 |
| Our new home – Lago d’Orta |
A train line runs alongside for most of the
way and the journey is brightened when a high-speed train overtakes and makes
you feel that your 80mph is more like 10mph.
Oh, and the other thing of course is keeping out of the way of Germans
heading home after their holidays at speeds which must be well in excess of
100mph.
After 250
miles we stopped for lunch and to let Buddy stretch his legs. He wasn’t interested in having a wander round
the Fido Park or even drinking any water and just lay down in the hot sun:
 |
We (I)
only got lost once and headed east instead of west when we had gone through
Milan, but it was noticed quickly and added only about three miles to the
journey so no impact really. I did get in
the wrong lane at a short stretch of toll road around Milan; not paying proper
attention I went through one of the ANPR lanes for those who have pre-paid
passes. After an embarrassed discussion
on the intercom (and probably a lot of impatient Italians in the queue behind
me) we were let through without a ticket and it was all sorted out
automatically when we went through the next toll.
The only
other thing of note, toll-wise, was that one booth wouldn’t take our cards and
swallowed our ticket, so we couldn’t start the payment process again. In the end we were presented with a long
sheet of paper basically requesting, we think, that we pay within 15 days or
get shot (our Italian is still not up to much).
Saying that we had been in Tuscany for a month
reminded me that we have obviously hit some sort of limit and our browsers
constantly ask if we want to translate English websites into Italian. I suppose it makes sense and I imagine the
limit is four weeks stay in a country and is no doubt controlled by browser
cookies.
One thing I always look out for when driving
are foreign vehicles and where they are from.
On the journey I saw my first ever Maltese (M) and Montenegran (MNE)
plated lorries. I know it sounds sad but
it helps pass the time 😉 There
were no other new plates to me but I did see two that I have only seen a couple
of times before: BIH (Bosnia & Herzegovena) and MK (Macedonia).
We arrived at the campsite at about three
o’clock and quickly got ourselves organised.
It’s a really pleasant site and as it’s a quiet time of year we managed
to get a pitch right on the edge, overlooking the lake and the village of
Pettenasco. Behind us, to the north we
can see the snow-covered peaks of the Alps, so we are in a most picturesque
place. Lago d’Orta is one of the smaller
lakes, just over eight miles long and is the farthest west. It is also the only lake whose exit river
heads north rather than south.
 |
Our spot overlooking the lake with the only island, Isola di San Giulio, to the left of the tree behind the car
There is a
small field next to us which has a single bull in it and it seems to like the
sound of its bell as every so often it has a little run around with much bell
clanging.
 |
| Bringing in the last two cows – the old lady in the distance is at the gate waiting to guide them in with a pushchair |
Talking about bells, the church strikes the
hour and half hour but, fortunately only between six in the morning and ten at
night. There is another church further
along the lake and that strikes the same times but is running about three
minutes later. If the bull next to us decides to
have a run around at the right time it can feel like the bells are pretty
constant. And then, if it's time for one of the many masses they seem to have then the bells start all over again. We had to laugh at about three
in the morning because the bull decided to have a run around and show off his bell for a while.
 |
| The church behind the campsite |
After being in the Tuscany house for a month
it was good to be back camping again as it’s more like the boating life we both
love. In fact, Karen reckoned she had
the best night’s sleep since we were camping on our way down 😊 We took
it easy on Saturday morning and took our time over breakfast and deciding what
to do for the day.
We had hoped to get a ferry over to the island
and maybe then across to the other side of the lake, but the website was saying
that from the middle of October the only services were now on a Sunday, so we
gave it a miss. Plan B was to walk down to Pettenasco which is a little town on
the lake and then have a walk along the shore.
We needed to get some wine and a few other heavy things and as the walk
back to the campsite is steep we took the car down and parked near the
supermarket before going for our walk, so plan C in effect.
When we got down there, Karen went for a run
and I took Buddy for a walk. Karen was
so happy to be running on level ground after the mountain roads and paths she
has been on recently. While we were going our separate ways I heard
a boat and assumed it was just a private boat but as it went past I saw it was a
ferry!
 |
A non-existent ferry in the distance
It was lovely and quiet as a lot of the villas
along the shore were shuttered up now the season is nearly over.
 |
| Cooling the feet after a visit to the bar |
When we got back to the campsite we had a rare
glimpse of the guy who seems to run the place so we went to settle up in case
we didn’t see him again. His card
machine wasn’t working so we had to pay by cash and we just had enough. As we were now extremely short of cash we
went out again to find the ATM at Orta san Guilio.
What a shock we got when we arrived at the
village which is on a promontory overlooking Isola di San Giulio. It seemed to consist of packed out coach and
car parks and there were people everywhere.
Our original plan A had been to
visit the place and walk around the promontory – we were lucky not to have
followed that plan, but at least we got a closer look at the island:
 |
| A closer view of Isola di San Giulio with the evening haze starting to gather over the lake |
No comments:
Post a Comment