Okay so Paris, London, and Scotland will still have to wait. I want to tell you of Italy.
We arrived yesterday. Today we’ve rested and slept….and worked. Tomorrow night we feast on Pizza and wine in Italy!!! Go into the circle of town and sightsee to our hearts content.
Our place is up the mountain halfway. So. After 36 hours of a bus ride we staggered up half a mountain with suitcases. Who needs a gym?!!! Just luggage 40 pounds up a mountains side on a rough road just hoping that the suitcases do not break down. Thankfully our suitcases are still intact.
Florence is beautiful. However, it’s the mountains I love. Buildings as impressive and grand as they are and I truly do mean that, can not compare to the majestic of mountains. I’ve had my first taste of the Alps in wee morning of dawn. There are no words, no photographs can ever truly capture the beauty. It’s hopeless. It’s just something you have to see for yourselves. If beauty can drown me it was the mountains that did it. I lost precious sleep because I could not stop looking at the mountains. My phone died on me and my cameras would be no good. My heart screamed at the opportunity lost. In fact my heart has done a lot of screaming of late. Moments priceless moments lost because it snuck up unawares. I was too caught up to photograph…but perhaps that isn’t such a bad thing. To be in the moment not always behind the camera. So perhaps moments such as the alps can only really be seen through words, by closing my eyes remembering the awe. It is rare that I am moved so. That something so beautiful can not be describe no matter hard you try. Though try I must.
It was nearly dawn just moments before. I had finally drifted to sleep. The bus shuddered and came to abrupt stop. I was yanked forward by my seatbelt out of being startled. Then my breath caught somewhere between my heart and throat.
Towering, looming, cascading in authority and covered at the top with snow an Alp stood hiding the peaking colors of a sunrise. In the dimness I could barely make it out, but I knew what it was. The legends of the Alps have been passed down to me. I never understood until just then what drew men to the wild. Now I know.
I will return. Somehow. Someway. I’ll return to the mountains. Photograph as well as I can its startling beauty.