised me (yes, she had practiced as both a geologist and a nurse). I was determined to avoid cramps today, ready for tomorrow’s epic hike. I had to make it to Florence, I had to. Now it was written in the stars.

    A guy passed on a mountain bike coming full force up the hill. I was impressed, I signalled.

    I reflected, as I walked, of how Enrico had told me that his daughter had done her thesis on the French writer, Flaubert. I had loved Madame Bovary. I thought about my relationship to France. When had Italy taken over as my soul place?

    I recalled the quote I loved so much from his famous novel,

    ‘Human speech is like a cracked kettle on which we tap crude rhythms for bears to dance to, while we long to make music that will melt the stars.’

    La parole humaine est comme un chaudron fêlé où nous battons des mélodies à faire danser les ours, quand on voudrait attendrir les étoiles.

    And with that thought I realized I’d gone wrong. I went back up the hill, annoyed at the 10-minute detour.

    On the woodland path were mounds of excrement full of seeds. A broad-leaved anemone, neon pink, shot up from the verge.

    The puddles of sunlight on the path appeared briefly then disappeared again, a kaleidoscope of light.

    From a prairie, I descended to flat vertical rocks which looked like lava slipping down the hill.

    I ate some bread, cheese, and tzatziki in the tentative sunlight.

    There were three different types of purple flowers. A yellow butterfly with orange tips saluted me. An ant ran across my bag and a bee buzzed.

    The sun felt great on my skin, though I had left my moisturizer at a previous B&B. The bee who hovered around my lunch was a really fluffy light brown.

    The view of the Apennines was striking.

    I enjoyed the crunch of the crisps with the soft cheese and bread. The spectre of work was haunting me, but I tried to focus on the soft buzz of the flies.

    Oh, I could lie here in the sun all day.

    But I was only about halfway. The sun momentarily went in and I took my leave.

    I felt steady on my feet today, maybe tomorrow I’d be OK.

    After another 2 kilometres, I cracked open the pistachio nuts that I’d been lugging around. Then there were five cereal bars, and some trail mix, that had accompanied me from the start. I was wary of slipping on the hazardous vertical rocks and wanted to make sure that I was strong. I stuffed them into my mouth.

    Two bees were mating, tumbling over one another on the ground in a cartwheel of evolution.

    The shadow of the leaves decorated the rocks.

    I turned the corner, past an abandoned house, and rolled my socks down. My black leggings were calf length and the wind felt good against the inch of leg that was bared. Why on earth had I been heaving around two pairs of shorts, I wondered. Only one had even seen the light of day.

    I lightly twisted my ankle as I descended the uneven terrain which led to more derelict houses. These ones were for sale. I stopped again to massage my feet. A. black beetle crossed the path before me.

    I exited the woods into a panoramic landscape with 180 degree views of the beautiful rolling mountains. The sound of birdsong warmed my heart.

    Then, fuck.

    One of my hiking poles had got stuck in the mud and had broken half way down. The expandable mechanism had completely detached.

    I thought of what I had in my pack to repair it – the sellotape Alina had left me – nope, not strong enough. Some plasters? Again, too weak.

    I would have to continue today’s gentle walk with only one stick, but what on earth would I do tomorrow which was famously one of the most difficult days of the trail?

    I tried not to cry, recalling how when I was hiking with Alina for the first four days I hadn’t used them. And I’m quite sure Dante hadn’t had silicone hiking poles.

    I was now starting the descent. I used my one stick to navigate the hard tug of the mud.

    It was a steep rock path down and, without two sticks, my knees were taking the full thrust of the incline. There was a quarry to my right. I late some dark chocolate and listened to Romagna Mia on repeat to lift my mood.

    I was struck again by the ubiquity of white snail shells on the path. Were they made that way or had their shells been bleached like my hair which was ever more blonde with every day of the cammino?

    There was moss snuggled between slabs of rock.

    I pulled my socks back up to cover my legs as I traversed a patch of brambles. In the distance, I could see Marradi. There was still quite a descent.

    Without my pole I felt weak. It was like losing a limb. I’d been a four-legged insect this whole time. Perhaps at the B&B they’d have some superglue.

    I let a cyclist past and continued on my downwards route. The path had been reinforced by wooden logs like staggered steps. A thin arch was constructed at one junction which I found it impossible to fit through. I jumped the fence.

    And here was that hideous orange netting again, signaling a landslide.

    Now there were also troughs in the road to catch the water.

    I was nearly there.

    I walked sideways for the last bit. It was steep and treacherous, and I’d already fallen once today – the incident where I’d broken my trail stick. 

    Then a winding path led me into the town where I heard the hum of cars and the roar of the stream. There was a sign boldly featuring a lily – I was back in Tuscany, alright.

    Marradi was an old medieval city that had been decimated in 1616 by an earthquake. 1775 had heralded the start of its neoclassical architectural reconstruction.

    A house to my left was decorated with pretty succulents, stone sculptures and shells, and poetry was displayed upon the wall next to a sign that read,

    ‘Here live anti-fascists!’

    I thought of Kelsey at her conference and how I should make more of my front garden back home as a kind of public art exhibition. As it was, I had decorated it with some of my mosaics and a fuchsia or two.

    There was the smell of a plant I struggled to identify – it was sweet like grapes – and vegetable gardens were staggered to my right.

    One poem, by Bruno Baracani read:

    Good Day

    Good day to those who pass by
    This street to breathe the scents of
    Spring as if it were speaking.
    The air, in the shade of those leaves
    From the song of the birds makes
    Cheerful the day, the first
    Leaves turn from green, to yellow.
    In the middle the chestnuts fruit
    From the tree, and the first
    Petals white as roses
    Cover the ground, in that
    Magical splendor that the mountain breeds.
    I send you wishes of a good day in peace
    Of so much love that accompanies you.


    (April 2023).

    




    A second poem on the wall read: 
    




    




    

    War of 1915-1918, 100 years after
    




    




    From those mad minds, the wretched, 
    




    The crooked furrows, traffic jams
    




    More a light color, now, only
    




    Reddish waiting for life.
    




    In a macabre disaster
    




    Afloat with rotten leaves
    




    A gray-green dress brings with
    




    It the buds, most of which will bloom.
    




    Now a smoke stinks of the dead
    




    Acrid dirt, even if, the sharp mountains,
    




     Green pines snuggle between them.
    




    Grass is haggard, now to speak: a mute
    




    Silence, everything is quiet.
    




    Only the wind has the strength to whistle. 
    




    




    (October 2017).
    

    




    




    My phone battery died just as I was entering the town, so I plugged in my power bank. Pink blossom decorated the road like frosting on a cake.
    




    Tiny succulents sprouted from in between bricks. Someone had graffitied a smiley face onto an electricity box similar to those my dad would draw on my prominent mole as a child. A rosette on a door announced the birth of a boy child.
    




    




    As I passed the church, the stream ran into the river. A man was reading a book in the Square and a palm tree sprung from someone’s garden which was also decorated with Italian flags for Independence Day. It felt good to be in the city again and to see the Tuscan shield. 
    




    I stopped at a bar on the corner, Café Teatro. Reggaeton music was blaring. There was a gaggle of other walkers who were accompanied by a brown dog and a guy with a crystal around his neck and palm trees on his shirt. He was chatting to a girl with braids with gold beads, a belly button piercing and a miniskirt. She wore big gold hoop earrings and leather boots. They were drinking tequila shots. 
    




    




    I passed an opticians on my left and then climbed some steps to arrive at my destination, Pizzeria and B&B Le Scalelle.
    




    I rang the bell and waited five minutes but no one came. I tried phoning the number on the door. 
    




    ‘Arrivo!’
    




    Now, someone was coming.
    




    I watched a little boy with a helmet on playing with his scooter in the square. 
    




    Finally, Franco welcomed me and led me into a room which was filled with smoke from the fire he had just lit in the restaurant. Did I want a coffee? 
    




    




    My room was just by the toilets. So much, I thought, for an early night.
    




    Then here it came again, ‘Are you alone?’
    




    I’d caught the sun today. I wanted to buy some more sunblock  along with paracetamol for my foot cramps but the pharmacy was closed. Of course it was, it was a Friday.
    




    On a little wander, I discovered two ice cream shops. Oliver had sent me a message to enquire after my feet. He remembered then.
    




