Leaving Italy via Ancona

 We moved by taxi/bus/train and shank's pony to our overnight stop in Ancona. An appropriate link as Randall recalled that his father, who would have turned 100 today, had also stopped overnight in Ancona in May 1945 as he was on his way to be repatriated to England, after spending most of his war time in Austria. And now we are heading to Greece where Randall's father had been part of yet another piece of political misjudgement. We will go over part of the area in Greece where the Allies were routed and quite close to where many Australians and Roy Kingsley were captured. Learning ancient and modern history as we go along.

Perhaps a little surprising for us but we have found that during our few days here, the Italians seem to be very relaxed and at ease with the world. Almost everyone is friendly and helpful when required. Stress levels seem very low indeed.

 

As a port city Ancona has its less attractive parts but we did enjoy a Sunday promenade along a very attractive main street, a wander through a large antique fair and a couple of rest stops for a drink and our evening meal.

On these trips I sometimes wonder why we travel this way with an almost constant need to figure out and then operate the various connections and bookings. The Web is a great thing and a boon for people like us with loads of useful information. But there is always the small stress of the unknown that raises the blood pressure just a tad as the time draws near for the next step in the travel plan to actually happen.

But we like it this way and we like the idea of spreading our spending locally as we go along. And for the first time, this trip we are stopping three nights where we used to work with two.

We could rationalise that by taking three days at a time, we get to know places better and we argue that in new places it takes about 24 hours to get a reasonable feel of the city/town.

But perhaps the hard reality is that maybe we ARE getting a bit older and slightly slower. Just kidding, plenty of life left in us yet.

That is it from Italy for now. Chow!!! (or do you have to say Ciao?) Looking forward to crossing the Adriatic tomorrow.