The old ways persist in Calabria. Admittedly, rural regions around the world tend to hold more firmly to tradition, for reasons that are ideological as much as economic, but history doesn’t just place a thumb on the scales here; it’s pulling downward with both hands.
Il Piccolo Eremo is an unusual combination of past and present, preserving millennium-old Basilian practices with a convent only 22 years old, an argument that time is a flat circle if ever there was one. Just downhill, though, is an even firmer assertion of tradition. The Santuario Maria Santissima di Crochi, set on a small outcropping that overlooks the broad riverbed, is the site of an annual pilgrimage procession over three days in September. Towards the middle of this stage, the town of Gioiosa Ionica hosts the annual feast of San Rocco every August 26, with a procession capped with the traditional dance of the tarantella. As the trail climbs back into the stubby coastal hills, much mined over the years, it skirts the area where the hermit monk San Jeiunio, the “hunger artist,” fasted in a cave in the 11th century. And then, as it dips back down, it leads through Prestarona and its Basilian sanctuary devoted to the Madonna di Prestarona, where the cult has persisted for well over a millennium at this point–including yet another annual procession, taking place the first Sunday after Easter.
How silly the people here must find conversations among contemporary walkers to Compostela about “real pilgrims.” There’s no lengthy and expensive journey to reach an arbitrary starting point, no grand leave taking, no elaborate debates about authenticity. To the extent that travel happens, it’s not away from home–it’s back to one’s roots, a coming together of the Calabrian diaspora. The walking, to the extent that it happens, is quite finite, an act performed amidst a larger community. There’s no complaint about crowds. The crowds are the point. The crowds are your people. For all the contemporary forces tugging families apart, tossing communities asunder, calling into question traditional practices, this is one thing that perseveres, a thread that runs through the fraying fabric.
This personal, individual act of pilgrimage, though, also plays with history, reinforcing a through-line that holds together past and present like beads on a chain. What had been a smooth, breezy walk through the hills, my best day of walking in a little while, came to a crashing halt in the final approach to Gerace. Instead of taking the easy entrance via the provincial road, the Cammino Basiliano veers onto a footpath, or at least what was once a footpath, climbing directly onto the back of the 500-meter high clifftop (made of conglomerates of sea fossils that formed 60 million years ago) upon which Gerace sits. This, too, is an attempt at preservation, at clinging to a literal old way, the old south gate into town. Due to limited traffic, though, along with erosion, the walk today involves wading through waist-high brush, delicately maneuvering along steep hillsides, some minor scrambles over rocks that have tumbled from above (hopefully not too recently), and then–in the only part that shows any measure of interest from the town above–a climb high into the center with a sheer drop off to the side.
If present-day Dave found this alternately frustrating and captivating, my 8-year-old self was manifesting a dream, storming a medieval castle through this forgotten entrance. Perhaps I was breaking a siege; maybe I was slipping past the guards to commit an act of political intrigue. The particulars don’t really matter. What does, though, is this idea of slipping into some fantasy realm, some amalgamation of The Hobbit, The Odyssey, and King Arthur, some world of absolute freedom–tromping through woods, eluding capture, discovering a forgotten sanctuary, and being utterly cut off from the present.
It’s almost always a criticism to suggest that one is living in the past. Instead of moving on to bigger and better things, the implication goes, we cling to fading glories, unrewarding habits, unsatisfying comforts. There’s something to be said, of course, for moving on when the time is right, for taking some risks in pursuit of personal growth. But could we be more deliberate about building on the past, like the Italian towns that continue using Roman and medieval infrastructure, while also adapting to modern needs? Those childhood longings aren’t entirely misplaced or at odds with responsible adulthood. There’s a joyousness that comes from a full-hearted engagement with the physical world around us.
The Ionian Sea has been staring at me for weeks now, a constant presence, peeping through the hills, but never quite within reach. Sitting in Gerace, I decided to make the leap, breaking with the Cammino Basiliano for one day in order to seize an extended opportunity along the coast. The next day was always going to end on the coast; the town of Bianco, famous for its Greek dessert wine, was the lone stop on my itinerary on the Ionian Sea. It was easy, though–so, so easy–to drop down from Gerace to the old Roman ruins of Locri, and then proceed south along the coast to Bianco.
The timing made sense because of my scheduled night in Bianco, but it also offered another link between past and present, a celebration of this life I’ve carved out for myself. One year ago today, I reached the Pacific Ocean, completing my walk across the USA. Today, I touched down in the Ionian Sea–or, perhaps more accurately, the Ionian reached up and grabbed me.
History, memory–these aren’t intellectual abstractions. These are grounded, literally grounded in the world around us. When we physically reconnect with the surrounding landscapes, this simultaneously reopens our minds to so much of our past, while also planting seeds for a future that will resonate all the more fully because of the links forged today.
