Thursday July 2, Gemona to Nimis, a day of unplanned backtracking and rerouting
Ah, coolth! Or at least, ah, not mid-90s anymore!
We began our day by heading up the hill to see Gemona's old city center.
The main draw there for us was the Duomo di Santa Maria Assunta. A 7-meter tall statue of St. Christopher, patron saint of travelers, looms by the front doors. It was built from six blocks of sandstone by Giovanni Griglio in 1331-32. Pilgrims on the Romea Strata must have appreciated the colossal spiritual nod.
As with most cathedrals in these here parts, there's evidence of pre-Christian, early Christian, and medieval structures that preceded the current building, a renovation that was begun in 1291 and consecrated in 1337. The Romanesque scene above the main entrance dates from the late 12th-early 13th century and depicts judgment day. Gemona's tourism website says all of the cathedral's exterior sculptures were once similarly colorful.
A mermaid flexes her provocative tail at St. Christopher's feet, representing the whores who were sent to him in prison, and whose wiles he of course resisted. Tsk, women.
Inside, an angel rides a dolphin across a baptismal font. The basin is from a Roman monument dating from the 1st or 2nd c. CE; it was repurposed as a font around 1000 CE, with baptismal carvings added to both ends in the 11th to 12th centuries.
The epicenter of the May 1976 earthquake was near Gemona, and the cathedral suffered significant damage. Rebuilt stone by stone, it has been structurally reinforced to protect it from future damage. An earthquake-damaged crucifix is now the focus of a memorial to the event, symbolizing both damage and recovery.
On to hiking! Here, a view of Gemona's ancient public laundry along the city wall below the church and castle.
The plan for the day was to seize one of the last opportunities for elevation gain and to hike over two foothills between Gemona and Nimis. Up, up, up through the woods we went--until overgrown trails forced us back down on the only passable trail we could find.
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| This is not the overgrown part |
We emerged from the woods after 3 miles of hiking...
...and were disappointed to see Gemona just a stone's throw away. Indeed, we hadn't even left town yet.
We decided to stick to roads until our next opportunity to tackle a ridge, where we hoped the trail would be better maintained. Up, up, up the windy road we went to San Giorgio, where we paused for lunch in the shady portico of the new church (the old one having been destroyed in 1976). We then headed to the trailhead below Mt. Campeone.
The trail followed a lovely creek for a mile, then rapidly became overgrown and then repeatedly blocked by fallen trees. A small metal sign enthusiastically said the trail was being repaired for all users!--but the fallen trees and brambles made it so slow and difficult for us to navigate, we decided we should backtrack to San Giorgio and stick to the roads if we wanted to reach Nimis before nightfall.
On our way back through San Giorgio, we thought perhaps a pretty side road that aimed steeply downhill would get us back to the main road...
...but it dead-ended in brambles behind an orchard, so back up we climbed.
We were now back in St. Giorgio for the third time. A three-wheel mini pickup truck zipped past us. By this point we were 8.5 miles into our day's hike and barely 3 miles from Gemona.
Down, down, down he main road we went, past bees...
...and accompanied by cicadas. Turn your audio on to hear them.
We passed several names painted on the road. S guessed that the women's Giro d'Italia had gone up this hill. We later learned that both the women's and men's races had come through Friuli to honor the 50th anniversary of the 1976 earthquakes, but none of the cyclists was named Ilenia, and "mandi" simply means "hello." Perhaps this was a greeting for Ilenia Lazzaro, a former professional cyclist who is now a prominent sports journalist.
We descended to Artegna--and would you look at that! We were now a good 3.4 miles from Gemona. I found this far more amusing than S did...
We did not bother climbing this hill in Artegna to see the inside of this 19th-c. Valhalla-ish church.
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| Evidence! |
We continued on through towns and fields toward Tarcento, where we figured out that our new stick-to-the-roads route had us heading to a freeway. With 14 miles already behind us and rush hour in high gear, we decided it would be safer to ride a bus the rest of the way to Nimis than to get hit by one on the freeway.
From the bus stop in Nimis, we made our way to beautiful Agriturismo Bressani, our accommodation for the night.
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| Ruh roh |
On our way to a neighboring Agritourismo for dinner, we passed this very tiny car. Dinner included grilled radicchio, "frico" (potato-onion-cheese patties), and the lesson that we needed to learn how not to order both a first and second course just because a server expected us to.
Ta da! Almost 14 of the day's 15 miles, 2,025' up, 1,900' down.