    That night, I ate a huge parmigiana pizza with fries. The waiter, Kevin, asked abount my laptop. His sister lived in England and he was a student of IT.
    




    I washed my socks and knickers in the bidet and put them to dry on the abundant heater for which I was glad. These kind of things had become extremely precious to me.
    




    I drank a bottle of fizzy water and used the special throat medication Kelsey had left me preventatively. 
    




    Tomorrow would be hard, but I would do it. I had to do it. 
    




    Before I went to bed I asked Franco to make me a sandwich for lunch the next day. 
    




    ‘Tuna and tomatoes is ok?’ he’d asked.
    




    ‘Could you also add some cheese,’ I’d responded.
    




    Fish and cheese, together, in Italy. What had I been thinking.
    




    And this was my last thought before, at 10pm, I fell into a deep, deep sleep.
    

    
			
    
		
    
		
	
  • 
		
		
    
			
			
    What Goes Down Must Go Up: From Brisighella to Monte Romano
    
			
    

    It was a difficult day of walking starting with an overdose of gypsum followed by an unforgettable evening of hospitality and a sky full of stars.
    




    




    I got up at 7am to a lovely message from my American writer friend Joyce who said she was headed to a ballet version of Frankenstein. I was jealous! Frankenstein, so misunderstood, is among my favourite books. Misread as a horror story, Mary Shelley’s novel is nothing if not a deeply romantic reflection on man’s search for connection and love. 
    




    Shelley writes,
    




    

    ‘If the study to which you apply yourself has a tendency to weaken your affections, and to destroy your taste for those simple pleasures in which no alloy can possibly mix, then that study is certainly unlawful, that is to say, not befitting the human mind. 
    




    If this rule were always observed; if no man allowed any pursuit whatsoever to interfere with the tranquillity of his domestic affections, Greece had not been enslaved; Caesar would have spared his country; America could have been discovered more gradually; and the empires of Mexico and Peru had not been destroyed.’
    

    




    As I wrote in a recent article in The Times, I try to follow this logic with my own research as much as I can: taking my time, respecting people and not rushing to conclusions. 
    




    Indeed, part of the motive for this cammino was to take time to reflect on my research practice as a social scientist. 
    




    As I’ve been listening back to audio recordings of interviews with refugees on my way, I feel I’ve been able to hear their voices with a new attentiveness. I was taking care of myself and my own need to be outside and wonder. This would, I hoped, help me to care for other people. 
    




    For me, individuals’ wellbeing and not the political machinations of the world have always been my primary interest. One of my favourite quotes is from the French writer, Boris Vian,
    




    

    ‘What interests me isn’t the happiness of all people, but that of each one.’
    




    ‘Ce qui m’intéresse, ce n’est pas le bonheur de tous les hommes, c’est celui de chacun.’
    

    




    I had tried to carry this spirit with me on this adventure that was also, in many ways, a self-reflective ethnographic exercise.
    




    




    I headed down to breakfast where the cappuccino machine spat out my drink. The hosts were gracious and said I didn’t have to pay for the disappointing spa. 
    




    The morning was fresh but sunny. As I packed my bag, I was disappointed to learn that one of Alina’s glittery socks that I’d washed and put out to dry the night before had disappeared over the balcony. A pigeon flew into my glass door repeatedly. I closed the curtains hoping that might help.
    




    I drank a whole bottle of fizzy water and ate a cheese sandwich for the road. Yesterday at the supermarket, I’d purchased a Red Bull energy drink which I tucked into my sack. I was still quite tired. I didn’t feel like walking today. I had even contemplated getting a taxi, but Italians don’t really do taxis and part of me had to continue. I’d see how far I got.
    




    There was a Sardinia flag on one of the houses that lined the road, and I passed a man who was fitting new shutters on his house. A fancy-looking restaurant had hung wine bottles from an olive tree outside and the door was decorated with a sculpture made from cork. 
    




    




    The Dante trail takes you right through the heart of the medieval town of Brisighella. The cylindrical turret of the tower of Orologio, built for military purposes in 1290, dominates the sky above the majestic town hall.
    




    The butcher’s shop, or macelleria, was doing a roaring morning trade and a boutique called Woman included, among the tempting items in the window, a beautiful crochet top and leather boots.
    




    The road up out of the town was closed and so I had to take a scenic detour up some very steep steps that were about half a metre tall. I heaved myself up and the sweat was soon pouring from my forehead down into my eyes, rendering me partially blind. Leaving my bikini behind with Alina’s one remaining sock clearly hadn’t been enough to lighten the load of my heavy bag. 
    




    Succulents were nestled into the rocks and a purple flower called tassel grape hyacinth sprung out of the verge. It looked alien with its prongs – something like the covid virus. As I passed the church, the butterflies were back out in full force.
    




    




    Then I was back on the path which took me into a national park. It featured an open-air geology museum on the old site of the quarry of Montecino. I was in the land of gypsum, the second hardest mineral after talc on the Moh scale of mineral hardness, or so my geologist mother had informed me. She’d kill to be here. On holiday in Tunisia she had swooned over the abundant gypsum. ‘The desert rose’, she’d called it.
    




    The Gypsum Vein is a small mountain range characterized by one rock only, Selenite. It marks the landscape of the Apennine foothills of western Romagna. This, in turn, is made of just one mineral: shiny, soluble, slippery gypsum. 
    




    The landscape’s origin dates back to about 6 million years ago when the Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean were separated and the sea water evaporation caused the formation of several strata of crystals that are the origin of today’s ravines. The solubility of gypsum produced a tessellation of caves and sinkholes (it is almost ten times more soluble than limestone), making it an area of great geological interest to Europe. The site had given rise to fossils from over five and a half million years ago: of rhinos, monkeys, hyenas, antelopes and crocodiles. But a sign made clear that fossil hunting was not permitted here. The park was to be enjoyed, not excavated. 
    




    




    I passed a French couple who I wished a bon chemin and stopped to locate my cap to ease the sweating situation. I had only done two kilometres but I was exhausted. 
    




    I exchanged voice notes with Alina whose mother’s house in Ukraine had been hit by a missile the day before. We shared thoughts on the mistaken assumption that refugees are somehow running away from something rather than staying to fix the problems in their countries of origin. 
    




    This brushland was a new kind of scenery for me. Something like broom scraped my arms as I walked and two mountain bikers came hurtling down the hill:
    




    Occhio! ‘Watch out!’
    




    ‘But are you by yourself?’ one man stopped to ask me. 
    




    I was, I replied for the umpteenth time. With every time I was forced to declare it, I felt more and more alone. 
    




    I whistled back at the birds as I climbed up the dirt track road which soon turned to gravel. An orange peel left by a previous hiker was being devoured by ants. 
    




    I offloaded my empty Red Bull can in a bin in a parking lot that was next to a sign with an arrow that simply read Carne – ‘meat, this way!’
    




    




    The valley had been slashed and hacked as if it had been visited by the devils in Dante’s infernal circle of schismatics.
    




    I could hear the sound of children laughing and soon arrived at a scout camp which was surrounded by sculptures. One resembled a dragon; here was a lizard and, there, a tortured woman who made me think of the Bernini sculpture of Persephone turning into a tree to escape violation by Hades. The statue is housed in the Galleria Borghese in Rome. 
    




    Two years ago, on a tour that I had taken with refugees, led by my brilliant friend and curator Stefania, one woman had said the sculpture reminded her of the sexual violence that her and others had experienced in Libya en route to safety in Europe. How she wished she could have turned into a tree. 
    




    




    The sun had gone in and it was nice and cool under the trees. In the panorama, the pine trees sprung up like bishops in a chess game.
    




    Several scouts filed towards the camp heading in the opposite direction to me. My Granny had been a scout leader, known as Akela after the character in The Jungle Book, but I’d never been a scout myself. Though I grew up in the city, my love of the outdoors had been instilled by my mother and father through our regular walks in the ‘Country Park’, a beautiful stretch of parkland some fifteen minutes’ drive away from our house. There was also, nearby, an old quarry where occasionally, with friends, I’d swim. Once I got a fishing hook caught in my foot. That hurt alright!
    




    My feet hurt now alright, and I was relieved to reach a stretch of downhill. But looking at the map I was reminded that what goes down must go up. Today would not be easy.
    




