Travel Biography - Week 35.

The Catacombs of Capuchin, my Final Thoughts.

So far, I'm thoroughly enjoying writing this biography. This diary came about after several readers either asked me to write about my travel history or suggested doing so. Other suggestions were joining a Writer's Circle or making an effort to write a book. However, thanks to the Internet, I'm now able to write for the immediate publishing of the diary in blog form, thus avoiding the risk of the publisher's rejection of the manuscript or the need for an agency that would have involved a lot of box-ticking and bureaucracy.

However, when travel writing, what I am doing is relating the history of my travel experience, and this involves visiting places some may find unsettling or telling of my failures and any difficulties I've been through, as well as the more attractive venues, successful adventures, and times of leisurely bliss.

Successful Adventure: At Grand Canyon, 1978.

And so, I concluded last week's episode with a visit to the Catacombs of Capuchin in Palermo, Sicily's capital. I also posted several photos of the preserved corpses to show the reader exactly what I was writing about. However, I was unaware that such photos proved controversial.

After the publication of the blog, for curiosity, I logged into the website Tripadvisor to see what other people were saying about the venue in their reviews. One reviewer's wit I had to admire. In it, he put words into the mouth of one of the corpses when he wrote, 

There was a time when I was just like you as you are now. The time will come when you will look just like me as I am now.

I was impressed with his comment, as it reflected my thoughts exactly. The very same thoughts I had when I stood inside one of the corridors of the underground vault back in 1982. The only difference was that in 1982 there was nowhere to express them.

And so, on the same evening, I posted on Facebook another photo I took of the bodies over 40 years earlier. Within minutes, the website administration blocked the photo with an explanation that it was too unsettling for some and asked me to agree to their policy. I agreed merely to keep the peace.

I have to admit, I was taken aback by the censorship imposed by the social site. They were merely photos on a screen. It was I who actually stood in front of them, alone, feeling no fear or any apprehension as the faces stared back down at me. After all, what possible harm could any of them do? Rather, the whole catacomb was a university of life, death, and eternity, each unavoidable and without regard for wealth, education or social status. Indeed, even I found the revelation shocking when confronted with such a hard reality. Yet those who paid to have their bodies preserved to rest in these vaults were the rich and the privileged, as well as the Capuchin monks themselves. Oh, the irony!

From Palermo to Rome.

As my time in Sicily drew to a close, it was time to make my way homeward. And that's the advantage of slow surface travel as opposed to air travel. My holiday didn't end quickly.

After vacating my hotel room, I boarded the train at Palermo Terminus for an overnighter to Rome Terminus. This will be the first time I had experienced the embarkation of the train itself onto the Messina Strait ferry. If I remember rightly, I must have boarded the train quite late in the evening, as it was long dark before the train pulled out. It travelled on the line bordering the north coast of the island, hence avoiding Caltanissetta altogether. At Messina, the wait was rather long. That is, until the train shunted forwards, then reversed back out, then pulled forward again. This time, the carriage I was in remained stationary whilst the carriages behind ours pulled out, then moved forwards until all three sections of the train were fully shunted onto the ferry, all three resting side by side as the boat set sail for Reggio Calabria, on the mainland.

Below is a photo I took of the same ferry on my way to Sicily from Italy two weeks earlier. Then, the train I was in from Taranto remained in Reggio Calabria, leaving the portable railway lines unoccupied. This view is looking towards the stern, where the buffers were. It shows that the three lines run the full length of the ship, thus allowing a mainline train from Turin, Rome, and Naples to board for access on the two Sicilian lines.

The stern of the Messina Ferry, 1982.

At the "toe" of mainland Italy, the whole process was reversed. A first-in-last-out procedure, with my section of the train in the middle. Eventually, the whole train was coupled together, ready to depart northwards.

I noted that during the sailing, nobody alighted from the train. Neither was anything to be seen out of the wide windows as it was the middle of the night. Apparently, alighting whilst on the ferry was not allowed. So I remained in the train, lying down across the whole seat, as I had the compartment to myself whilst the coach-length corridor ran at one side of each carriage.

By early daybreak, I was able to look out at Mt Vesuvius as it sat majestically over the Bay of Naples. The train was actually using the Circumvesuviana Line to avoid docking into either Naples Central or Naples Porto Nolano, but to connect with the main line to Rome from Naples Terminus. By breakfast time, the train from Palermo to Rome ended its journey at the capital's terminus, allowing me a full day in Rome before boarding another overnight train to Milan, where my friend Derek would be waiting.

There were two attractions I was to spend my time at, the Colosseum and the Basilica St Peter's. Not that I was unfamiliar with them, for I had already visited both during my last visit to Rome in 1975. I went to visit the Colosseum first. Rome boasted an underground line that linked the Terminus to Colosseum Station, hence the journey to it was quick and easy.

