Day 38 - Castelnuovo dell’abate to Rocca d’Orcia- Wednesday July 22, 2015

We had windows on three sides yesterday, and between the breeze and the temperature going down somewhat (to maybe 26) it was definitely tolerable for sleeping. The party went on until about 2am but even that couldn’t keep us awake.

We were up, had breakfast and ready to go at 7am. Russell was just taking down the suitcases when the fellow arrived to pick them up. I caught on to the fact he was there just as he closed the door and left. It was a perfect opportunity to shave a bit of the 20km off today. He was here very early, so we wouldn’t have had to delay our start time. I tried to intercept him but was a fraction of a second late.

It was very pleasant when we left. Lovely scenic view of the vineyards and a castle. The British fellow, Richard, had told us that Brunello was the best Italian wine (like the baggage transfer taxi fellow the other day from Buonconvento), and all the vineyards in the area around Castelnuovo dell’abate belonged to them. Their wine is very expensive because it is all aged for at least 5 years in oak barrels.

We ran into Stephania, our B&B host, on the highway just as we were exiting the city. She was going into the city. Not sure if she stayed somewhere else overnight, or was just out for a walk, but we thanked her and said good-bye. She works on a farm during the day.

There were a lot of complicated instructions early on today, as we were basically taking a shortcut through a farmer’s vineyard. Remember I said yesterday Russell had said his GPS was tracking the entire route for today? Well, at around km 2.1 he stopped tracking the route, but we were still okay according to the route notes. By km 3 we were no longer in sync with the route notes either. We were in a ‘private property’ vineyard, we had even opened a closed gate to get in there. We went past a couple of men working in the vineyard, and in Italian they seemed to be telling us we were going the right way, where to go and waving toward the way. There were aspects of the surroundings that seemed to correspond to the route notes, but we went this way and that way and kept running into fences. Russell was very annoyed. We finally decided to exit through another gate into a field of waist high weeds, heading toward a railway underpass (one of three possible underpasses the notes may have been referring to).

Once on the other side of the railway, there were some things that sort of fit with the route notes, and Russell could see a way to get back on the GPS. Russell also had a deer jump in front of him along there.

We got back on an asphalt road (the one we had started out on this morning) and resynced with both the GPS and route notes (at exactly km 5.4, where we were supposed to be according to the route notes – a miracle). It was 8:30 and we started at 7. Not good timing.

We followed the highway until km 9.5, which allowed us to make up for the slow timing earlier. Note that throughout the walk we frequently had views of both where we set off from this morning, and Siena. It really is beautiful countryside. By this time it was 9:30 and already too hot. It went up to 38 degrees today. It’s 8:40pm right now and it’s still 35 degrees (we had a thunderstorm this afternoon and the temperature went down (more on that later), but its back up now).

There was endless climbing today, a total of 829 meters, basically from km 5.4 to 19.5 (ie, to the end). There were also no stores at all along the entire way today getting here. The weather stations are telling people not to exert themselves for more than 15 minutes per hour in this heat, and to drink .75 litres of water per hour. We arrived at our B&B at 12:50pm, virtually 4 hours of strenuous walking, and 2 hours of standing around reading route notes). We never sat down once. We should have gone through 4.5 litres of water each, which we would have had to carry from the start. We started out with 4.5 litres between the two of us. The worst part is that getting to our B&B from km 18.5 we went past the medieval city of Castiglione d’Orcia, we walked through the new section of that city, and then walked to the ancient city of Rocca d’Orcia where we are staying tonight, without passing a single bar/restaurant or store that was open, and when we got here, the sole restaurant was closed until 5pm.

I was about to sit down and cry when a lady poked her head out of a house across from the ancient well in the middle of the piazza, 

and waved me over and called Martha, the owner of the B&B, to tell her we were here. I asked to speak to Martha, who thankfully spoke English, and she said the lady who makes up the room was coming over in 30 minutes. I asked her if the lady coming could bring us a 1.5 litre bottle of cold water. She said she had no big bottles but the lady would bring two small bottles.

At this point I was totally exhausted and parched. From about 8:30 on all our water was hot, and it just doesn’t do anything to cool your body down. The idea of walking anywhere (where?) to get water at this point was out of the question. As usual, this town was a series of very steep hills.

When Elizabeth got here with the key and two 750 ml bottles of cold water, she called Martha, who I wanted to talk to again, as well. About 5 minutes after Elizabeth arrived, Russell and I had drank all the cold water, and I for one felt almost semi human again. We got the low down on supper, there is no wifi, and breakfast. I also asked where there was a store or bar we could get lunch and more water. Elizabeth ended up walking us to the only bar/restaurant open in the area, and showed us where the stores were, which would open again at 5pm. We had a lovely pear/walnut salad for lunch and a gelato. After eating we asked if we could buy a bottle of wine to take away, and the waitress asked if vino del casa was okay, and we said sure. She then rinsed out a 1 litre Schweppes bottle and filled it with wine from a bag in a box. Total cost about 3 euros. You’d never see that in Canada! What’s left can go in an empty water bottle and come with us to the next B&B!

Tomorrow is 28km, with a forecast of 39 degrees again. There is no shade along the route, and the only place you get a buy a drink is at km 10. There is an uphill gap of 800-900 meters, and a very steep climb at the end. We would be walking well into the afternoon to cover that distance with no cold water and no shade. This is not possible in this kind of heat. The way the other pilgrims are handling this heat is to cut way down on the day’s mileage, take days off, or go home and come back in September. We can’t take advantage of any of those options, because all our hotels are booked.

So I called Beppe and asked if we could get a ride the whole way with the baggage transfer taxi tomorrow. I need a day off. We are staying in a really fancy place tomorrow, and it has a pool! Hurray. Actually where we stay for the next two days have a pool!

The place tomorrow is an agritourism place, which I expect to be out of the city, and dinner is not included (not sure how much sense that makes). We have an apartment. They have a fancy restaurant, but I think we will go to the grocery store here tomorrow morning and get stuff to make our own dinner. We also plan to go to the fortress here, visit all the churches, and visit the medieval city of Castiglione d’Orcia. It is really beautiful here. That will give us a walk for the day with a good climb.

We had a big thunderstorm here at 4:30pm today. There was a big wind blowing in our direction so I opened the window wide, opened the door to our room, and opened the door to the B&B to let the cool air flow through the whole place. Our room got wet with rain, but I kept mopping it up with paper towels and wringing them out the window. The temperature managed to get down to 28 degrees during the storm! It’s the best I’ve felt in days.  It’s totally unrealistic to expect the air conditioners in these rooms, which probably have never been serviced and only have half the Freon they should have, to cool the room down enough to make it tolerable in here.

Beppe said that on Saturday the temperature is forecast to drop 8 degrees. I just want the afternoon temperature to at least be below body temperature. When it’s warmer than body temperature you just have no way of cooling off – your sweat doesn’t cool you off by evaporation. I really hope the heat wave subsides, so we can enjoy the last week of our journey into Rome.