    I put on some music to elevate my mood. The song, Despacito, poignantly rang out and I sang along to the Spanish lyrics. On my most recent trip to Cuba, I had teased my friend Jo by requesting the song repeatedly from the ubiquitous itinerant street musicians. 
    




    The hills undulated like pencil sharpener shavings strung out across the landscape.
    




    The yellow broom smelt magnificent, and pinecones littered the path. The poppies opened up their petals like the wings of a butterfly. It was 1pm now and the sky was smudged with clouds. I passed a monkey orchid and bushes of juniper. 
    




    




    I didn’t have time to check out the Museum of Olive Oil but I was making up time on the gentle downhill patch. To look down was to see a furry black caterpillar curled in a ball; to look up was to see the vineyards dusted with buttercups.
    




    I proceeded past a sign saying the road was broken up ahead only to find that yet another landslide had torn into the cliff face. Luckily, I was able to hop over the barrier and traverse the crevasse on the left hand side. I put on Fleetwood Mac.
    




    




    The combination of smoked salmon and tzatziki was so, so good as I stopped for lunch, looking out over the vines. I noticed a worrying hole in my shoe. I still had quite a long way to go but I wanted to take a nap. This plan was thwarted by a tractor that emerged spraying pesticides.
    




    A car sped past. But where had it come from? The road was broken? Oh well, I’d missed my chance to hitch a ride.
    




    Some pigeons perched on an electricity wire. A delicate trace of honeysuckle decorated a laurel tree.
    




    




    And now came the ascent once more. I noticed the various signs signaling that European Union money had been invested in the area and passed another landslide, though this time the road was still navigable.
    




    My feet ached and I stopped to take some ibuprofen. Now I was listening to an audiobook that Alina had recommended, The Signature of All Things by Elizabeth Gilbert. It was about botany. I thought of my grandfather who I had never known, but who had been an academic at the University of Manchester. A doctor of blue green algae or cryptogamic botany, he had apparently been a walker too. The family legend went that he had even been shortlisted for the Edmund Hillary Everest expedition. In my dad’s house there still hung a beautiful black and white photo of him at the summit of Mont Blanc.
    




    I tried to channel that spirit as I ploughed on with painful feet. I tried smaller steps – that hurt. I tried longer strides – that hurt too. A tiny spider hitched a lift on my thumb nail. Desperate for some company in my hour of need I played some opera music. The highs and lows of the singers’ voices matched the ups and down of the path.
    




    My phone signal had gone so I couldn’t call anybody for motivation. The rocks weren’t massaging my feet now, they were hurting them. I’d only done 12.1 kilometres but the incline had been 72 floors.
    




    A chapel to the Madonna spurred me on for a while, then I collapsed by some abandoned farming equipment. I would take some paracetamol too. Shit, how would I fare tomorrow, and the day after, and the day after that?
    




    




    I watched a hawk sweep across the sky and contemplated it a while. It hovered then soared down in a flurry of feathers which were dark on the outer edges and a lighter brown in the middle. It screeched into the sky. I hear you, I thought. This was the sound of my foot cramps. 
    




    I put my feet up on my bag and closed my eyes. God, it felt good to be horizontal. It was nearly 4pm. In my body I felt fine. It was just that my stomach was still playing up and my feet were aching.
    




    I carried on, listening to the sound of the hawk and dogs barking in the distance. I was rewarded by a spectacular 360 degree view of the mountains which was framed by wild rosemary and thyme and blue daisies that exited the ground in little puffs of mauve. 
    




    




    The pain killers had taken the edge off, but every step still hurt and I had another two kilometres to go. There was a brief flirtation of rain, just enough for me to cover my bag and myself, but then it passed as swiftly as it had arrived.
    




    I pushed down hard on my hiking poles to relieve the pressure on my feet.  By 6 o’clock, I told myself, I’d be there. I ate some pistachio nuts and carried on my way. Panting like a dog, I dodged muddy puddles here and there and noticed an interesting orange fungus on a tree stump.
    




    A sign informed me that I was in Ca’ di Malanca where on the 10th of  October 1944, Italian forces had clashed with German soldiers. There had been 42 fallen partisans. It was humbling. 
    




    The forest opened up to reveal spectacular views on either side. I saw some parasites on an oak tree and thought of Paolo back in Ravenna and his ink. What a man he had been. 
    




    Now the path led across a sheer rock face littered with boulders with precipitous drops on either side. I thought again of Dante’s hike through canto 12 of Inferno,
    




    

    ‘And so we made our way across that heap
    of stones, which often moved beneath my feet
    because my weight was somewhat strange for them.’
    

    




    Attention is drawn here to Dante’s weight to stress he is a human being visiting the underworld. I hoped Dante had had good boots.
    




    




    The sun was now illuminating the mountain tops in a vibrant green. Then, I could hear a dog, I saw a car and my heart started to lift. Here was Enrico, my host for the night who had promised to meet me. 
    




    I couldn’t have been more happy to see him. 
    




    He showed me that across the ridge you could see Ravenna and, see that last line? That was the Adriatic sea. On a clear day you could see the mountains of Croatia. 
    




    I immediately liked this man who was accompanied by two adorable dogs, Mia and Cilian.
    




    




    Enrico was a keen geologist and star gazer – to love planet earth is to love space after all, he explained. He was one of the patrons of the Observatory that sat atop a nearby hill. When they’d built it, they’d found an unexploded bomb from the war.
    




    Together we passed Monte Romano, a tiny village composed of just ten houses, and arrived at his home. It was folded into the hills in the middle of nowhere. The view was breathtaking. You could see Mount Falcone which I’d crossed from Florence in the snow, and here were the origins of the Arno and Tiber rivers.
    




    




    It was moving to see how far I’d come. Perhaps I could do this after all. 
    




    ‘And you’re doing it without the threat of the death penalty over your head like our dear Dante,’ Enrico reminded me. We laughed. 
    




    Enrico’s wife had left to pay her respects to the late Pope at 2am that morning and so it was just me and Enrico who enjoyed an aperitivo on a little balcony as we watched the sunset. He had grilled aubergines with the local oil into a delicious sauce to make bruschetta. The olives melted in my mouth. 
    




    




    That night we ate tagliatelle with mushrooms he had foraged from the surrounding woodland with pepper he had brought back from Madagascar and discussed all things geology and stars beside a roaring open fire. The mushrooms were called St George’s mushrooms, since the best day to collect them was St George’s Day. 
    




    Enrico also prepared me a delicious baked potato with rosemary and some grilled cabbage and tomatoes which were served with pecorino and some local squacquerone cheese. It was all delicious. 
    




    The house was as stunning as Enrico’s cooking, with original brick walls and beams that crisscrossed above us protectively. There was an antique clock, oak furniture and a near perfect pencil depiction of Dante’s death mask which had been rendered by his grandmother’s sister for a project at school.
    




    And then Enrico shared with me one of his prized possessions: a striking photograph of the comet Hale–Bopp which was visible from earth in April 1997. It had been one of the brightest seen for many decades. 
    




    I can still recall my mum’s excitement. 
    




    ‘A comet, a real-life comet in the sky!’
    




    I had been ten at the time. It was one of my most vivid childhood memories. It won’t return for well over 4,000 years, had marveled my mum. I wished she were here to meet Enrico. 
    




    The dogs were under the table and I tickled one of them with my weary feet. It felt luxurious. Enrico shared with me a poem he had written about comets:
    




    

    Our existences flow rapidly.
    




    Like swift wandering comets
    




    That move
    




    In cold, empty spaces.
    




    




    Distant projects,
    




    Guarded in the dark
    




    Suddenly called
    




    To the light.
    




    




    Beauty and love
    




    They light up and burn
    




    Around this Sun.
    




    




    For each, the orbit is different,
    




    But it inexorably brings us
    




    Back to a place that reason cannot understand.
    

    




    




    Enrico had been the translator for Thomas Bopp, one of the astronomers who had discovered the comet before it became visible to the naked eye, on a visit to Italy during which he had signed his photograph. The photo, he proudly shared, was also featured on numerous book covers.
    




    ‘Comets now have names of computer programmes,’ he lamented, ‘not astronomers or lovers of the sky.’ 
    




    This man was a true lover of the sky, just as Dante had been.
    




