The country is the heart of a nation

 The country is the heart of a nation and the closer you get to the heart the stronger the pulse you feel.

Claire Bear gave us this book for Christmas called Coolcamping Europe which directed us into the mountains NE of Roma near Monte Vetfore. ……and we love it.

The waters clean, the airs clear, there are no shopping malls or Nigerians flogging off cheap watches and if you say “Parla ingles” they rush around the corner to get their daughter to interpret.

Tourism is both a blessing and a curse to a region because while it can bring wealth it invariably changes the culture.  As you leave behind the tourist traps and big cities so to do you leave the multicultural multi lingual influences and you start to see the true people. You as a tourist are no longer the purpose of their being. Their interaction with you is as one stranger to another.

The downside is that no one understands you; the shops close at 1pm and don’t open again till 4; the food range becomes more limiting and that now might mean anything within the next week. 

Looking across a panoramic view of wheat, olives, grazing and forestry I marvel that this land has feed, clothed and kept warm, generations for thousands of years and continues to do so today. Caesars have come and gone. Soldiers have fought and died on this land. Ownerships have been disputed, but as the heart loyally ticks in spite of its abuse so to does the land continue to satisfy the appetite of the population.

Michelangelo may have created some wonderful sculptures and paintings on ceilings but his talent has nothing to the living canvas of the country and its people. 

No comparison