An Interlude in the Italian Alps

320 Sycamore Studios publishes original kids stories served fresh monthly, plus essays, book recommendations, and postcards from Readerville. Everything is completely human-written.

Heya,

Last weekend I drove my wife’s family from our place in Stuttgart down to Italy’s Aosta Valley in a rented Ford Tourneo van, which cornered like a leviathan but contained us all comfortably.

We made the six-hour drive in ten hours, what with various refuelings and meal breaks and grocery stops. The stick shift didn’t give me too much trouble (muscle memory kicked in), nor did the switchbacking roads that started when we left the highway in Martigny, Switzerland. But navigating the tight turns in that parking garage in Chamonix shaved a year off my life.

We all arrived undamaged in Pré-Saint-Didier (French name, Italian village) and for the next few days lived our best lives. We hiked, ate fontina cheese, drank the local sparkling wine, meandered through villages, refilled our water bottles from the town water trough, lingered over morning capuccinos, ate slow meals, played board games, soaked in a thermal spa, visited a castle, and read books.

I think what made the trip so wonderful (besides its being, you know, Italy), was that we were off our phones most of the time and open to experience.

Travel is great that way.

It gives you a view out past your ordinary umwelt, lets you see how else you might live.

The rest of the time there’s books. :)

Happy reading,

— Jeff

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