At the start of the summer, Giulio Turriani and Francesco Piacentini and their talented team at La Locanda di Mezzo in Piazza SS. Annunziata, Barga Vecchia celebrated their first birthday in style with live music and food in the piazza in a joint celebration with the Shamrock Irish Pub and La Gelateria (article here)
There then followed an extremely busy summer season which finally came to a close just this week as the
Locanda shut its doors for renovations and some restructuring. They will be open again on the 2nd December but the chef, Francesco Piacentini will not be resting on his laurels, instead he is off to walk part of the Via Francigena from Rome back up to Lucca.
The Via Francigena is the common name of an ancient road and pilgrim route running from France to Rome, though it is usually considered to have its starting point much further away, in the English cathedral city of Canterbury. As such, the route passes through England, France, Switzerland and Italy covering 1900 kms.
In mediaeval times it was an important road and pilgrimage route for those wishing to visit the Holy See and the tombs of the apostles Peter and Paul.
We will be following Francesco Piacentini as he walks back up the country to Lucca and unlike Sigrid the Serious, the Archbishop of Canterbury, who walked the route to Rome and recorded his travels in a journal in the 10th century, we shall be using instagram, cell phones and the 21st century technology of the internet to keep you informed on a daily basis of Francesco’s progress.
All roads lead to Rome
The route was known in Italy as the “Via Francigena” (“the road that comes from France”) or the “Via Romea Francigena” (“the road to Rome that comes from France”).
Only a few decades ago, interest in the Via Francigena was limited to scholars. This began to change in recent years when many who, after travelling the Way of St. James in Spain, wanted to make the pilgrimage to Rome on foot as well. In Italy, this gave birth to a network of lovers of the Via Francigena, who with paint and brush, began to mark its trails and paths. These people were joined by religious and local government agencies who also tried to recover the original route. Where possible today’s route follows the ancient one but sometimes it deviates from the historical path in favour of paths and roads with low traffic.
According to Cicerone Guides, there was an estimated 2,500 Via Francigena pilgrims in 2012 but that number has now gradually increased as more and more people have become interested in this walk.