Continuing our epic Euro-travels of 2012/13 we have just celebrated, rather enthusiastically, the 12 month mark of what started out as a fixed 'one year working holiday'.. enthusiastic, perhaps as it culminated in my throwing in my longstanding job back home and deciding I wasn't ready to go back; not literally nor figuratively, at least not yet anyway! Rather than a whimsical act of defiance after a few too many champagnes, this was more a gradual, somewhat inevitable decision and one that was not taken lightly... but as for so many of the wanderlust inclined, this journey has become so much more than the destination.. and there are only so many self-fulfilling prophecies I can google and then filter photos of on instagram to make me realise what I knew all along.. that if you are in love with cities you've never been and with people you've never met (as well as your new husband who wasn't going home either ;) then in the end you will only regret the chances you didn't take. So here I am... hoping the Pound Sterling currency picks up soon!
Having just booked a birthday weekend in Venice followed by a week in Morocco to buoy the spirits (but not the bank balance) I've been back on the travel research trail much helped by a nifty little flight planning tool called Skyscanner. With a pervasive theme of lack of time but not material for travel blogging, I was reminded of a small update I wrote about my first trip to Italy which took place over a couple of weeks towards the end of 2006. While one day might see me catch up on documenting details of last year's Italian adventures to the Cinque Terre, Amalfi coast, our drop in over the border for lunch from snowboarding in the French Alps and more recently a blissful week in Lake Como with plans towards another lake visit, further Italian Riviera travels not to omit the opportunity to languish under a Tuscan sun in the wine country before the summer is out.. until then, this wintry Venice/Florence/Rome city soujourn from oh-so-many years ago may have to suffice!
This story was preceded by my first Moroccan blog entry which for the sake of
chronology might be worth a re-visit. That said, Italy's retrospective was written from the depths of the Canadian Rocky Mountains in winter and is probably no more out of place than many of these ambling rambling nomadic tales...
❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄
Writing to you all on Sunday night from our wood cabin (read 5 bedroom house) in the Canadian Rockie Mountains, British Columbia where my journey has come to an eventual and much needed stand still. The surrounds of a white winter wonderland is like some kind of magical ginger bread/icing fairytale and seems worlds away from the Africa of 2 weeks ago and everything else in between.
Its just gone opening weekend at Fernie Alpine Resort and a base of the mountain retail job is in the midst of the action. One week on the job, 2 managers have quit, and some kind of elevated seniority has allowed me to swing best mate, georgie, a job at the shop- which is totally sweet! A week of "PK" product knowledge training sees us ambitiously preparing to sell a tonne of expensive ski and snowboard gear- the added commission of which is necessary to supplement a base wage of 8 dollars an hour to see us through a long winter. If this weekend is any indication, the hectic holiday season seems to bring with it a whole bunch of careless tourists with money; cries of "i forgot my pants/goggles etc." followed by "... they'll do " hopefully means we wont be too strapped for cash.
The last week has seen a decided shift towards more 'drinking' and less 'thinking' and an emerging struggle to fit a 40 hour week in between more important priorities of shredding the slopes and sitting in the hot tub. A reminder of my self-imposed social obligation to provide detailed travel reports came in the form of a lowly shoe squashed into a cardboard box and sent from Morocco that somehow managed to find its way to Elk View Drive.
I saw this shoe as a sign to provide the folks back home some closure on my European travels with a final installment. If not completed soon, i feared this this lapse would leave a legacy of unfinished work more notable than any prior accomplishments. Perhaps not unlike DaVinci's "Battle of Anghiari" horse sketches or Michaelangelo's life work of 4 slave sculptures, ambitiously destined for the Vatican and Pope Julius' tomb but unfinished in Galleria de Academia in Florence to this day. But not to confuse my own humble work with the ranks of genius; a pervasive theme as i continued something of a postgraduate diploma and followed the history of Italian painting from the Florence and Tuscan schools of the 13th Centuries to the Renaissance, also Flemish, German and Spanish masters, Classical sculpture and beyond.
Leaving the camel in Morocco, we upgraded to more modernised modes of transportation in all forms of planes, trains, and automobiles venturing trans-continental from Africa, back to Spain and onto Italy in the space of 24 hours. We started in Venice, lugging our body weight in lamps and teas sets on and off Vaporetto canal ferries and along cobbled streets. A broken strap on my Louis Vuitton travel bag was a quick lesson that a cheap imitatiton is probably not as hard wearing as the real thing, a sentiment also expressed on the disapproving faces of the high class Italian ferry-goers with their designer umbrellas and Versace gum boots. Amidst taking in the Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Murano glass masters and Venetian mask shops, a visit to the world's first Casino and oldest gaming house to check out the setting of Giacomo Casanova's elegant romantic exploits and to be intimidated by an elitist atmosphere of a small room of men in suits that required a photo membership on admission.
