Oak and Bone

NOW BOARDING AT GATE 43

It was a sunny Wednesday in July and I had no set plans for the next four months. The following day I had a flight booked to Italy. I was leaving in three weeks.

Those three weeks were filled with feelings of mainly excitement, but also unease and apprehension about what the next four months would entail. I had two straight weeks of work in Italy for the beginning of the trip, then after that, my schedule was free.

I decided instead of coming home after the two weeks of work was wrapped up, I would continue travelling for another twelve weeks. A bit excessive? I figured I was already up in the Northern Hemisphere, why not stay for a while?

The night after my flights had been booked, I sat at the kitchen bench with a notepad and pen and started writing down all the names of friends who live in different parts of the world. Many friends who I hadn’t seen in years. France, Sweden, England and the USA were at the top of my list.

I looked at flights, I looked at buses, I looked at trains. I roughly planned out a route to fill the following months and began sending out messages.

Three weeks quickly passed and I was boarding my flight from Sydney to Rome.

I arrived in Rome at 5:30am and by 7:30am I was out in the balmy, humid Italian air.

I fumbled my way onto the train and towards my apartment just outside of Rome. It would be three days before I had company.

Over those three days I began each morning by blasting Stevie Wonder and Chuck Berry to keep me from falling back to sleep and to fill the silence that echoed through the huge apartment that felt far too big for just one person.

I met strangers at train stations and together we spent days exploring the cobblestone streets, the Vatican City, the vintage stores, and stopping every couple of hours to purchase icy cold drinks (providing some relief from the 42 degree days outside). We ate out in little Italian restaurants with over-flowing bowls of pasta and swapped stories from our different parts of the world.

Each afternoon I would stop by the little market beneath my apartment on my way home and pick up ingredients for dinner. Tomatoes, pasta, zucchinis, mushrooms, pesto and peaches became staples. The nights were hot and humid and I would fall asleep with the fan on full blast.

Three days passed and early on the Wednesday morning I met Christina at the central station in Rome. She had just arrived from a 30 hour journey from New Zealand but was as perky as ever. We hauled our suitcases into the nearest coffee shop, sat down and began planning our route down to the Amalfi Coast.

The following week on the coast jumping between different villages every 2-3 days was a chaotic, hilarious, humid whirlwind.

I have so many stories to tell. But I don’t even know where to begin. I feel like photos are better storytellers than I’ll ever be. So…

Arrival in Florence. Excerpt from my diary … “It’s 11am in Florence, the sun is beating down on the people walking along the hot pavement. I’m tucked away in the apartment with the window open and the fan on full blast. I arrived into Florence last night after catching the train with Christina from the little country village to here. Christina left early this morning to fly back to New Zealand. I’m editing photos from the previous two weeks and waiting on the arrival of Lai and her sister Kalia. They should arrive in about 20 minutes. I’m so excited for them to be here!”

Both Lai and her sister Kalia had both been travelling through Greece so when the doorbell rung, I ran down the stairs to let them in and was greeted with what can only be described as two bronzed goddesses waiting on my doorstep.

We brought their bags upstairs and swapped stories of our travels while cooling down over icy glasses of water. After an hour we grabbed our cameras and some euros for gelato and headed out into the streets.

Four days in Florence passed quickly and soon Lai and I were stepping onto a train bound for the Cinque Terre, my favourite part of the Italian coast.