    Before I went to bed, Enrico took me outside to see the stars and took my photograph beside his favourite oak tree. I felt honoured. And naturally, I recalled the last lines of the Divine Comedy in Paradiso:
    




    

    ‘As the geometer intently seeks
    to square the circle, but he cannot reach,
    through thought on thought, the principle he needs,
    




    so I searched that strange sight: I wished to see
    the way in which our human effigy
    suited the circle and found place in it—
    




    and my own wings were far too weak for that.
    But then my mind was struck by light that flashed
    and, with this light, received what it had asked.
    




    Here force failed my high fantasy; but my
    desire and will were moved already—like
    a wheel revolving uniformly—by
    




    the Love that moves the sun and the other stars.’
    

    




    

    
			
    
		
    
		
	
  • 
		
		
    
			
			
    A Divided Sky: From Oriolo dei Fichi a Brisighella
    
			
    

    Today’s mix of sunshine and rain left me in a melancholy mood which was not alleviated by the hotel’s awful spa.
    




    




    I woke up to a horrible dream which put me on edge. And, typical: I’d left my mosquito repellant with Kelsey to offload some weight and now, in the night, they had assaulted me. It was my own fault – it was a balmy evening and I’d left the window open to hear the cicadas.

    I received news from Stefano and Donatella that Oliver’s memory was returning and shortly after he sent me a Whatsapp message. Thank God. 
    




    The aftershocks of yesterday’s drama were still hitting me. 
    




    The rain fell lightly on the vineyards surrounding the agriturismo, la Sabbiona, which had a swimming pool and children’s play area for the summer. There was a bench made of wooden crates from which you could enjoy them, though something like a large football net obscured the view.
    




    




    Over breakfast, I got chatting to Chris and Carey, a retired American engineer and teacher couple from Colorado who were vacationing in the region. We discussed Trump and their plans to keep travelling until his four-year reign was over. I thought of the schismatics and sewers of civil discord in Dante’s Inferno who are punished by having their body parts mutilated. 
    




    

    ‘Who, even with untrammeled words and many
    attempts at telling, ever could recount
    in full the blood and wounds that I now saw?…
    




    And then, were one to show his limb pierced through
    and one his limb hacked off, that would not match
    the hideousness of the ninth abyss.
    




    No barrel, even though it’s lost a hoop
    or end— piece, ever gapes as one whom I
    saw ripped right from his chin to where we fart:
    




    his bowels hung between his legs, one saw
    his vitals and the miserable sack
    that makes of what we swallow excrement.’
    

    




    The prophet Mohemmed shows his entrails to Dante and Virgil while on the left stands his son Ali, his head cleft from chin to forelock. Some other souls have their heads on backwards. That might be more suitable for Trump, I thought.
    




    Breakfast consisted of homemade juices – I chose raspberry and grape – that came in plastic cups (Italians really like their plastic cups) and a range of home-baked pastries. There were some pretty flowers in a little boxes set out on the table in a line. Perhaps there would be a wedding. I realized as this thought transpired that I was thinking in Italian – un matrimonio.

    I was eager to get back on the cammino after a couple of days of not walking but I was also tired. Yesterday had taken it out of me, even if I had slept all night. I had a headache and my stomach was playing up, so I took some paracetamol.
    




    




    As I set off, I was rewarded with the familiar sight of olive, rosemary and fruit trees. When I passed guard dogs, now I greeted them familiarly, converted by my experience in Forlí.

    The lizards were back and the thistles, poppies and sticky weed. Some wild verbena sprouted on the roadside. 
    




    A sign announced that we were in the land of ‘flavours and wine’.

    Once I’d passed the little church of Sant’Apollinare, which had been reconstructed in 1946 after bombardments in World War Two, I passed onto a dirt road where poems had been pinned upon the tree barks and lamposts. One called ‘crickets’ by Nino da Oriolo read:
    




    

    ‘In the red of evening
    




    The crickets serenade the moon
    




    In a row with elms they stand on top of the hill,
    




    They greet my day of work.
    




    I feel them close,
    




    They live in my land,
    




    They live in my sun,
    




    They feel my wind,
    




    We enjoy the pleasure of living.
    




    In silence they accompany me on my way.
    




    I am not alone, we are not alone.’
    

    




    




    I felt alone today, though now I had met Giordano, Marcello and Oliver, the guardians of the trail, I had a new appreciation for every marker on a tree or lamppost to which they had put their generous hands. I recalled how Giordano and his son both had strong, thick fingers like tree branches.
    




    I tried to religiously keep my feet dry as I navigated the mud which was embroidered with tractor tracks here and there. 
    




    Marco, who I had met at Fattoria Chiocce Romagnole, who had set off on the cammino from Ravenna, had written to warn me about the roads which were muddy and diverted in several places, and today, as I walked along, knocking over the daisies with the tip of my boot, I felt some comfort knowing that they had walked before me here.
    




    




    The path weaved in and out of the vines. A butterfly decorated some dog excrement and a man ate a brioche on a stationary tractor by the side of the road. The sun was strong up in the sky. 
    




    An explosion of poppies lined the margins of the path making me think back to the schismatics and of war. 
    




    My feet felt surprisingly OK. My shoes had fully dried out and I’d applied blister plasters preemptively before setting off. The wounds on the top of my toes had hardened into scabs. 
    




    It seemed like the world and his wife were mowing their lawns today in Oriolo. From everywhere emanated the smell of freshly cut grass. 
    




    




    A message from Kelsey arrived to say that the UN Lesbian March she had been organizing for this coming Saturday had been cancelled because some 250,000 people, including Trump, were expected to descend on Rome for Pope Frances’ funeral. Even from the grave it seemed he had it in for the gays. 
    




    I missed Kelsey. 
    




    Back on the tarmac, there appeared a pretty terracotta farmhouse to my right the colour of my bathroom and huge thistles the size of small children lined the road. 
    




    After an hour, I stopped for a caffé macchiato at Manueli restaurant which featured pretty frescos on the walls. My back was already sweating into my t-shirt. I contemplated stopping to write awhile but decided to continue on. Writing and walking had come to be, for me, one and the same. 
    




    




    I crossed the river Manogue and spied a lizard that had been run over. Its skin and guts were spilled out onto the pavement. It was an iridescent hue, green and blue, like an oil spill.
    




    A dusty blue Fiat Panda sped past and a lady in a straw hat who was cultivating romagnole artichokes wished me a buon cammino. 
    




    Everything in this region is ‘Romagnole’ – there’s a deep sense of pride. 
    




    A peacock strutted across the road next to a tractor as I passed over another river following the Via della Uccellina – the path of the little bird. 
    




    




    I looked back at the city of Faenza from where puffs of industrial smoke rose into the sky, merging with the clouds which were pooling grey and white. I’d visited Faenza with my Reading Dante with Refugees class and remembered vividly Sahra dancing on the stage of the spectacular theatre. I pinged her a message to see how she was getting on.
    




    It was relatively flat on the path though I was surrounded by undulating hills. The landscape reminded me somewhat of Le Marche where I had spent several summers at my friend Harriet’s house enjoying quality time with University friends. 
    




    I listened to some gentle Indie rock as I sweated under the midday sun.
    




    A big white car pulled out of physiotherapist’s office which I found  odd to be located in the middle of the countryside. 
    




    The livid poppies made it look like the hill was aflame.

    The trees were embracing one another on either side of the path to make a tunnel.
    




    




    As Brisighella came into view before me, there were quite a few cars on the road. 
    




    Pink, yellow and purple irises bloomed from a garden to my right. I felt the rub of the end of my second toes inside my boots. 

    Throughout history, different cultures have attached meaning to the length of toes, including the second toe. The Greeks, known for their appreciation of beauty and mathematical harmony, considered a longer second toe, also known as Morton’s toe, as an aesthetic ideal. Greek sculptures, such as the Venus de Milo, often depicted figures with Morton’s toe, further perpetuating its cultural significance. French sculptor Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi studied Greek and Roman sculptures, which resulted in the Statue of Liberty’s longer second toe.
    




    




    As the mountains came into view beneath a purple sky which was heavy with rain, I thought again of items I could get rid of before the climb ahead. My hoody perhaps? Or my deodorant?

    Olive trees marked the perimeter of the vineyard and a familiar cuckoo sounded out.

