Our journey as Pelligrini on the Via Francigena has finished and at the moment we are tired, a little sore but exhilarated. Would we do it again? Yes, we hope so, after all there are hundreds of kilometres more to choose from. It hasn't been the peaceful and spiritual experience I was anticipating but we put that down to the weather and its effects. The sense of achievement on a daily basis was very rewarding. There had been doubts that I could actually do this walk. I was the slowest walker amongst the twenty or so we saw daily but we did cover the route in seven to eight hours each day (including photo stops, rest and food breaks).
Some random comments:
Our new non broken-in hiking shoes performed incredibly well. We both only had one small blister and a bit of taping overcame that. Will they ever look clean again? Who cares, they have walked part of the Via Francigena.
Our credenziale has some stamps to remind us of good times, we acquired two pellegrini souvenir tokens to add to our backpacks and lots of photos.
One surprise was the lack of seating along the way, we only saw two, which meant actually eating our snacks sometimes didn't happen. The ground was always too wet to sit down But those wonderful breakfasts at all the accommodations set us up well for the day.
We often said that the evening dinners were the reward for the walking we had done all day. Tuscan food is amazing and we feel that we experienced some of the best.
RAW Travel in Melbourne and S-Cape Travel in Florence, what a team and thanks for your extra support when we needed it.
We had a first this morning, we took a taxi to the train station as we'd had enough walking for a day or two. Waiting on platform 1 in Siena we heard 'Oi, Australia!' and there across the tracks were our English friends. Ah, the exuberance of youth.
From Siena to Chiusi, then on to Rome, and now we are back at our usual hotel.
That's great!
ReplyDeleteSo happy for you guys, good on ya!
Keep going!