Sunday Dec 10. Cocumola. 18.9 km.

Yesterday when I arrived in Otranto I was too tired to look around much, but this morning I enjoyed the seafront with its lovely terrace walk, stores and restaurants that must be a hive of activity in the summertime.

Otranto is known for its medieval church with a beautiful twelfth century mosaic floor. I loved the much later ceiling - gorgeous warm woodwork.

A strange four-bodied but one-headed beast on the floor.

And here is Alexander the Great getting lifted up to heaven. (This photo is from the internet as it is much better than mine.) The story behind this comes from early Greek written sources and is found in Medieval romances and iconography. Alexander wanted to see the view from the heavens, so he captured two griffins and didn’t let them eat for a few days so that they would be really hungry. He attached a seat between the two of them, and holding skewers of meat above their heads, got himself lifted far up in the heavens.

Otranto also has a large Angevin castle dating from the sixteenth century when the French Angevins ruled the region. I thought it was the inspiration for Horace Walpole’s “Castle of Otranto” but couldn’t see anything romantically Gothic in this squat, rather prosaic military fortification. Google to the rescue again - Walpole never visited here and picked the name for its sound from a map. Ho hum! Anyway, I’ve just finished rereading his novel, and as it is a cold, windy night with the rain pelting down, at least the weather seems in harmony with his story.

It rained on and off for my walk as well. I lost the (totally unmarked) path twice, necessitating one short and one very long detour. Rocks everywhere!

This was my lunch - a plate full of little snacks that usually get served with an aperitivo. Since I was still walking, a cappuccino took the place of a glass of wine. Tonight I have to make do with the emergency rations I have in my backpack, as it is far too miserable to venture out.

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Sat Oct 4. London.

19 days walking on pilgrimage paths for a total of 395 km or 245 miles on foot (not that arduous - an average of 20.7 km per day, and lots of ‘rest days’ staying put in one place). All of that undone in 1.5 hours on a Eurostar train. I’m not entirely sure what conclusion I’m drawing from that comparison, but I’m back where I started, in London. On my way to my lodgings (I’m staying in a Buddhist retreat centre) I decided to visit the first visitable place to cross my path, which turned out to be the Foundling Museum. Horrified by the sight of infants being abandoned on 18th c London streets, a prosperous seaman, Thomas Coram, spent 17 years raising awareness and funds, as well as obtaining royal permission to build London’s first children’s charity. Opened in 1739, the Foundling Hospital continued its work until the 1950s, and actually is still active as a non-institutional resource, under a different name. Here is a photo of it in 1935. So many similarities to ...

Fri Oct 3. Lille.

I had a lovely day in Lille. In fact, all my days on this trip have been lovely! In the morning I went to the very large Palais des Beaux-Arts. This museum holds the largest collection of works of art of any French institution outside Paris. The collection started at the time of the French Revolution as the works of art of the nobility and of the church were confiscated, and continued on apace due to various enthusiastic municipal governments. By 1892 the collection was so large and important that the Palais, its current house, was constructed in the centre of town. The first fun aspect was the recent work of the Swiss artist Felice Varini who used the museum’s interior as his canvas. The oldest works of art are in the ‘basement’, beautifully displayed. Look at the marvellous three dimensionality of this (flat) marble plaque sculpted by Donatello (c 1435) showing Salomé dancing for the head of John the Baptist. And modern technology brings statues alive by giving them back t...

September 5

I landed at Heathrow this morning at 6 am, a very inconvenient time to get a room and rest! But my student residence accommodation includes a common room with handy couches for a short snooze. The neighbourhood abuts on Regent’s Park, complete with gorgeous flowerbeds. The Queen Mary’s rose garden in Regent’s Park. My neighbourhood wandering took me to the Wallace House which used to be one of the homes of the marquesses of Hertford. The Hertfords were fabulously rich, mainly from extensive land holdings, and in the 18th and 19th centuries avid art collectors. They obviously had Trumpian home decorating tastes. Here are two of their many clocks, all of which need frequent ‘fine tuning’, it appears. I particularly liked two 18th c British paintings by Sir Joshua Reynolds in their collection: Mrs Carnac and the hauntingly strange Strawberry Girl.

Celia Walks

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