Next stop was Florence, a slight deviation from our original itinerary to go and see a few big buildings, big galleries and big statues- including the Duomo (the dominant city cathedral) and some guy named David. Michaelangelo's statue of triumphant, illuminous divinity and symbol of civil virtue was well worth the visit (1 million people every year also agree). Considered the most beautiful statue in the world, David's perfect form is the ideal of art and (?)generous in its depiction of the young son of a poor shepherd; the biblical hero who is said to have defeated the giant Philistine soldier Goliath. We spent a day in the Uffizzi Gallery immersed in the Italian renaissance and staring at works by Bellini, Titian, Tintoretto, Caravaggio including Botticelli's "The Birth of Venus" and Raphael's aptly named "Portrait of a Young Man with an Apple". A special exhibition on Leonardo DaVinci: The Mind of a Genius was an amazing insight into the bold theoretical syntheses and inventive experiments that sought to assimilate the universal principles that govern all mankind. Complex studies in anatomy, optics, mechanics, hydraulics, geometry, the flight of birds, engineering, geology and cartography were represented- the interpretation of which is now all but lost on me besides the vague uncertainty as to whether the The Golden Section or Divine Proportion 1:0.618 as a law of order and proportion in nature has any impact on the ideal degree of side-cut radius and subsequent carving diameter of my snowboard.
A few gelatis and a leather jacket later we caught the train to Rome where we were to witness more painting and sculpture on a overwhelmingly grander scale- the likes of The Vatican and St Peter's Cathedral. 5 hours in The Vatican was probably enough for one visit. Its physical and spiritual heart, The Sistine Chapel, was just as awe-inspiring as imagined in its visual depiction of the biblical history of salvation. It was fascinating to learn that Michelangelo was a moody and solitary figure who accepted The Last Judgement wall and ceiling frescoes commission somewhat reluctantly, preferring to think of himself more as a man of sculpture. Cut to his famous 'San Pietro' marble sculpture in the Cathedral completed when he was only 25 and you might begin to understand why. In completing the Sistine Chapel, he dismissed all of his assistants, deeming them incompetent, and painted the entire ceiling single-handedly while being pushed to his physical and emotional limits.
Armed with a guide book that was 8 years old, it was comforting to know that nothing much changes in ancient Rome in the large part of a decade and the Colosseum, Palatino, Pantheon and lots of other significant sites were either still standing or still in ruins. From the origins of Romulus and Remus and the she-wolf, Sabine women, Republic era and reign of Julius Caesar to the early empire, Decline and Fall, Dark Ages, Renaissance and into the 20th Century there was certainly a lot to be learnt... and then forgotten if it weren't for a detailed journal.
Negotiating the complex postal and metro system was something of an exercise in beaurecratic red tape, but we did manage to avoid the notorious pickpockets while continuing to successfully misplace more of our own belongings at a similar rate. Feeling a little pushed to my own physical and emotional limits after one month on the go it is most comforting to have a base, an emerging routine.... and my shoe back. Having written enough for one evening (and a small lifetime over the last month) my brain might be taking a bit of a break for a while, relieving your inboxes from verbose spam lest a sudden desire emerges to wax lyrical on the various dimensions and ventilating features of snowsport helmets.
Love to all Sarah xox
This story was preceded by my first Moroccan blog entry which for the sake of
chronology might be worth a re-visit. That said, Italy's retrospective was written from the depths of the Canadian Rocky Mountains in winter and is probably no more out of place than many of these ambling rambling nomadic tales...
❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄❄
Writing to you all on Sunday night from our wood cabin (read 5 bedroom house) in the Canadian Rockie Mountains, British Columbia where my journey has come to an eventual and much needed stand still. The surrounds of a white winter wonderland is like some kind of magical ginger bread/icing fairytale and seems worlds away from the Africa of 2 weeks ago and everything else in between.
Its just gone opening weekend at Fernie Alpine Resort and a base of the mountain retail job is in the midst of the action. One week on the job, 2 managers have quit, and some kind of elevated seniority has allowed me to swing best mate, georgie, a job at the shop- which is totally sweet! A week of "PK" product knowledge training sees us ambitiously preparing to sell a tonne of expensive ski and snowboard gear- the added commission of which is necessary to supplement a base wage of 8 dollars an hour to see us through a long winter. If this weekend is any indication, the hectic holiday season seems to bring with it a whole bunch of careless tourists with money; cries of "i forgot my pants/goggles etc." followed by "... they'll do " hopefully means we wont be too strapped for cash.
The last week has seen a decided shift towards more 'drinking' and less 'thinking' and an emerging struggle to fit a 40 hour week in between more important priorities of shredding the slopes and sitting in the hot tub. A reminder of my self-imposed social obligation to provide detailed travel reports came in the form of a lowly shoe squashed into a cardboard box and sent from Morocco that somehow managed to find its way to Elk View Drive.
