Day 69: Stage 56: Vetralla, 18 km, Sun, 22°

The Etruscans Were Here First!

I put these photos from the restaurant yesterday into my blog because we had a couple of great meals there. They were pretty accommodating and we had lunch with a nice pasta meal and last night I had a nice chicken dish with potatoes and a fresh salad. At lunch yesterday there was a great Belgian beer available that we shared. The place is right across from our hotel window, and in spite of our best efforts there was almost nothing open in town during the day or evening last night. So many places are closed on Monday. 

Today was a fairly short stage, but we were up and away in decent time. We crossed through the main piazza where the film was being made yesterday.. They had part of it open to allow early morning traffic through.

The VF took us right back out to the Duomo and the Popes palace that I visited yesterday.

As a matter of fact, we walked right underneath it and down a set of stairs and almost directly out of town. We were quite surprised that we managed to get ourselves to the edge of town without having breakfast!



So we headed out the gate in the impressive walls still in search of breakfast.

As we came out the gate we saw where all the extras and actors were being fed and readied for a day of filming. Right across the street was a familiar sight. We started to walk past, but had second thoughts about the likelihood of finding a place to get breakfast. A quick about face and before we knew it…well you get the picture.🫤

We shared a good laugh and Rob seemed pretty happy with his coffee this morning.

Day 9: Rob…coffee. 

One of the real highlights of today’s walk came very early in the stage. We arrived at the Etruscan Vie Cave which translates to ‘excavated roads’. As I’ve said, we are in a major volcanic region of Italy and there is a very deep layer of tufta from the volcanic explosions spread out over the surface of this region. There’s apparently no clear understanding of why these roads are cut so deep into the hillsides (>12 m deep), but it has been theorized that they had to make the paths deeper and deeper as the wheels from the wagons cut into the soft material. In other words they had to resurface time to time by repeatedly cutting down deeper into the tufta. The Etruscan people were in Italy 600-800 years before the Romans dominated the region. About 800 BC! They were here first, or depending on how one looks at these things, next. 



















In 2009 my daughter Erin and I spent a month in Turkey together. Part of that travel involved spending five or six days trekking through Cappadocia which has it’s almost exactly the same tufta piled on the surface. In that situation civilizations had tunnelled down through the tufta and made whole cities including elaborate churches. Quite the exceptional location! 



One of the things I tried to say in the blog yesterday before I had technical difficulties was that we made it into town just before massive thunderstorms came through. The residual effects from that storm were evident on the trail in many places today with huge puddles we were forced to navigate around, and of course there was mud in places.







We found ourselves walking through a massive of all of grooves. Period the farmers were beginning to lay out the nets to catch the olives which I assumed harvested in the next month or two.











One of the local residents lived along the VF and has gone to great lengths to set up a rest station for the pilgrims complete with a stamp for credentials. We were really pleased to get one because we haven’t found a place to get a stamp since arriving in town.



You might notice that these signs now have a 100 on the right hand side. I believe this signifies the final hundred kilometres into Rome. As per my guide we have 95 km left to travel. Four more stages!

Arriving at our destination at around noon today.

We couldn’t get into our place until 1430 PM so we entertained ourselves by first enjoying a very long Tuesday market and then finding a place to have a light lunch.





Amusing ourselves while we wait for our accommodation to open reception. We had found a grocery store to stock up on a few things, including food for our longer walks over the next three days. It seems that we have developed a taste for potato chips of late!

Yes, once again we are only 5 years old!😂

Finally admitted into our accommodation we were surprised to find out that we’ve been provided with a small apartment with cooking facilities. So it was back out on the road headed in the direction of the grocery store. We now have a supply of food available to us to make a nice dinner tonight which will allow us to avoid the walk and climb into town to find a restaurant. We are a little way out of town. Tomorrow our holiday walk sort of is a bit subdued as we will walk around 25 km. Not a super long way, but longer than we’ve done the last three days. I’m thinking that Rob is over the jet lag and ready to stretch his legs. The weather looks good and hopefully it’ll be smooth sailing all the way into Rome! 🤞 

Blogger at work!🙂