A small plaque in the pull in used for our lunch spot, near the top of a hill, sits quietly waiting to be read. Google lens helps a little – later delving and you enter the world of freedom fighters resisting the Nazis. Places like Bobbio are liberated and lost. For a while Bobbio was the centre of the declared Republic of Bobbio. The Bishop had a foot in both camps it is implied.
We left via the Mona Lisa (disputed) bridge. The Romans know how to make things last. Other bridges have been washed away. A new one shows it started in 2021 with completion due in 2023: twinned with HS2 one assumes.
On a serious note one near Genoa collapsed in 2018 with 43 fatalities.
Today was some sloping things up, followed by some switchbacks down. Villages hung at impossible angles to the hillsides. Watched by men outside smoking with a coffee.
Genoa was quite a shock to enter: immediately faster traffic in some chaotic dance. Vast rows of high rise apartments lining the river. A wee explore to find a bike shop (tomorrow is Sunday so everything is closed) reminded me Google Maps is not infallible. Why walk 18 mins when you can take tunnel to the place you can see the other side of the railway line. Maybe it had heard about the traffic.
Genoa is for tomorrow. Some famous Genoans come from here, including Mr America 1492:
In Genoa, a port by the sea, A mariner’s heart felt free. With fleets of the past, and Christopher Columbus unsurpassed, They’d sail to a rich history (Anon, not me!)
Travelling reflections 