Joanne's long walks: Road to Home 2023 Day 82: Medesano

When you are moving towards an objective, it is very important to pay attention to the road. It is the road that teaches us the best way to get there, and the road enriches us as we walk its length.

- Paulo Coehlo, The Pilgrimage

We left the hostel in Medesano before dawn and immediately found ourselves on a perfectly flat cycling track beside the main road, which we followed the all the way into Felegara, rather than the pedestrian route of the Via Francigena, which climbs unnecessarily up into the hills and back down again. In Felegara a couple out for a walk warned us that the footbridge was out on the regular Via Francigena pedestrian route just after the town, and told us we should continue straight on at the roundabout, follow the road to the end and take a pedestrian underpass beneath the motorway. The underpass is marked as Via Francigena, but you don't see the signs until you are almost there; it looks as though you are walking toward a dead end!

After the underpass we found ourselves once again on the regular track of the Via Francigena, on a footpath through the trees beside the river Taro. We actually followed the footpath too far, missed a turning and ended up on the wrong side of a cement plant 😆. After backtracking for about 500 metres we got onto the right side of the gigantic cement plant and managed to make our way around it to the bridge over the river Taro.

After crossing the bridge in the pedestrian and bicycle lane, we descended a staircase to a supermarket parking lot and stopped in to stock up on provisions for the next couple of days, as grocery stores will be scarce in the mountains! We then walked into the centre of Fornovo to take a look around and have lunch.

Fornovo

Fornovo, from the Latin forum novum, is located at the confluence of three rivers, the Taro, the Ceno and the Sporzana, and has always been an important stopping point on the Via Francigena before heading into the Appennines.

The church of Fornovo, Pieve dell'Assunzione di Maria Vergine, is one of the oldest churches in the diocese of Parma, first mentioned in historical records in the year 854 and most likely built over the foundations of a former Roman temple of Mercury. The present church dates back to the 11th century, and originally had an arcade in front of it to provide pilgrims with a sheltered place to sleep. 18th-century Baroque additions were removed during a restoration project conducted between 1927 and 1942, restoring the simple beauty of the 11th-century Romanesque church, though most of the original façade has been lost. Parts of a 13th-century sculpted pulpit which had been taken apart have now been mounted on the façade, including a wrestling match and scary depiction of the tortures of hell.

A now-headless pilgrim beside the door of the church, identifiable as such by the keys on his belt, symbols of Saint Peter, indicates the way to Rome.

Photograph sneakily taken from behind a column

We walked round the church interior as quietly and stealthily as possible, because it is open for the adoration of the Eucharist every Thursday and there were lots of people praying. Then we got our pilgrim credentials stamped at the tourist office next door and sat down in a café for a drink and something to eat, as there will be no more food sources until Cassio - tomorrow evening. The local specialties in this part of the country are heavy on the meat, especially cured meats, but the café also served branzino (sea bass) with polenta - an unusual combination! 😄

This should get me up the pass!

They don't seem to eat vegetables at all around here. I bought a carrot, hummus and fruit for this evening and tomorrow's lunch - as well as a pouch of instant oatmeal and a bag of dragée chocolates 😋. The only kind that don't melt in the sun!

Laden down with all this food - in my stomach and in my backpack - I set off for the final 5 kilometres of the day, climbing a series of hairpin bends on a paved road high above Fornovo.

We paused at a rest stop with a drinking fountain and a couple of chairs that someone had thoughtfully installed beside the road at the top of the hill in Caselle. Then we continued down Via della Massona, an ancient road joining the valley of the Taro river and the town of Fornovo with the Val Sporzana, valley of one of the three rivers that converge in Fornovo. There was once a pilgrim hostel kept by the Knights Templar on this site, and someone has carved a Knight Templar of wood to watch over modern-day pilgrims passing by on the road to Rome!

We descended into this pleasant valley, where we turned onto a not-so-pleasant road with speeding traffic... but only for a few kilometres, to reach our destination for the evening, Agriturismo Casa delle Viole in Roncolungo, just before Sivizzano. Sivizzano's parish pilgrim hostel closes for the season on October 1st, and so our only options were to stop here or walk another 13 kilometres to Cassio: a bit too far for one day!

Our apartment at Casa delle Viole is charming, and it's nice to have such a big place all to ourselves after sharing the rather cramped quarters of the pilgrim hostel in Medesano with three other walkers last night!

Our apartment is only a small part of this huge house, where the owners themselves live and there are also a number of refugees of various nationalities, whose colourful clothes are hanging out to dry on the line next to our few bits of pilgrim laundry! One of them showed us to our accommodation so we have not yet met our hostess, the mistress of the house.