    I stubbed my swollen toes on a crack in the road and stopped for lunch, looking back over Faenza and forward towards the towering peaks. I bit into a blood orange which burst in an ecstasy of sugar in my mouth. I was tired and I wanted to take a nap but the rain was coming, so on I went. The sky was divided in two: here in front it was dark and brooding, the colour of a whale; there behind me it was light, the colour of delphiniums. 

    As I continued, the road collapsed down to the left. The hills were cut with ridges and valleys like slices of an apple. 
    




    




    A blackbird sang out and the leaves on the trees began to rustle in the light wind.
    




    I had come to recognize the smell of oncoming rain. The butterflies had disappeared and, was that thunder I heard in the distance?
    




    The overcast sky made the hillside look emerald green rather than the more vibrant pea green of earlier in the day. A ruined brick house emerged from among the foliage.
    




    After about ten minutes of walking downhill, I realized I had missed a turning but I decided to proceed down the road along via Carla. I would pick up the trail later on.
    




    I stopped to cover my backpack at the touch of the first drops of rain, outside a house with peppermint green shutters. A huge beetle crossed in front of me and my phone pinged with the offer of a discount from a takeaway back home.
    




    




    At a junction where there was a Cammino de Dante sign, I stopped briefly to converse with a woman called Stefania who was pruning her roses. She greeted me warmly and I petted her dog, Pepe. She said I was the first person she’d seen pass this year. A man in overalls asked me if I’d come from England to salute the Pope.
    




    ‘I’ll let you go before the rain comes down any stronger,’ she said, ‘do you need anything, water?’
    




    She was particularly impressed that I was tackling the cammino alone as a woman.
    




    ‘You must have strong legs and a strong will!’ she said. 
    




    A bonfire in a farm to the right reminded me of one of my favourite Italian books, La luna e i Falò (The Moon and the Bonfires) by Cesare Pavese.
    




    ‘We all need a homeland,’ reads one line, ‘if only for the pleasure to leave it.’
    




    A tractor on the right was mowing in between the vines and the rain was starting to hit hard. I was rushing, trying to arrive at my destination, which was suitably called Modus Acquae, for a four o’clock zoom meeting.
    




    An impressive railway bridge on the right marked my entry into the city along with some tennis courts and recycling bins. 
    




    




    The river Lamone was opaque and surprisingly low given recent rainfall.
    




    I passed beneath the railway bridge and by some apartments with pretty flowers on the balcony and decorative windmills spinning in the breeze.
    




    A billboard advertised a pork festival, another steel sign announced that I’d arrived in the city of olive oil. The town sat in a nest of hills.
    




    I popped into a big Conrad supermarket to stock up on dinner and lunch for tomorrow and giggled at the significant section of Italian Mills and Boon novels which had titles including ‘The Seduction of Fire’ and ‘Undeniable Alchemy’. I treated myself to some smoked salmon, strawberries and dark chocolate.
    




    




    I made it just in time for my meeting with five minutes spare to untie my braids for a more formal look. It was about the presentation of some research on asylum appeals to the English judiciary. As part of the project, I’d observed 100 asylum appeals – an experience that had left me with a profound sense of moral injury at the injustice of it all. 
    




    After the meeting, I visited the hotel’s spa which had nothing on my blissful experience at the Hotel Granduca in Campigna. In fact, it was pretty awful. The view encompassed some orange tape, a ping-pong table and some camper vans that were stationed in the car park. The sauna was tepid at best and only one of the three jacuzzi functions worked. 
    




    




    Back in my room, I peeled the blister plasters off my socks into which they had unhelpfully melted and took a Coke Zero from the mini bar. There was no question about it, I was going to lose my second toenails from the rub, rub, rub of my boots. 
    




    The rain bounced off the cover of the swimming pool and an ant scurried across my balcony to find shelter. I would have to email my local book group to let them know I would miss tomorrow’s session on Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, a migratory novel that I’d loved. 
    




    I felt a bit lonely as the rain stopped and the evening sunlight poured into my room. I looked out into the courtyard at an abandoned skateboard and starkly pruned tree. A Spanish girl in a princess crown was showing another how to ride a bike,
    




    ‘Go, Maria, go!’
    




    I checked my phone to see a message from Alina and another from Oliver. Alina’s news was bad: her mother’s house in Ukraine had been hit by shelling. The news from Oliver was good: he had been discharged from hospital and was finally home. 
    

    
			
    
		
    
		
	
  • 
		
		
    
			
			
    Emergency: From Passo Vico to Bologna to Oriolo dei Fichi
    
			
    

    A last-minute invitation to Bologna came with some unexpected drama where I witnessed the strength of Italian family life and was impressed by the Italian health service.
    




    




    Although the Cammino di Dante is mostly a circular trail, the first day back from Ravenna required retracing the steps of day one. Since I’d already done that leg and I was in need of a rest day, after we dropped Kelsey at Ravenna train station, Oliver dropped me back at Fattoria Chiocce Romagnole where I was all too happy to stay with Rossella and her animals once more.
    




    I finally managed to wash my clothes and we spent a lovely evening together with her friends eating pizza and playing with the brood. I got to cuddle Margherita the skunk and a recently born pigeon. Rossella also introduced me to two chicks who had hatched from eggs just that day who were being cared for in an incubator. I was amazed to discover that as well as managing the farm she had an office job in Forlì  – this woman was a powerhouse!
    




    




    I had been among the first pilgrims of the year and there was a tangible sense of excitement that the season was starting. Spring was on its way which would be marked by a party to celebrate Rossella’s birthday. Kelsey would come from Rome. If only I could pop over from England!
    




    I saluted Blu the African gray parrot and Raul the smaller red one. I was also introduced, to my delight, to Dante and Beatrice, the pair of peacocks who merrily cavorted on the lawn in a frenzy of colour as we ate crisps and chatted among ourselves.
    




    




    Kelsey had brought me a nail file from her ample collection of hotel goodies – thus is the life of a UN employee – and I filed my nails neatly into ovals. 
    




    Oliver had invited me to the regional meeting for walking trails the next morning and, given that I’d be showing up in my rather pungent by now hiking wear, the least I could do was this small gesture of civility.
    




    I took a shower – with hair conditioner Kelsey had also provided that came in a miniature bottle – and looked at myself in the mirror of the wardrobe. Perhaps I had lost a few kilos. I noticed a large bruise on my right buttock where I had fallen in the Apennines on my way to Ravenna. It was the size and colour of a Victoria plum. 
    




    Despite my painful foot blisters, I felt in shape and ready to tackle the backwards leg of the cammino. An email arrived from Anna sharing much good will, an invitation to come and stay with her and write, and a reflection that perhaps next time I could consider spending more than one night in each place. She was right. It was saddening this constant stream of hellos and goodbyes; hence I was so happy to be back at Rossella’s farm. 
    




    One of the kittens batted a tampon underneath the bed. The other toyed with my shoelaces. This place had become like a second home and I wrote as much in the little guest book. 
    




    




    Oliver picked me up the next day in his large grey car and off we went to Bologna for the regional meeting of trail heads. There would be some 30 different walks represented including religious pilgrimages, such as the cammino of Assisi, and also the relatively new but expanding phenomenon of cycle trails. 
    




    Though it is not part of the official route, it felt right to visit Bologna on the Dante trail since he was known to have spent time there, probably teaching at what is one of the world’s oldest universities. I had visited the city on two previous occasions, once with my mum and once to visit my former partner who had procured a prestigious visiting professorship. 
    




    Unlike Florence where the medieval towers had mostly been flattened, here in Bologna the towers rise up in a phalanx, representing the phallic wealth and status of families who fought for power there. One such tower, the Garisenda tower, is mentioned at the end of canto 31 of Inferno to describe the staggering stature of Antaeus, one of the giants who are punished for opposing God, between the eighth and ninth circles of Hell. 
    




    

     ‘Just as the Garisenda seems when seen
    beneath the leaning side, when clouds run past
    and it hangs down as if about to crash,
    




    so did Antaeus seem to me as I
    watched him bend over me—a moment when
    I’d have preferred to take some other road.
    




    But gently—on the deep that swallows up
    both Lucifer and Judas—he placed us;
    nor did he, so bent over, stay there long,
    




    but, like a mast above a ship, he rose.’
    

    




    Antaeus transports Dante and Virgil to the deepest part of Hell, the frozen lake where he is to meet Satan himself.
    




