Via Romea Germanica Day 105: Città della Pieve - Ficulle

Un paese vuol dire non essere soli, sapere che nella gente, nelle piante, nella terra c'è qualcosa di tua, che anche quando non ci sei resta ad aspettarti

(A village means knowing that you are not alone, that there's something in the people, in the plants, in the earth that is yours, something that waits for you even when you're not there)

- Cesare Pavese, La luna e il falò (1950), quoted on a wall in Ficulle

We prepared our own breakfast in the kitchen of the monastery guesthouse in Città della Pieve and then attended the morning service in the adjacent church. The nuns were all in attendance, so we wouldn't have been able to return the keys until Mass was over, whether or not we wanted to participate! At a quarter past eight we slipped the keys and our donation into the wheel beside the nuns' daily bread, which happened to be given to them this day at exactly the same time. Then we headed out of Città della Pieve, finding ourselves high above a sea of fog!

We descended gradually along a gravel road into the foggy depths of the Valdichiana, the long and rather narrow valley formed by the former course of the ancient river Clanis, beginning in the province of Arezzo and continuing for about 100 kilometres through the province of Siena and into the Umbrian provinces of Perugia and Terni. 

Just over three kilometres from Città della Pieve, we came to the 13th-century church of the Madonna degli Angeli, originally a monastery and pilgrim halt on the road to Rome.

Reaching the valley floor, we continued along a broad gravel road parallel to the high-speed railway line; we could hear the trains whizzing past, though we couldn't see them for the fog. Some way along this route, we came across a bench by the roadside, incongruously located in the middle of the woods. Naturally we sat down for a break! As we were preparing to go, I looked up the road to check that no-one was coming so that I could go behind a tree, and saw two pilgrims coming toward us! 

For the first time in two thousand kilometres on the Via Romea Germanica, finally, some other pilgrims walking to Rome!

Antonella and Walter live in Bergamo, and just started walking this morning from Città della Pieve. They have already booked their accommodations all the way through to Rome, and they mostly don't coincide with ours, but today they did. So we walked together for the rest of the day, exchanging stories about our experiences on pilgrimage walks. They are also cyclists, so they have that different perspective on long-distance people-powered travel as well.

It was good that we met some new walking companions to talk too, as the rest of the day's stage was not particularly interesting in terms of landscape or sights to see. There was a lot of walking on the roadside, mostly on the flat valley floor, until the final kilometres up a steep hill to Ficulle.

Ficulle way up on the top of the hill

Enjoying our reward at the top

Our landlord waiting for us at our lodgings

Our lodgings at Affittacamere Fratini in Ficulle were simple but sufficient, and our room came with a big sunny terrace where we put out our boots to air and our laundry to dry. As I was sitting out in the sunshine a zampognaro came by - a wandering bagpipe player. An ancient tradition which I hadn't seen for many years, until now! I threw him down a few euros from the balcony. Later on, we went to buy apples at the local mini-supermarket, and there he was - exchanging all the coins he had collected on his rounds for a crisp fifty euro bill!

The four of us wandered about the village of Ficulle (population 1550), exploring its picturesque and largely deserted streets. Another of those towns that deserves a lot more attention than it gets! Ficulle dates back to Etruscan times, but was particularly important to the Romans as an observation post over the Via Traiana or Trajan Way, a major road connecting Rome with northern Italy. Castrum Ficullensis was fortified in the Middle Ages, when it was the most important castle in the vicinity of Orvieto.

And that's where we will be tomorrow! Ultreya!

Città della Pieve - Ficulle 22.5 km