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North Italy.
My time in this ridiculously beautiful region was a testament to the spontaneous, social nature of solo travel.
After the hectic events of Barcelona, I spent 4 nights relaxing in the countryside near Aix-en-Provence with Boriana and Margot, family friends with whom I'd also stayed in Paris. Aside from a driving tour of Marseille, a run through the countryside, and a nice Italian dinner out in Aix (a prequel to the Italian leg of my trip), I spent most of my time in the house, doing not much of anything. I knew that this would be the last time I had free accommodation on my trip, at least until the very last stop, so I really savored having my own room.
Bonding with their cat Mike made me miss my own cats back home, and believe me, I enjoyed doing nothing, but after a few days I started to feel cooped up again. I was ready to get back on the road, and head to Italy.
Mike and I
The bags
I left Aix-en-Provence last Sunday, bound for Milan, and it would end up being my longest travel day of the whole trip. I only took regional trains to save money on seat reservations, and after being on trains all morning, I had an hour and a half to kill in the French city of Nice in the early afternoon.
It's difficult to go out and shoot when I'm carrying ALL of my bags with me, but that day I embraced it, like an extra challenge. I didn't have enough time to get from the train station all the way to the old city, but I managed to see a lot of Nice and capture as much as I could in the short time I had. I'd been itching to get back out in the streets with my camera, so it was worth it.
I finally arrived in Milan, at the Ostello Bello Duomo hostel, at about 9:30 pm that day.
Nice Moments
Nice Moments
I only had one full day in the city, but my time in Milan was extremely prolific for street photography.
After Barcelona, where I didn't do much shooting, followed by my few days of rest in the French countryside, I yearned to get back out and shoot; I felt I had to get it out of my system. So I was eager to spend the whole day out exploring the streets of the city. I think for Milan, one day is the perfect amount of time to see everything interesting. There's only really the Duomo cathedral, the enclosed market nearby, and the park at the north of the city, and I'd imagine that if I had another full day, it would start to get boring. Maybe that's just me with a short attention span. I don't know. Even if the sights were limited, though, Milan had so much life to see. That's the beauty of street photography, it forces me to appreciate the beauty that exists on every little street corner, not just in the glamorous cathedrals or monuments.
Once I finally got back to the hostel, I felt released, like I'd gotten the art-making all out of my system. To date, that day was probably my most prolific street photography day in a city on this trip. I felt like I was completely focused and firing on all cylinders, and I took a whole bunch of photos I'm proud of. I included some images below, but for all of the photos from that day, you can of course find them on my Instagram.
That evening, the hostel was hosting a free walking tour of the city, and even though I'd spent all day walking around, I knew it would be a great way to meet some new people. Plus, with a proper tour guide, I got to see some more niche spots, my favorite of which was the exquisite marble statue of a hand flipping off the stock exchange. Then a free pasta dinner, free drinks, and a trivia night (we got second - a robbery) wrapped up my stay in Milan.
The Ostello Bello hostel crew
The next day, I packed my bags and hopped on a train to the small Italian town of Peschiera del Garda. My eventual goal for my time in Italy was to get to Venice, and then city-hop down to Rome. I figured a quick pit stop - like I did in Andorra a few weeks ago - would serve as a peaceful nature retreat. I wanted some time for a proper hike, in between the big cities.
The aquamarine waters of Lake Garda were quite a spectacle, and I wasn't expecting it to be so beautiful. There was a long path along the water, with white ship masts framing the mountains in the background, and it made for a great place for a run when I first arrived. The whole area reminded me a lot of Lausanne, on Lake Geneva in Switzerland, where I'd spent a couple months living when I was 14, and which I can accredit to giving me the idea of taking a travel gap year in the first place.