    




    We don’t know precisely when Dante arrived in Bologna, but the details in his writings make it clear that he knew the city well. After Florence, Bologna is the most cited city in the Divine Comedy.
    




    On the way to the meeting, Oliver explained to me something of the politics of running a cammino. You had to make sure you had official permission for all the signs, and individual communes would lobby you to have you include them in the itinerary in order to boost the footfall of tourists there. As it was, the Dante trail had been divided into two rings, each providing a separate circular trail for the Tuscany and Emilia Romagna regions. After some gentle persuasion, they had also included an optional detour to include the city of Faenza.
    




    I felt at home talking bureaucracy and politics. I had worked at the European Parliament before Brexit, after all. 
    




    ‘Corruption was the biggest sin during Dante’s time and so it remains now,’ cautioned Oliver.
    




    




    As he mapped out the complicated process of fundraising to maintain the trail – putting up signs and information boards, cutting back brush, running the website, welcoming pilgrims –  I thought of Dante’s portrayal of the money lenders in Hell who have their heads bowed forwards for the weight of the money bags around their necks. The Cammino di Dante wasn’t all daisies and dandelions after all. 
    




    ‘That’s politics,’ sighed Oliver.
    




    Oliver had become involved in the trail a few years ago after re-reading Dante following a heart attack,
    




    ‘It was like opening a new book,’ he said. To read Dante was to ‘enter into a new world.’
    




    On the way to the meeting, Oliver spoke fondly of his wife, Donatella,
    




    ‘When you’re old, you need someone. She’s my soul mate.’ 
    




    I thought of my dad and his girlfriend to whom I’d sometimes been too harsh. Love was love after all. 
    




    Once arrived in Bologna, we parked the car on a street on the fringes of the city and Oliver covered my backpack with a patterned cloth:
    




    ‘Ochio non vede, cuore non vuole’ he said. 
    




    What the eye doesn’t see, the heart doesn’t grieve. 
    




    




    It was a fifteen-minute walk to the towering palace where the meeting would be held and we stopped in a bar for a quick coffee en route. Oliver had a decaffeinated one – I had my usual, a double espresso macchiato. Yes, I was addicted to caffeine. 
    




    The district was business like and very contrary to the medieval city centre. 
    




    We located the building and shot up in the dizzying elevator to the 20th floor from where we exited into a meeting room. Some people had already arrived, and Oliver introduced me as a pilgrim and student of camminos.
    




    There followed a 90-minute meeting in which the different trail organizers each contributed thoughts on issues and opportunities to the regional office executive, a smart woman who greeted me in English and informed me that she had studied at Leeds University. It was highly formal. Everyone rose when she arrived. She was dressed in thick white glasses and a perfectly matched necklace. Business cards were flicked around like tiddledywinks. 
    




    




    I felt somewhat self-conscious not to be dressed in a suit and was relieved that at least I’d been able to wear clean clothes.
    




    Some of the trail organisers joined on Zoom, including someone who was walking as they spoke. This made me feel like less of an imposter. There was Via San Francesco, the Cammino di Saint Antonio, Via degli Abati, Via Romea Germanica, Via Misericordia, Via San Colombano…I’d have to come back to try them all.
    




    The window afforded a panoramic view of the city.
    




    We went round in a circle and when it was my turn to speak, I deferred to Oliver. I was there to give witness to the reality of the cammino, he offered.
    




    The discussion centered on the difference between ‘slow tourism’ and ‘active holidays’ and how the region could attract more tourists from both Italy and abroad. 
    




    ‘A path doesn’t exist if it isn’t maintained,’ someone said, and thus came a discussion of the floods of 2023 and 2024 and the ongoing damage to many of the pathways. Other topics included the facility of arriving at trailheads via public transport and different types of accommodation, including licenses for people to pitch tents. People appealed for more resources and someone raised the topic of climate change. 
    




    The region should leave a margin of wild trees on the edges of the pathways and invest in more accommodation in remote areas. There was an issue of hotels only wanting to give rooms to people who would stay for a week, not one night, in July and August – there were pilgrims and then there were tourists – it was important to make the distinction. 
    




    




    I felt proud to be representing the Dante trail. The King of England had recently mentioned Dante in a speech, someone pointed out with a hint of envy, so there would be a boom in foreign interest in our trail. 
    




    The meeting overran and people were hurried in their contributions. The gentleman next to me was taking notes in minuscule script, using a mechanical pencil on squared paper. The lady next to him drew a mind map. I noticed that Oliver didn’t seem to be taking any notes at all. 
    




    At the end of the meeting, the regional deputy offered some feedback and then proceedings were formally brought to a close.
    




    I turned to Oliver who, I noted, was wearing a Cammino di Dante jacket. 
    




    ‘That’s a wrap!’ I said.
    




    ‘Whose bag is that?’ he replied, pointing to his rucksack. 
    




    I was confused.
    




    ‘It’s yours.’
    




    By the time we had exited the lift, I had started to realize that something was seriously wrong. Oliver had asked me where we were and if I remembered where we’d parked the car. Had we come in a car?
    




    Physically he seemed fine and so I retraced our steps in the direction of the vehicle taking note of his behaviour. Was it just a funny turn?
    




    




    I managed to locate the car, my navigational skills no doubt seasoned by the trail, but, by that point, the gravity of the situation had hit me. Oliver was not ok. 
    




    ‘I think we need to go to a hospital,’ I said. 
    




    ‘Could I drive the car?’ Oliver suggested, admitting that his head felt ‘a little funny’. But I didn’t trust myself on the Italian roads. 
    




    I checked to see if Uber was operational – it wasn’t – then I asked a man who was passing if he knew of any taxi services.  
    




    ‘You’ll be quicker calling an ambulance,’ he said. And so call an ambulance I did.
    




    They instructed me to illuminate the car’s emergency lights to aid them in finding our location and gave the coordinates of the street. I was preparing for a long wait and instructed Oliver to sit tight inside the vehicle. 
    




    ‘Where are we?’ he kept repeating. 
    




    Much to my astonishment, the ambulance came in five minutes. Yes, five minutes. When my Dad had had a similar episode some years back we had had to wait five hours! It was ten points for the Italian health service from me.
    




    The paramedics were highly skilled. They checked to see what medication Oliver was taking and got him to say some tongue twisters. Could he raise his arms?
    




    In my head I tried to stay positive, but I also feared the worst. Surely he couldn’t have had a stroke, right here, right now, with me?
    




    I accompanied Oliver to hospital in the ambulance, sitting up front beside a paramedic called Samantha who had extravagant gel nails. She was curious to hear about the appalling state of the British National Health Service from which multiple governments had cut funding in recent years. 
    




    Five minutes. 
    




    I still couldn’t believe the speed at which they’d come.
    




    Once at the hospital, they took Oliver in for treatment and I was ushered into the waiting room. Was I family? I was not. We’d called his wife from the ambulance and she was on her way. 
    




    I bought some fizzy water from a vending machine with a one Euro coin which had Dante’s face on it.
    




    




    There followed two long hours of waiting until I finally convinced the receptionist to let me go and see him. He was sat in a wheelchair in the moderate care unit ‘under observation’. He asked me where he was and I tried to see if he could remember me.
    




    ‘Allsopp?’ he tentatively offered. 
    




    But he remembered nothing when I showed him photos of the time we had spent together over the last three days. 
    




    As he repeatedly asked me the same questions, I thought of the thieves in canto 25 of Inferno who are punished by being metamorphosized, time and time again, from souls into serpents in some hideous version of Nietzsche’s Eternal Return.
    




    Like Dante, I was in shock,
    




    

    ‘If, reader, you are slow now to believe
    




    what I shall tell, that is no cause for wonder,
    




    for I who saw it hardly can accept it.’
    

    




    I also reflected that while Dante’s shades lose their bodies but not their minds, here was Oliver in the very opposite state. 
    




    Finally, his wife Donatella arrived. She was as lovely as Oliver had described her. Accompanying her was their son Stefano and his wife, Sara, who was five months pregnant with Oliver’s grandson. He had been euphoric when he had told me of the future arrival in the car that morning but now, he recalled not a thing.
    




    Upon seeing Sara, he burst into tears, 
    




    ‘What a wonder!’ he remarked.
    




