Day 49 A holiday on an adventure

If you browse the travel section at a bookshop you will discover the phrase ‘adventure holidays’. Normally this is a term that is confined to the sort of travel you can have in your twenties which often includes activities like white water rafting and bungy jumping. However we are of the view that travelling for all the ages can be full of adventure. A few years ago some good friends of ours, made a suggestion to us that we would describe not as an adventure holiday, but as a holiday on an adventure. Let us explain.

Whilst travelling for 13 weeks the routine of packing up and moving every few days can become exhausting, so we had the idea to have a ‘holiday’ during our long adventure. This week we are staying in a studio apartment overlooking Lake Como in Northern Italy where we will, to some extent, relax and take it easy. However the reality often doesn’t match the theory, and even on a restful holiday we will no doubt have lots of adventures, but the idea of having ‘our own place’ for a whole week is quite enticing.

So on Day 49, the first day of our ‘holiday’, we enjoyed a sleep-in as we began to absorb the sights, sounds and feel of this beautiful place. It is almost impossible to describe the gentle sound of the water lapping at the edge of the lake just below our window, or the coolness of the light breeze as it drifts in through the open French doors or the melodious sound of the church bells as they ring out from one village to another across the lake. The lake made famous by many James Bond movies is much quieter and more peaceful than we had imagined.

Later in the morning we walked down the road for about 1.5 km to a wharf where we boarded our chauffeured launch for the week (known better as the local ferry) and headed for the township of Como to buy some supplies. Shopping in non-English speaking countries continues to be an interesting challenge. We bought some gnocchi in a local shop and nearly ended up with 4 kilos instead of 400 grams. We bought wonderful local ham, fresh ravioli, cheese, cold sliced roast beef and our favourite, fresh parmisan cheese. After the usual search we eventually found ‘normal’ fresh milk and healthy muesli. After spending about 40 Euros on supplies we were just about set up for the whole week. We may not even