Friday 10 July 2009

Esplorazione For Beginners Pt4

The First morning dawned clear and bright, two minutes was all it took to gather these Cherries from a tree outside the door and life was sweet. Literally La Dolce Vita, the sweet life.

The mists over the hills cleared and the temperature rapidly rose to 24C, hot enough when every step forwards is also a step up. Looking out over the narrow valley i could see that ours wasn't the only super steep hillside. All the way along the valley the hillsides are so steep and heavily wooded that possible shots would either have to be either well inside 50 yards or you'd be shooting over to the next hillside at something over 500 yards. The internets army of whitetail hunters all advise finding the game trails but taking great care not to walk on them. On this terrain everything that has to walk is walking on the same slithers of land. Goats (domesticated), Boar, Deer and porcupines all share the available opportunities for perambulation.

During one of our many trips to the car to collect household goods we were invited to visit the nearest farm where through our broken Italian (OK broken is the wrong word - it implies that it worked at one time). We found out that the matriarch of the nearest farm had recently been forced to take refuge in a chicken coop as a wolf had shown up looking for a chicken ready meal, and finding the menu extended he thought he'd eat her from the specials board. Yikes!

The surprise news was that a Hydro Road had been cut through the bottom of the valley, basically a very big pipe has been buried under the road you can see above, it runs down hill to a building the size of a double garage, where a small plant generates the local electricity supply. I wanted to go to another local plant where they have guided tours, but as you'll see that wasn't to be.


More Soon
Your Pal
SBW