La vita chiede solo di essere vissuta.
Sii nel respiro per essere nel presente...
Per esserci.
Life asks only to be lived.
Be in your breath to be in the present moment...
To be there.
- Message for pilgrims, hanging from a tree branch in front of the Benedictine church just outside Valfabbrica
At breakfast in the courtyard of the hermitage of San Pietro in Vigneto, Luca, the other pilgrim who had stayed overnight, played the guitar and sang songs from Franco Zeffirelli's film Brother Sun, Sister Moon about the life of Saint Francis. After an emotional goodbye we left the ospitaliere behind at the hermitage and went our separate ways, Luca heading north toward Gubbio, while Flavia and I walked south to Valfabbrica. Today's stage was 23.5 km, a long way in such hot weather, but very green and scenic, winding through the hills around Lake Valfabbrica, a brand-new lake created this year when the dam for production of hydro-electric energy and regulation of the level of Lake Trasimeno became operational. On the way we crossed a few streams, and passed several agriturismi farm holiday places and a number of chapels, all closed and locked. We met a German couple walking for three days, from Gubbio to Assisi, with their dog, a rescue from Romania which cowered whenever I tried to pet him, and when I picked up my sticks. Who knows what the poor pup has been through! Further along the way we met two German ladies with large backpacks. But none of them are staying where we are, at the super-clean and comfortable pilgrim hostel in the medieval centre of the town of Valfabbrica, run by very friendly nuns, Casa Betania.
The nunnery turned out not to be as quiet as we would have expected. Right below our bedroom window was a pizzeria; when I saw it filling up I leaned out the window and asked the waiter to reserve us a table. But the pizzeria was not the source of the noise! On our way into town we had passed the local football stadium, and seen many people heading in its direction. Later in the evening, honking horns and shouting interrupted the nuns' vespers, and celebrating townspeople gathered outside the bar in the main square. One of the nuns explained to us that the town is divided into three districts, and they normally dispute a sort of palio, an archery contest I believe, every year, an event surrounded by celebrations of all kinds around which the social life of the village revolves. Frustrated at not being able to hold their traditional palio for two years, the townspeople had organised a series of football games in which the three districts played against one another, and this evening the winners were celebrating their victory!
Luckily they did not carry on until very late, and we were able to get a good night's sleep and rise early for our final day of walking.
Eremo di San Pietro in Vigneto - Valfabbrica 23.5 km
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