Thursday 5 July 2012 - 5
countries in one day! Helo Ello.
Day 83 and 76 to go
Well that was a drive! We are
now happily parked up in Ello outside the family home of Ezio and Fabio after a
drive that took a hell of a lot of concentration on Paul’s part. He is now
resting as he has a headache from the stress.
Our day started out well. We
were awake and up by 8. I didn’t sleep too badly once I managed to turn the
brain off, however Paul slept very little as was expected. We had breakfast, a
croissant and a banana before we went for a walk into the main town of Lindau.
It took us about 20min to
walk to Lake Constance where we crossed the bridge onto a small island. We
wandered around the old town that was quaint and old and well serviced by
bakeries. We did a loop of the main area before returning over the bridge and
back to the van an hour and a half later.
We packed up the van and then
drove to the nearest petrol station for fuel which just happened to be opposite
the supermarket so we were able to fill up on things for lunch and dinner
before embarking on the next part, our drive into Switzerland to check out the
town Walendstat.
The drive was a picturesque
one with lots of green and snow capped mountains. It was very beautiful. Our
route took us from German borders into Austria, through part of Lichtenstein
before coming to the Swiss border where we had to buy a pass to drive on the
roads. With that sorted we were free to continue on our journey reaching
Walendstat by 11.00.
We parked up the first chance
we got and went for a brief wander seeing two bakeries and wondering if either
one was the one owned by Andi’s family where my cousin Belinda lived and worked
for the past 2 years.
We returned to the van and
found parking further down the road where we decided to have lunch. It was
lovely to just be able to stop even if briefly. We then continued to the lake
and found parking again. We wandered along the lake edge. There were plenty of
people there catching the sun. It was very beautiful and peaceful too. We could
have happily stayed on, but with Ello to reach today we had to return to the
van and on with the travels.
We only had a further 200km
to go but the GPS was saying it would take 3 ½ hours that indicated that it was
going to be a bit hairy and once we reached the mountains we certainly were in
for a ride. There were twists, turns, up, up ups and down, down, downs. There
were tunnels and areas of road that we could just navigate in this larger
vehicle. Signs indicated heights shorter that the van, but fortunately we
cleared them comfortably. The views were spectacular but Paul saw none of them,
his eyes firmly fixed on the road with both hands clutching the wheel. I yelled navigation instructions, hairpin
left, zig zags, wide bend, clear road, too far to the left. Oh damn there goes
the wing mirror. Well not quite but it did get a bashing a couple of times. All
we could do was watch the GPS countdown the time and the Kilometres.
However, it was all worth it
when Lake Como came into view and we began winding our way along its edge. Well
not really. We were still up the side of a mountain and driving through tunnels
inside it. Occasionally catching glimpses as one tunnel finished and another
began.
It was all beginning to look
familiar with signs pointing to Lecco, Bellagio and Oiggono and when we saw the
sign for Ello we both sighed with relief, pulling into Zero shortly after and
at 3.45pm.
Paul went straight for a beer
to calm himself down and then we made the journey up the hill to visit Luiga.
She asked us to move the van up next to the house so with some further
directing Paul navigated down the steep drive and then up the steeper drive
into the parking bay next to the house. Phew!
Luiga welcomed us in with
drinks and biscuits. We attempted communication but with our poor Italian and
her poor English it was a struggle but we managed. She told us Ezio would not
be home until 9pm. Bummer. We continued to sit for a bit. It was quite warm and
muggy. Luiga then showed us around the Ezio’s vege garden and Tino’s flower
show before we walked down to see Milena and her three children. Lucia, Lorenzo
and Francesco. When we were here in 2008 she only had Lucia and she was only
just walking.
The kids were busy having a
play in the paddling pool. We had a brief chat with Milena and laughed with the
kids before we returned to Luiga’s with her two kittens in tow. One is called
Gus.
Luiga rang Angelo for us to
let him know we were in Ello and then we went out to the van for a rest as we
were both feeling the effects of the long and taxing drive. Paul had a sleep
while I worked on the computer and read my book before also having a lay down.
The time disappeared very
quickly and at 8pm Ezio was at our door, home from work in Milan. We went
inside where Luigia had prepared dinner and we ate and chatted for a few hours,
catching up on all of the news.
Ezio’s girlfriend, Roberta,
joined us for dessert along with Milenna’s parents, Jani and Andrianna. We were
able to use Ezio and Roberta as interpreters as they both speak good English.
At 11pm we decided it was
time for bed, so we said our goodnights and retreated to our van for the night.
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