Reggio Calabria - Unwanted Stop
- Tobias Heller
- 24. Okt. 2016
- 5 Min. Lesezeit
What was the original plan that day? This is one of the phases where I just end up somewhere, not having a specific plan, seeing how things may proceed. The last several weeks i went from the upper seam, along and across the outer shell all the way to the heel and down to the toe of the Italian boot. Reggio Calabria is situated just there, and from here daily ferries are the connection to Messina, one of the port cities in Sicily.
Prologue
Late night Arrival
Due to further delays, which seem to become more common once the deeper to the south I get, I miss my connection train, once more getting stuck, forced to wait for hours at the deserted train station until the next connection train arrives. A starless, darkened sky welcomes me when I get off the train and again I have no clue of where I might end up tonight. Before leaving Tropea I desperately texted some Couchsurfers if they might be able to host me on a short notice, for that reason I engage myself in the never stopping act of finding a decent wifi to check my messages. I start walking through the streets which are devoid of humans except for an occasional shadow passing by, surely observing me, the intruder with his heavy backpack, and wondering what I am up to that late. Trying to find a lively area with bars or restaurants turns out to be futile, either I just constantly miss it or there is none, so I end up walking a broad seemingly endless street with big fashion stores all around until I finally encounter a free wifi. This search for wifi can be utterly annoying, though I gladly deny myself to buy a sim card with an italian phone number and internet data volume, for the simple reasons that I do not want to end up engaged in online communications and distractions. Being shut off from the rest of the world can be highly enjoyable while traveling, and I reckon, just assumably standing in the middle of a wonderful beach in the middle of nowhere texting with a friend about last night's cinema movie would not add overly to the travelers feeling.
I happily find two people who replied my requests, luckily telling me that it wouldn't be a problem to stay. One is a woman living with her husband and two kids in the southern side of Reggio, the other one is a student who lives slightly to the north. I decide to pick the latter, as it is closer and indeed soon he replies and meets me in front of a dark massive building, apparently a museum with a broad Piazza in the front. Federico, studying law here in Reggio and living with his mum, seems to be fascinated by my travels and we spend the evening talking, sitting at the massive kitchen table. How fast those things work sometimes!
Harbor & Seaside
A glance over to Sicily
I am not sure what actually to expect from Reggio Calabria, and I only have one day to spend walking around as my intention is to go over to Sicily the following morning. Keeping in mind that that Sicily's coast is only about 10 kms linear distance away from Reggio's coast, I start the morning walking along the pebble stone beach, amusing myself by climbing deeper into the sea over various rocks that protrude out of the shallow water. All the while the large and massive Island is in the background, those boundaries are not able to make out due to it's mere size. I haven't expected it to be that close, white red piles along the coast are to be seen as well, apparently some of the villages and cities houses. Somewhat puzzled by what must be an optical illusion I narrow my eyes to slits as to decipher what I am seeing. Very faintly a dark massive shadow sits above all the other hills and mountains with way clearer visible outlines due to the fact that they are closer to my location. It takes a while until realization seeps in - this is the volcano Etna.
I explore the cities center, those construction seems to be somehow inappropriate for an Italian city, as the streets are set in long and large parallel lines across the whole city, establishing a grit of connections. Additionally I find the pavement to be clean and everything seems organized and well better maintained than in other cities. This indeed is a surprise to me, catching myself somehow being a bit disappointed not to find cities going down in exorbitant chaos, randomly built streets and decadent houses. Around lunch time I meet with the woman and her husband who so kindly replied to my last minute request and offered to stay at her home, inviting her for a coffee. The two of them are hilarious and funny and I enjoy the niceties of meeting someone you don't know at all, knowing that the spent time will only be short living but yet, it is somehow nice and entertaining. In the end I end up having a large lunch and drinks, because the owners of the modern and welcoming place are friends of them and winking they encourage me to eat whatever I want as they will handle the payment with them later. My initial intention to invite someone to a coffee obviously didn't work out that well.
The rest of the day I spend walking over several large and nicely set Piazzas, and then follow the roads leading up a slight slope, where I even find a tube like tunnel with electric stairs running the distance from the coast to the upper parts of Reggio. My stroll brings me to Castello Aragonese, one of the most famous landmarks of Reggio Calabria, representing the city and it's history, due to a lack of time I only explore it by circling around the massive building.
Churches & Architecture
Flooded with gold
I step across Reggio Calabria's cathedral, and though I enjoy stepping randomly into churches and admiring their sometimes completely unexpected grandeur, I am not able to overcome the feeling of not being able to stand more churches thanks to an immense overdose during the last weeks traveling. The church is segmented into 4 thin towers and two statues, holy Paulus and Stefan, guard the entrance. From the outside it seems to be just another church that does not differ much from others, but in the inside I am positively surprised, not necessarily due to the construction with nicely painted wooden timbers on the ceiling and the flow of arches along the aisles, but more specifically because of the effect of the light inside. The sun's rays of light seem to be bundled and fortified by the windows glasses, touching the church in a splendid gold light, which makes this church indeed enjoyable. It is not comparable with some of those somber dark places, with small slits that only let in a limited amount of light. Near the altar the pipes of a huge organ are reflecting softly the light of the nearby windows and are a sight of their own.
Sightseeing & Architecture
Over to the other Side
Finally in the morning my short time companion Federico accompanies me to the harbor, from which I am supposed to take the ferry over to Messina, which leaves frequently given the fact that many people are commuting between those two cities for work or studies. We sit here in the bright sunlight for a while, the sun's heat already burning down on us, despite that autumn already had arrived, the temperatures tended to become way hotter in the last several days since I entered the south. I finally say goodbye, buy my ferry ticket and I am on my short crossover to my next goal across the blue sea: Sicily.
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