Sunday 10 July
Mass on Monte Amandola
We drove from comfortable farmland to the forest line, parking at the 1,200 M high Amandola Rifugio. From here we followed the footpath up the side of the mountain. It was 8.30 in the morning and the heat was already nearly 30˚C. Because we rested in the shade of every rare bush we could find, it took us nearly three hours to climb the further 500 M to the peak of Monte Amandola. At the top, about ten retired Alpini and two dozen assorted trekkers were gathered round a stone cross where a priest was holding mass.
It was already a mediaeval world. In the meadows at the top of the mountain, sun browned shepherds, fleeces on their shoulders, guarded their flocks, while their white shaggy maremmas (Italy’s version of Collies) chivvied and barked flaking pilgrims like me the last hundred yards to the summit. Across a deep gorge, above rocky cliffs, rose the sharp conical peak of Mt Sibilla, and behind were the other peaks of the Sibillini chain.
The tableau at the top was breathtaking, and very moving. It reminded me of the mosaic in the crypt of the St Emidio Cathedral in Ascoli Piceno showing Roman Catholic partisans at prayer with their rifles in the high Apennine pastures during World War Two.
Please click on thumbnails below to scroll through the gallery:
Luckily, since the heat had now reached 34˚C and my four-year-old daughter, Sybil, was in no state for the tramp down again (nor was I: I’d just experienced a visual white out in the blazing sunshine) one of the Alpini veterans volunteered to take us to the bottom in his Jeep (along with the table and the communion wine). We bumped along sparse grassy mountain tracks and traversed precipitous slopes. “Brutto” said the Alpino, though there was a view of paradise at every perpendicular bend.
I expressed my admiration for his hat. It was the traditional green, curled rim trilby, with the feather and badge of the Italian army’s most elite regiment. It was old and well worn, but in fine condition. He said he had been given it when he joined the army in 1969. He had worn it proudly when facing off Tito on the Austrian border, and ever since. He kept the felt supple with grappa – 52 bottles over 42 years.
Mosaic of partisans at prayer in the crypt of the Cathedral di San Emidio in Ascoli Piceno
Photos © Hong Ying
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