Again, like the Catacombs of St John in Siracusa, and also with the Eifel Tower in Paris, in 1982, there were no security barriers at these sites as they are at present. Also, 1982 was the last time I had ever set foot in Rome, and to this day I had never returned. Indeed, I took my beloved to Sicily in the year 2006 to celebrate our 7th anniversary, but in that year we flew directly to Palermo from London Gatwick Airport, then took a bus from Palermo to Siracusa. Therefore, after not setting foot in Rome for the last 40 years, again I turned to the website Tripadvisor to catch up on the data. I thought, wow!

Reviewers talk about long queues outside both the Colosseum and St Peter's. With the former, each individual has to buy an entry ticket for admission to the ancient monument. These are bought more in advance rather than at the door, and the presence of security barriers is the main reason for the long queues. Also, booking timeslots now exist, whether mandatory or for the customer's convenience, at this point I can't be sure. But all this is a far cry from my day when anyone was able to walk straight into the Colosseum for free and without any security gates and long queues, although access inside the Colosseum back then was more restricted. Also in 1982, no ticket touts were crowding the underground station, attempting to sell overpriced entry tickets that may be invalid for entry.

The Basilica San Pietro is also suffering long queues due to the presence of airport-style security barriers. According to the reviewers' testimonies, there seems to be some inconsistency among them on whether one has to buy a ticket to enter, as in the case of St Paul's in London, or whether entry into the main cathedral is free. By reading a large number of reviews, I have concluded that the basilica is free to enter, but tickets would be needed for the cupola, and also for the Vatican Museum and the Sistine Chapel. Queue-skipping tickets for fast-track entry into the Basilica also look to be available at a price.

Travel and Mass-Tourism.

In 1982, walking alone into the Catacombs of St John in Sicily, the Colosseum in Rome and St Peter's at the Vatican was easy and straightforward. Just like walking through the doors of a Costa Coffee. So was entering the Roman Forum and the Circus Maximus, both also in Rome. No security barriers, no queues and no entry fees. Likewise, there were no queues for the airport-style security barriers at the Eifel Tower in Paris, and in London, St Paul's and Westminster Abbey were free to enter, especially during the late 60s of college years.

Hence, Travel was an adventure in itself, to visit places and experience culture not easily accessible to the masses. I believed that the exorbitant price confined foreign travel to the rich or for military purposes. There was a time when the average Briton headed to seaside resorts such as Morecambe, Blackpool, Bognor Regis, Brighton, and other coastal hotspots for their annual break. However, those who did manage to travel abroad might have brought back other-worldly tales of experiences away from their home country that fascinated their listeners.

Roman Colosseum 1982. Free entrance on the left.

In 1976, my plan to visit Israel alone as an independent caused quite a stir in the workplace, both on the shopfloor (where I was working) and around the adjoining offices. Before taking off and after my return, I was the talk of the town. Funnily enough, neither my trip to Italy in 1975 nor to America in 1977 had any real effect. Could it be that the Middle East during the mid-seventies was still recovering from a history of conflicts and therefore untainted by tourism?

Going by the reviews I read on Tripadvisor, mass tourism looks to me like it had destroyed the real spirit of travel. With plenty of time and money alike, it looks to me that mass tourism had forever tainted the magic and spirit of adventure gotten by lone exploration of virtually unknown locations. Furthermore, there was an accumulation of dirt, as described below. 

Brian Moynahan's book, Fool's Paradise, writes about the Spanish beach "suntan factory" and the great tourist ripoff, the abundance of cheap trinkets and souvenirs, aggressive beggars approaching the tourist, ticket touting, the street newspaper ploy - where a beggar pleads with a passing tourist for some money to buy a newspaper. Sometimes the tourist buys the paper for him, which he then returns to the shop for a refund, and so it goes on - every means to part the tourist of his money and for the beggar to make a handsome profit by the end of the day. Moynahan also discusses how the tourist will fight for a raised alcove in a restaurant or to sit at the captain's table on a cruise liner - on both occasions not for the conversation, but merely to be seen by others. And not to leave out the annoying fact that many restaurants deliberately raise their prices during the busy tourist season at popular venues.

Basilica St Peter 1982. View from the Cupola.

And I too am not entirely guiltless. In Week 3 of this biography, I wrote how in 1972 I became drunk whilst on a Spanish package holiday and I slept in the bathtub soaked in my own vomit. That is not travel. Instead, it was a gross abuse of such a noble endeavour. Rather, travel began in 1973, a year later when I stood on the rim of Vesuvius' crater and walked the streets of Pompeii.

That evening, after a full day spent in Rome, I arrived in Milan on the next day in preparation for the final leg of the journey home.

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Next Week: During the 1980s interlude, I was shown a new way of travelling.