This morning I look out over the tops of a sea of hotels. I'm in Valleverde, part of a strip that includes and is called Cesenatico. Our (Galena and my), hotel is about 40 meters from the seashore, on that arm of the Mediterranean Sea that is known as the Adriatic Sea. We leave tomorrow for Rome. We will have been in this hotel, the Tridentum, 18 days by the time we leave tomorrow morning.
The weather has been wonderfully cooperative, each day bright and sunny, with cooling breezes, not at all hot for what I, a Southerner, would expect for a July at the beach. This hotel calls itself a 4-star and seems to meet that criterion though one wonders about the fact that it is used only during a 5-month season. This is true of probably 90 percent of the hotels, residences, villas and other rentals along this stretch of sea that extends from Ravenna to Rimini and is called the Adriatic Riviera. I ponder and calculate. Do these Italians (or whoever collectively is responsible) understand the lost economic potential of the literally billions of idle capital associated with these endeavors?
The Tridentum is a family owned enterprise, as it seems many along this coast are. Indeed, the whole area and its visitors seem to be what would be considered family oriented. Plenty of playgrounds, carnival rides, ice cream parlors (they are called by another name but remind this American of a Walgreen's soda fountain of another era, spotlessly clean, air conditioned and totally pleasing) and other kid-oriented venues. Not really my idea of the Riviera. Here I think of the French, of Cannes, even of my own Redneck Rivera with its wild parties, wet t-shirt contests, rocking sounds and general abundance of roaring decadence. So, in lieu of toplessness and thong bottoms and lithesome, youthful beauties I see housewives in more modest attire. Some bikinis but adorning more, shall we say, fulsome bodies. And nearby, the same stroller encounters a bambino sitting in a highchair at the dinner table in the restaurant. And a few older kids, an occasional 12 to 14 year old and looked after by even more fulsome senoras.
And I use senoras for a reason. Not surprisingly, this Italian retreat if full of Italians. And there are a few Germans. Surprisingly to me, there are no English speakers. And I mean, none. Well, Ricardo, the hotel proprietor speaks a little. But his wife Eugenia, his sister-in-law, his two daughters (I said the hotel was family owned and these four seem to do anything and everything except wait the tables and clean the rooms) speak none. My usually helpful mate Galena is of course no help in the language department in this place.
In the evenings I hear some English, but that comes from Olga. Olga, some may remember is my semi-adopted 24 year-old. She moved to this area some three years ago to be near her older sister, Julia, and to assist with the care of Julia's 12 year-old daughter, Elena. Being Kyivans, each bears witness to part of Ukraine's problem of diminishing population. Olga, a Ukraine university educated honors graduate some time ago successfully passed Italian training programs and is now working in a secretarial-type position. She has learned to drive an automobile (a rather expensive and arduous task in Italy) and now owns her own late-model Fiat. She - they - are Italian.
I've done little here save contemplate. Oh, we've visited a couple of small towns just off the coast. These living, working remnants from ancient times. These places with their narrow, winding streets, old wells in the center of town, some still used, others abandoned, but centuries-old storage areas still for review and contemplation of life in medieval or even renaissance times ... are interesting.
But mostly, I view the sea. This from my balcony. Viewing the banyas with their colorful umbrellas over white chaise lounges, the flags that tell of wind and water conditions and regulate the use of the rainbow of umbrellas. Beneath the umbrellas, the people, sun worshippers for a week or some relative brief time, packed together, side by side, close-in, sardine-like, at least to me. Then there is the pool below. Actually the pools, if one counts the rather huge Jacuzzi nearby. It is busy, active always too.
Me. I'm happy, I contemplate and cogitate.
Nearby, a 5-minute ride I'm told, is the Rubicon. Refreshing my memory of Julius Caesar, I Google. (Did I mention that this hotel has WiFi? My Xircom card works super. Unfortunately, the hotel's antenna is fixed in a manner that I have to occasionally move the laptop around the room. I finally found just the right spot. The computer has to sit on the bed, the top of the writing desk won't do. And just so it hangs on the bed. And in the evening when the sea breezes pick up for a couple of hours, two more inches to the right and a little more forward. These minor adjustments along with perfect jaw-set, only slight teeth-grit, and with the left foot angled, big toe slightly bent...well everything is damned near perfect.)
From Google I find that Ravenna was the place to which ol' Julius was banned from the triumvirate. It was his old post and was a part of then-Gaul just outside official Rome. The Rubicon was the outer boundary. So, it was Ravenna from whence Caesar plotted his return. From Ravenna, he left and made the fateful decision to cross the Rubicon and re-enter Rome, much more than a Kodak moment in history.
Cesenatico itself is historical. The principal canal that goes out to sea and from which working boats, a fishing fleet, leave today was designed by one Leonardo da Vinci, a person of some notoriety, I'm told.
Tomorrow, Rome. Why? Don't know, other than Galena wants to say she's been to Rome. Me, I've never been there either. But, I'd rather go when I had a week or more. Actually Rome isn't high on my list of places I've never been but want to visit. It's above Detroit, but somewhere below Tashkent, Baku and Tiblisi. But, when in Rome...what? Oh yeah, our small hotel is said to be just a few meters from an old church named after some saint.
And we visited Venice (Ven-eet-tsa). The highlight of which was the 80 euro gondola ride, negotiated down from 90 euro (still a fleecing). The gondolier reminded me of some New York cabbies I've met, just as talkative, but not nearly so entertaining or helpful. Memorably, while I was dutifully about to comply with the gondolier's instructions to kiss the other passenger as we were passing under what was termed "the famous romantic bridge', my mobile rang. Olha, my assistant in Kyiv, needed instruction.
So far a good trip. My little burnt-red Niva will have surpassed 5,000 kilometers by our return.
Late one dark night on a stretch of Austrian mountain road we meandered down to a small town and found that the only hotel in town was closed on Mondays. So that Monday, sans any knowledge of German, but having a thorough familiarity with Drunkspeak, we palavered with a few inebriates in a small bar and located a woman named Secreid (sounded like "secret") who put us up in her home for the evening. Jahn, the inebriate-in-chief and a genuinely nice guy, met us the following morning. Some Ukrainian vodka shared with Secreid and us the previous evening had enhanced his hangover. A good memory.
Other. The narrow, straight, elevated road that crosses fields planted with grain and sunflowers that leads from the Ukrainian border, through what seems like delta land (and maybe is, since we move towards the Danube) and leads into Budapest is familiar. But it's not 43 years ago, and I'm not driving west in Mississippi to The River to cross Her by ferry at Helena. Then to face a like road headed further west toward Texarkana. And there is no cotton.
Now to Kyiv...and home someday.
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