I saw this shoe as a sign to provide the folks back home some closure on my European travels with a final installment. If not completed soon, i feared this this lapse would leave a legacy of unfinished work more notable than any prior accomplishments. Perhaps not unlike DaVinci's "Battle of Anghiari" horse sketches or Michaelangelo's life work of 4 slave sculptures, ambitiously destined for the Vatican and Pope Julius' tomb but unfinished in Galleria de Academia in Florence to this day. But not to confuse my own humble work with the ranks of genius; a pervasive theme as i continued something of a postgraduate diploma and followed the history of Italian painting from the Florence and Tuscan schools of the 13th Centuries to the Renaissance, also Flemish, German and Spanish masters, Classical sculpture and beyond.
Leaving the camel in Morocco, we upgraded to more modernised modes of transportation in all forms of planes, trains, and automobiles venturing trans-continental from Africa, back to Spain and onto Italy in the space of 24 hours. We started in Venice, lugging our body weight in lamps and teas sets on and off Vaporetto canal ferries and along cobbled streets. A broken strap on my Louis Vuitton travel bag was a quick lesson that a cheap imitatiton is probably not as hard wearing as the real thing, a sentiment also expressed on the disapproving faces of the high class Italian ferry-goers with their designer umbrellas and Versace gum boots. Amidst taking in the Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Murano glass masters and Venetian mask shops, a visit to the world's first Casino and oldest gaming house to check out the setting of Giacomo Casanova's elegant romantic exploits and to be intimidated by an elitist atmosphere of a small room of men in suits that required a photo membership on admission.
Next stop was Florence, a slight deviation from our original itinerary to go and see a few big buildings, big galleries and big statues- including the Duomo (the dominant city cathedral) and some guy named David. Michaelangelo's statue of triumphant, illuminous divinity and symbol of civil virtue was well worth the visit (1 million people every year also agree). Considered the most beautiful statue in the world, David's perfect form is the ideal of art and (?)generous in its depiction of the young son of a poor shepherd; the biblical hero who is said to have defeated the giant Philistine soldier Goliath. We spent a day in the Uffizzi Gallery immersed in the Italian renaissance and staring at works by Bellini, Titian, Tintoretto, Caravaggio including Botticelli's "The Birth of Venus" and Raphael's aptly named "Portrait of a Young Man with an Apple". A special exhibition on Leonardo DaVinci: The Mind of a Genius was an amazing insight into the bold theoretical syntheses and inventive experiments that sought to assimilate the universal principles that govern all mankind. Complex studies in anatomy, optics, mechanics, hydraulics, geometry, the flight of birds, engineering, geology and cartography were represented- the interpretation of which is now all but lost on me besides the vague uncertainty as to whether the The Golden Section or Divine Proportion 1:0.618 as a law of order and proportion in nature has any impact on the ideal degree of side-cut radius and subsequent carving diameter of my snowboard.
A few gelatis and a leather jacket later we caught the train to Rome where we were to witness more painting and sculpture on a overwhelmingly grander scale- the likes of The Vatican and St Peter's Cathedral. 5 hours in The Vatican was probably enough for one visit. Its physical and spiritual heart, The Sistine Chapel, was just as awe-inspiring as imagined in its visual depiction of the biblical history of salvation. It was fascinating to learn that Michelangelo was a moody and solitary figure who accepted The Last Judgement wall and ceiling frescoes commission somewhat reluctantly, preferring to think of himself more as a man of sculpture. Cut to his famous 'San Pietro' marble sculpture in the Cathedral completed when he was only 25 and you might begin to understand why. In completing the Sistine Chapel, he dismissed all of his assistants, deeming them incompetent, and painted the entire ceiling single-handedly while being pushed to his physical and emotional limits.
Armed with a guide book that was 8 years old, it was comforting to know that nothing much changes in ancient Rome in the large part of a decade and the Colosseum, Palatino, Pantheon and lots of other significant sites were either still standing or still in ruins. From the origins of Romulus and Remus and the she-wolf, Sabine women, Republic era and reign of Julius Caesar to the early empire, Decline and Fall, Dark Ages, Renaissance and into the 20th Century there was certainly a lot to be learnt... and then forgotten if it weren't for a detailed journal.
Negotiating the complex postal and metro system was something of an exercise in beaurecratic red tape, but we did manage to avoid the notorious pickpockets while continuing to successfully misplace more of our own belongings at a similar rate. Feeling a little pushed to my own physical and emotional limits after one month on the go it is most comforting to have a base, an emerging routine.... and my shoe back. Having written enough for one evening (and a small lifetime over the last month) my brain might be taking a bit of a break for a while, relieving your inboxes from verbose spam lest a sudden desire emerges to wax lyrical on the various dimensions and ventilating features of snowsport helmets.
Love to all Sarah xox
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