    Over the next two hours, this was to happen time and time again.
    




    ‘But what news! What wonderful news!’
    




    ‘How many times have you become a grandfather today,’ Sara would later gest. 
    




    We had to gest. There was nothing to be done but wait, instructed the doctors, and the whole situation was absurd. 
    




    Outside were huge signs reading ‘No smoking.’ 
    




    Everyone was smoking. Even I was smoking. 
    




    




    After a while, Oliver came to join us outside. He had a canular in his arm from where they had taken blood but otherwise he seemed physically in form. He asked where we were, re-discovered he was to become a grandfather once more, and, much to our astonishment, joked about his condition.
    




    ‘It seems I’ve had a sfarfallamento,’ he offered. This was a word to describe a funny turn that comes from the Italian for butterfly. 
    




    But then he would forget it all over again. 
    




    The Pope died several times. I got to know him repeatedly and he was moved to tears when I told him I had bought a rose in Ravenna that I would carry back to Florence with me in Dante’s honour. 
    




    ‘Ma che bella cosa!’
    




    He was thrilled I was doing the cammino and offered me sound advice. His long-term memory was locked in, but short term he could not recall a thing. 
    




    ‘Allsopp?’
    




    




    His niece, Martina, joined us. We swapped power banks to charge phones and it was agreed that Donatella would stay with Oliver while Stefano and Sara attended to the dogs. And then there was me. 
    




    I was conscious of impinging on the family’s space, but each time I attempted to leave, offering to get a taxi, they insisted I stay. Kelsey had offered to come and meet me. Rossella had offered to come and collect me. There was so much love on the trail. But Oliver’s family insisted that they would take me where I needed to go. It was ‘the least we can do,’ they repeated.
    




    I knew better, being in Italy, than to reject this offer. 
    




    I had become somehow an addition of the family and I also deeply cared for Oliver. The last three days we’d spent together had been a riot. I had had the feeling of meeting a kindred soul, even though he now did not recall a thing.
    




    Luckily, I’d had the sense to pin the location of the car and take some photos, and so Stefano went to fetch it while we stayed with Oliver. It seemed to distract and reassure him, talking about the trail. 
    




    The doctors insisted it was likely just a temporary memory loss: a transient ischaemic attack (TIA) or ‘mini stroke’ caused by a temporary disruption in the blood supply to part of the brain.
    




     Could it have been caused by the dizzying elevator that had even caught me out of breath?
    




    I was sad to leave Oliver but, in a moment of lucidity, after I’d reminded him who I was for the umpteenth time, he had encouraged me to continue with the cammino, chastising me with it for the big size of my backpack which I’d taken in the ambulance from the car. 
    




    ‘Could you have packed any more stuff?’ he joked. 
    




    We shared a hug. His body seemed to remember the bond we shared, even if his mind currently didn’t. 
    




    Thus I climbed into the car with Stefano and Martina, moving some Cammino di Dante signs from the back seat to make space for us. 
    




    Who would put them up now?
    




    Stefano was clearly terrified for his father. The whole family had come out in a display of love and support which had moved me deeply. No wonder he had spoken so fondly of these special people.
    




    




    Night had fallen and so Stefano insisted on dropping me at the end of that day’s leg of the trail which was an agriturismo in Oriolo dei Fichi. I had called to warn them I was running late. He used my power bank to charge his phone and we discussed his dear relationship with his father and what it would mean to bring a son into this crazy world. 
    




    After finding love at 37, within one year Stefano and Sara had got married and made a baby. 
    




    ‘When it’s the one, you know,’ he councelled.
    




    There was hope for me yet.
    




    As an only child, Stefano had the responsibility of both his parents on his shoulders. I felt grateful for my brother and grateful for my own family.
    




    The scent of wisteria hit me in the car park and the sound of the birdsong clashed with the disquiet in my heart. I hugged Stefano goodbye and he promised to keep me posted. 
    




    I sat in my room which had brick walls and a wooden beam ceiling. A beautiful antique wardrobe faced the bed. I knelt on it and did something I had rarely done in my 37 years, I prayed. I prayed for Oliver and I prayed for his family. 
    




    He was my Virgil, my ‘master and my author.’ 
    




    Without him to guide me, I felt lost.
    




    

    
			
    
		
    
		
	
  • 
		
		
    
			
			
    A Mosaic of Colour: Ravenna
    
			
    

    I felt immediately at home in Dante’s city of exile, but the most special encounter came in the form of the hospitality of Oliver, our new guide.
    




    




    I had had the fortune to visit Ravenna on two previous occasions, once on a road trip with my University friends Tor, Martin and Will, and once to give a lecture at the University of Bologna. Ravenna is known as the city of mosaics and, as a mosaic artist myself, I had felt immediately at home in the city. This personal feeling of sanctuary came flooding back as I wondered the streets.
    




    On every corner are little mosaic plaques that depict flowers and announce, 
    




    ‘Ravenna, city friend of women’. 
    




    Though they are never explicitly cited, it is said that the Byzantine mosaics in the church complex in Ravenna (Ravenna has some 200 churches) inspired Dante’s Paradiso which he completed in exile here.
    




    




    Among the depictions that one can most easily recognize in the Dantean text is the mosaic in the apse of Sant’Apollinare in Classe which contains a sky dotted with 99 golden stars and a gem cross, in the center of which it is possible to see the face of Christ. In the 14th canto of Paradiso, the souls who welcome Dante arrange themselves in the form of a cross, with Christ placed in the centre:
    




    

    ‘As, graced with lesser and with larger lights
    between the poles of the world, the Galaxy
    gleams so that even sages are perplexed;
    




    so, constellated in the depth of Mars,
    those rays described the venerable sign
    a circle’s quadrants form where they are joined.
    




    And here my memory defeats my wit:
    Christ’s flaming from that cross was such that I
    can find no fit similitude for it.
    




    But he who takes his cross and follows Christ
    will pardon me again for my omission—
    my seeing Christ flash forth undid my force.’
    

    




    In the 10th canto of Paradiso, meanwhile, Dante encounters a group of blessed souls who surround him and his celestial guide, Beatrice, forming a crown of twelve. A second crown of twelve souls joins them in canto 12, which moves in coordination with the first.
    




    

    ‘And I saw many lights, alive, most bright;
    we formed the center, they became a crown,
    their voices even sweeter than their splendor.’
    

    




    It is said that this image could recall the two domes of the Neonian and the Arian baptisteries, where the twelve apostles are depicted in a circle.
    




    




    It is also possible to imagine that Dante was inspired by the beautiful portrait of the Emperor in the Basilica of San Vitale. Paradiso 6 tells the history of the Roman Empire which Dante viewed as part of the divine plan of Christianity. Justinian has a prominent role. Indeed, the political sixth canto is dedicated to him:
    




    

    ‘Caesar I was and am Justinian,
    who, through the will of Primal Love I feel,
    removed the vain and needless from the laws.’
    

    




    The Procession of Virgins and Saints depicted in Sant’Apollinare Nuovo may also have informed his description of the grand procession that heralds the arrival of his Beatrice in the Earthly Paradise. 
    




    I left Kelsey to explore the mosaics and caught up with some work during the day before meeting with the current president of the Association of the Cammino di Dante, Oliviero Resta, known to friends as Oliver. We had an appointment outside the tomb of Dante at 5pm. 
    




    




    Oliver is unassuming with his bushy moustache and two pairs of glasses, a contrast to the exuberant personality of Giordano, the founder of the trail, with whom who we had had the honour to spend the previous evening. 
    




    His quiet presence is fatherly and reassuring and, once again, I had the feeling that I had met a kindred spirit.
    




    




    That evening and the next day, Oliver was a host with the most.
    




     The first evening he showed us the house said to be home to Francesca di Rimini who is memorably depicted with her lover, Paulo, in a whirlwind of lust in canto 5 of Inferno. She is accompanied by Helen of Troy and Cleopatra. Her lyrical lament is among one of the most beautiful parts of the Divine Comedy,
    




    

    ‘Love, that releases no beloved from loving,
    took hold of me so strongly through his beauty
    that, as you see, it has not left me yet.’
    

    




    I recalled how when I had given my lecture on young refugees in Ravenna, two students in the front row had cried at the love story of Alim who, after being deported to Afghanistan from Leicester at the age of 18, had returned two years later only to find that his beloved had moved on and shacked up with his best friend. 
    




