At the end let it be Torino, Val di Susa, Moncenisio, Albertville …
… to take me to London!
I did not want to start off early, nut not even so late!
At four in the afternoon … luckily here it becomes dark around nine!
There is not one particular reason for this late departure, simply a sum of many things, which caused me to be still at home when Kwesha arrived from Zambia to start her path at the Faculty of Political Science of Milan, at that point I could not say bye and go … so between an advise and an ice-cram … I only started moving at four!
Heading towards Novara, the Novara route from Leganano I must have done it hundreds of times, it was my training circuit when I was coming back from work in the summer, getting the best roads to Novara first and Vercelli later, is not so easy … there are many variations … beltways … slip roads … it is not easy like in Africa where the road is one and only one …
The first thought I have since the beginning, and it grows when I cross the Ticino to enter Piemonte is that Italy is beautiful! Very green fields, paddy fields, irrigation canals, in style farms, migrating birds which are there in Africa too, small towns with a history clean and well kept … Italy we often forget has some exceptional places.
I pedal pretty well, it is hot but Sudan and Egypt have raised considerably my threshold of heat tolerance, I get a few roads wrong and after 77 kilometers, I arrive in San Germano Vercellese, at the very entrance a creek running fast crosses the road from left to right, with an extreme effort of fantasy and creativity the town has a twin town Saint German Laval in France!
When I see the ‘Albergo delle Miniere’, I decide to enter, the managers are Chinese, the daughter speaks Italian perfectly, she is crabby, sturdy, and tells me that they do not have a place where to keep the bicycle … even here? … that thieves have entered several times to steal the money from the slot machines … and they do not want to take this responsibility … but I have no intention to go somewhere else it is already eight … the father is more willing … they argue in Chinese because of me … I order a bottle of water and finish some snacks there for the aperitif … I order another water … and as I am drinking the father arrives with the keys and lets me put the bicycle in a place safer than many others where I slept in these two months … despite the daughter is pissed off she cannot be unpleasant for me because she suffers in front of the television to see Valentino Rossi struggle in seventh position …
So many mosquitoes, it takes me a while to remember that there is no malaria risk … as I devour a stuffed calzone a Roman residing here … who just told that he goes four times per month to Ukraine with pasta, cheese, and other Italian products … and comes back with something which cannot be said since he whispered it in the ear of his interlocutor … said: ‘This is a place of non-EU immigrant and gypsies … God where the hell are we going!’ … a young mother who had just made the small child cry because she forced him to have a cup instead of a cone … hugged the child full of attentions and cuddly and told him … ‘We are not gypsies are we? …’ and covered him in kisses … the calzone was perfect even though a pit deflated, but it went down the wrong way for a second …
I was a gypsy in these two months … but I did not dislike at all … another drunkard customer said ‘without the non-EU immigrant my nephew who is in primary school would have to go to Tronzano 8 km from here …’ …
Both in the pizzeria, and in the bar under the hotel there are many slot machines, what struck me was the young age of the players glued to the screen … it may be the crisis … but I think that many of these gambling addicts have been created by the machines … I do not think that a civil state should allow this games outside casinos …
Lastly I had forgotten the number 5 key of my room on the table of the pizzeria, one of the owners told me ‘why didn’t you come here to us that we are a bed and breakfast?’ … ‘but I did not see any poster!’ … ‘yes actually there is not …’ … could it be a bed and breakfast for clairvoyants?
Legnano N 45° 59.007’ E 8° 91.927’ – San Germano Vercellese N 45° 34.992’ E 8° 24.708’
77 km