I was lucky, and even though the off season rendered the hostel common area kind of dead, on the first night I met a bunch of cool people who had also arrived that day, forming a pseudo friend group. After going out with them for gelato that evening (easily the best I've ever had - yet), we woke up the next day with the plan to rent bikes and take the bike path along the lake to a peninsula with a medieval town at the tip called Sirmione. It was a spectacular 35 kilometers all told, and we also got a tandem bike, which made things a lot funnier. The peninsula jutted out deep into Lake Garda, giving us a wide panoramic view of the water and the mountains at the end, though the lake was so large we couldn't see the other side. It was such a fun day out, and though it wasn't what I was expecting to do, things always have a way of working out. Taking things day by day and not getting too hung-up on plans lets spontaneous things like this become possible.
Peschiera del Garda
Sirmione
Tandem!
The reason I'd chosen Peschiera in the first place was because it was one of the only towns with a high-rated hostel in proximity to the mountains of northern Italy. My plan had been to take a bus trip from Peschiera, riding north along the lake to a town called Malcesine. Here, you could take a cable car up to the top of Monte Baldo and look out over the lake and the mountains; I think they're technically the Italian Alps, though I'm not sure where the Alps end and the Dolomites begin. Originally, I had wanted to do this the previous day, but the bike ride came up and I went with it. However, I convinced my friends to get up early and take the bus with me the next day.
It just so happened that the night after the bike ride - after an amazing pizza dinner at a restaurant in the town - while we were hanging out and playing pool in the hostel, we met another traveler named Harry who we quickly befriended, and it turned out he had a car. Perfect! As a joke, we bet on one of the games of pool: if we won, he'd drive us up to Malcesine, eliminating the need for a longer, slower, more expensive bus journey. He was happy to do it anyway, but when we narrowly beat him, it sealed the deal. The next day we all piled into Harry's old SUV - from England, so the wheel was on the wrong side - and took a roadtrip. With the trees and boats whizzing by, and sunlight sparkling on the surface of the lake, it was an idyllic drive. I also realized I really should learn how to drive a manual.
Once we got there and grabbed some lunch supplies at a supermarket, we found ourselves in a ridiculously long queue for the cable car. I guess everyone had the same idea as us, on this beautiful day. Standing in line, I was seriously doubting whether it was going to be worth it, and I felt guilty for dragging everyone out here, just to stand in line. Plus, I had a train to Venice to catch in the evening, which left at 7. I could have left later, except conveniently there was a train strike across Italy starting at 9pm that night and lasting 24 hours. Just my luck. So it was all a bit stressful.
Finally, when we emerged from the cable car at the top of the mountain and got our first look at the vista, it was all worth it. Pictures really don't do it justice, the views over Lake Garda were genuinely spectacular, and to do it all with people I'd known for less than 48 hours, people who I already felt really close to, made it so much more special. It was Harry's birthday the day before, so of course we bought him a tiramisu cake and celebrated at the top of the mountain. If not for my train later, I would have dozed off for hours up there on the grass. Time is relative, so even though the hour-long queue felt like forever, the 2 hours we spent up there flew by in an instant. It all worked out perfectly, and we made it back to the hostel just in time for my train.
Huge thanks to Bo, Harry, Malin, Ronja, and Lilias for making my time in Peschiera truly special!
The whip
Monte Baldo
Now, I'm in Venice.
It's been gray and cold here for the past day, and I've spent most of my time relaxing in the hostel, which has 7 floors and is by far the largest and most daunting hostel I've ever stayed at. It feels much less like a little community, part of what made the other hostels I've stayed at so special, and more like a large industrial hotel. Except, unlike a hotel, it still has the classic uncomfortable hostel beds with no curtains.
Peschiera was meant to be a relaxing, solitary nature retreat in between the nonstop action of Milan and Venice, but it ended up being full of its own adventures. Now, Venice seems a bit pale by comparison; it's smaller and more expensive than I thought it would be, and though it is very beautiful, it hasn't really been the action-packed city stay I had planned.
But that's okay!
It's a testament to the spontaneity of solo travel; meeting a good group of people can completely uproot and transform any original plans you may have had, and a small, unassuming town can house more stories and memories than a large famous city!
Lunch in Venice
That concludes my adventures in north Italy. I hope you're enjoying this blog so far! Now, the plan is to make my way down Italy, passing through Florence and some other cities, before ending up in Rome.
Mark
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