    As Dante says,
    




    

     ‘Alas, how many gentle thoughts, how deep a longing,
    had led them to the agonizing pass!’
    

    




    




    The emotional and relational lives of refugees is a topic long ignored in contemporary scholarship. Dante helps to set the record straight that refugeehood can be a sight of lust and longing. 
    




    Oliver took us through the winding streets to see the Basilica which hosted Dante’s funeral. There were signs of the spectacular mosaic floor of the ancient church beneath the foundations which now, quite strikingly, housed a shoal of goldfish. 
    




    




    At 6pm we returned to Dante’s tomb where there takes place, every day, a reading from the Divine Comedy. A crowd of about 50 people had assembled there to hear two women recite a canto from Purgatory. The tomb itself was constructed by Camillo Morigia between 1780 and 1782.
    




    We saw the hole in the wall where Dante’s bones had been hidden by Franciscan monks in 1810 to prevent them being claimed back by Florence. They were found by chance in 1865 and returned. 
    




    Dante’s bones were once again buried in a secret place during the Second World Rar to protect them from bombardment by the Nazis. A plaque memorializes this event.
    




    




    In a pretty market in the square there was an exuberance of flowers and artisanal wares. I bought Kelsey a hand-whittled honey scooper.
    




    ‘I’ll think of you when I eat my honey,’ she said. 
    




    




    That night we dined at Passatelli  which since 1962 has been serving delicious local fare in a converted old cinema. We ate all local food including passatelli, a thick pasta that resembles a maggot but tastes anything but. 
    




    We purchased more roses from Mashalim which we weaved into the doors of Dante’s grave. It was touching to see that the roses we had devoted to him the night before were still there, embellishing the tombsite. 
    




    




    The next day Oliver picked us up in his battered old car that had Dante information boards stored in the backseats that he would put on the trail in the coming days with the help of Giordano’s son, Marcello. Together they maintained every detail of the cammino meticulously. 
    




    




    We passed by the convent where Dante’s daughter had become a nun, taking the name of Beatrice, and visited the lido which had formerly been the port from which Dante had set off on his last perilous diplomatic mission to Venice to negotiate salt taxes. 
    




    Though the sea had now retreated some distance from the spot to create a wetland abundant with birdlife, you could imagine the scene. Though he arrived via water he returned from Venice on foot where he caught the malaria that would kill him on the night of the 13th of September, 1321. He was 56 when he died. 
    




    




    Oliver explained that a river used to run through the heart of the city but it had been diverted to prevent flooding. The Ravenna of Dante’s day would have looked familiar but also different. 
    




    ‘Every pilgrim has his way,’ he said.
    




    Ironically, at 71, Oliver himself isn’t a fan of walking. Some years ago, he’d had a heart attack and had four stents fitted, just like my own father.
    




    Kelsey had a train to catch at 1.40pm which gave us just enough time to check out the Pine forest of Classe, located a few kilometers south of Ravenna, which inspired Dante in his representation of the ‘thick and vibrant’ woods of the terrestrial Paradise, which receives Dante and Virgil along their path in the 28th Canto of Purgatory.
    




    

    ‘A gentle breeze, which did not seem to vary
    within itself, was striking at my brow
    but with no greater force than a kind wind’s,
    




    a wind that made the trembling boughs—they all
    bent eagerly—incline in the direction
    of morning shadows from the holy mountain;
    




    but they were not deflected with such force
    as to disturb the little birds upon
    the branches in the practice of their arts;
    




    for to the leaves, with song, birds welcomed those
    first hours of the morning joyously,
    and leaves supplied the burden to their rhymes—
    




    just like the wind that sounds from branch to branch
    along the shore of Classe, through the pines
    when Aeolus has set Sirocco loose.’
    

    




    The forest was full of life. Wild asparagus sprouted in tall stalks and pines shot up like towers. They had been harvested to make boats in the medieval period. 
    




    Wild honeysuckle exuded a delicious tangy scent and from an acorn, an oak plant tentatively hazarded a thin thread of life.
    




    




    ‘If you don’t visit a place and touch it with your feet don’t get it,’ said Oliver.
    




    He spoke fondly of his wife, Donatella, who he said was very much at one with nature – somewhat of a tree hugger like me. When she harvested wild strawberries from the forest she asked for permission, he said.
    




    ‘Man needs to realize that nature does everything by itself.’
    




    Back on the road, we stopped at a piadina shack that was recognizable from its green and white stripes. I had one with rocket and a local runny cheese called squacquerone. Kelsey and Oliver had ham and hard cheese. I felt Italian, wearing my feather jacket in the midday sun.
    




    




    Oliver then took us to meet Paulo, another extraordinary man who makes his own ink out of oak parasites, which are rich in tannins, and uses it to write out, by hand, stunning tracts of the Divine Comedy. 
    




    This ancient way of making ink requires daily mixing, boiling and the addition of iron and copper to make black from red and green. Gum is added from apricots and peaches to create a substance that is tacky, doesn’t run and sticks to the page. 
    




    His work was flawless. 
    




    The ink smelt like balsamic vinager and he kept it in a sea shell which he used for his ink pot. He was, he explained, a man of the sea. Mountain scribes use stones with holes in as their ink pots. 
    




    




    He had started on his work with Paradiso since he had been sick at the time and wanted some lightness – Dante’s vivid depiction of Hell was too close to home, he explained. But now he was recovered and halfway through Inferno. It was the second time he had transcribed the Divine Comedy since he was unsatisfied with his first attempt which was rendered in a slightly different, gothic font. He had had to change the font he used because, with age, his hand was not as dexterous. 
    




    It took him five to six months to complete a canticle. 
    




    On some of the pages you could see the light outline of the lead he had used to draw the lines to guide his careful script. And here and there, he had embellished letters in gold leaf.
    




    




    Alongside the Divine Comedy he had transcribed the two volumes of Dante’s political tract, Convivio, and the Bible.
    




    After removing the car from his garage so that we could all fit in, he showed us his equipment of an eyeglass, goose feather quill, and a hare’s leg that had been taxidermized and stuffed with cotton. The softness of the hare’s fur gave a particular shine to the embossed parts of the manuscript, he revealed. Each text was written on paper made in the traditional way from papyrus. 
    




    The name for someone who handwrites manuscripts is an amanuense.
    




    




    When we had arrived, Paulo and his wife, Lucia, had been hand making passatelli. Of course they were, they said, it was Easter. They would eat it with prawns and courgettes in a soup, or brodo. 
    




    On the walls were family pictures, some of which had come loose from the frame, and a white shaggy dog called Pipo bounded across the room in search of affection. An easter display contained eggs and plastic decorations of rabbits and chicks. From the study two budgerigars were tweeting. 
    




    Paulo appeared incredibly humble but also proud of his work. 
    




    




    ‘Many normal people do things that are seen by others are titanic,’ explained Oliver. 
    




    Then suddenly his wife appeared from the doorway of the garage.
    




    ‘The Pope is dead,’ she announced. 
    




    ‘He met J.D. Vance yesterday,’ said Kelsey, ‘shit I hope he didn’t contract the evil eye.’
    




    I was struck how quickly the conversation moved on back to the books. Paulo was a religious man and the Pope was important, but he was here to show us his own devotional work.
    




    I asked him what his favourite part of the Comedy was,
    




    ‘For me,’ he replied, ‘Beatrice is everything.’
    




    He explained that for him calligraphy was a form of meditation that empties his mind. 
    




    He read us the last lines of Paradiso and then offered to write it out for Kelsey and I. Yes please, we said. He would entrust it to Oliver to pass forward. 
    




    Paulo tucked up the pages he was currently working on in a leather cover as if he were putting to bed a baby. 
    




    




    He used to go into schools to explain his work to the next generation but he fears that the art is being lost. He was teaching a 16 year old called Giovanni and a student at the university had done a thesis on his work. 
    




    I thought of my great aunt mary who had taught me how to handmake pillow lace. I’d have to pull out my cushion and bobbins when I got home and see what I could remember. 
    




    As we left, we asked if there was anything we could do for Paulo and he simply said ‘remember me.’ This touched me for its similarity to the pleas of the souls in Dante’s afterlife who ask him to remember them when he returns to the earthly realm.