A church in a cave

 Thursday 7 May 

(Postal vote has been submitted and may local election results today be the right ones but not the far right ones - let's tell those fascist racist Reform a***holes to f*** right off)

Awake too early to get up but too late to go back to sleep, so I've made a cup of tea and a start on today's entry. And the sun's out - but will it last? Ummm - just about.

Every evening before dinner, Barbara gives us a detailed (very detailed) preview of the next day's itinerary, though last night I arrived late so she was already mid-flow and I also needed to report that both hairdryers in my room are non funziona - the upshot being that I'm not entirely sure what we're doing today, but there's mention of a cave with a church inside, and talk of past miracles being related by passionate volunteer guides.

All I do know is that we're having some kind of rustic multi-course lunch and then coming back to the hotel mid-afternoon, enabling more splashing about, steaming and drying out in the sauna where the window looks out on to the valley. Yesterday evening I had a great view also of the thunderstorm, and where the thermal pool expands to the outside through a little hatch, it was slightly bizarre drifting about in what feels like a bath with an urge to sing "raindrops keep falling on my head". I am however slightly concerned about the prospect of a large lunch where I will, despite abstemious intentions, no doubt eat everything put in front of me, followed by a 3-course dinner just a few hours later. 

I'll need to do a lot of walking to combat the excess calorie intake when I'm solo travelling from Saturday onwards (booking.com is now collecting the accommodation payments - eek)  As one of the younger members (really) of the generally white-haired party here, I would be happy to engage in rather more vigorous perambulations, but instead it's gentle strolling march of the penguins stylee in order not to tax those of more advanced years and even stiffer joints. Though to be fair, it's all a bit too steep and slippery to walk far or fast with the current rainfall - on the island yesterday, for example, the narrow winding streets above the perimeter road were often cobbled at acute angles and therefore a bit treacherous in Skechers.

The trip to Corbusa Sanctuary took place over many hairpin bends - having gone down the valley, we went back up the other side. The cave is actually at ground level - more of a cavern really. It was hollowed out further into a church in the early 1900s by the local poor people (of course). The miracle legend arose from a young deaf and dumg shepherdess (see tableau below) taking shelter in said cave when it was small, and finding a small statue of the Madonna at the bottom of the natural spring within. Having put it into its rightful respectful position within the cave, she was then miraculously cured of her afflictions when she went home to her family and told them all about it. The fact that Pope Giovanni the 23rd came from the Bergamo region has increased the profile of the sanctuary, and there are statues and pics of him everywhere, and his humble bedroom (apart from a silk counterpane) is housed in the museum.

The cavern/church itself has many seats, a rather beautiful altar, confession boxes, and the natural spring ever present. The initials GR are everywhere - this means Grazia Ricevuta (Grace Received) where many people have appealed to the Virgin Mother to  save them from accidents, enable long-awaited pregnancies (see pic below) and recovery from serious illnesses or otherwise-fatal accidents where all seemed lost. There are many amateur artworks in the museum - including football-related items - appealing to or thanking the Madonna for her aid, with a vision of her shining her light from the corner of the frame on to the disaster or sick persons below. Most of them are really bad. 

 

I would like to have had more time to do one of the walking trails around the sanctuary - the views of the valley were spectacular, mad even better by a sunny day in contrast to the past three - but we didn't really have enough information to do that within the time frame, and we'd been allowed rather too much time there before moving on for a group lunch a few km en route back to Rota d'Imagna at a rustic place called Antica Locanda Roncaglia. 

The food was good, the service slow and the small room with four long tables extremely noisy. The first course was prosciutto lard with honey - I avoided - followed by a delicious, very al dente leek and cheese risotto, a tasty spaghetti carbonara, polenta (not my fave), and stewed pork and roasted potatoes - I just had a taster of the latter, and managed half of the tiramisu before giving the rest away. The wine was weak but plentiful, and Kim and I managed to stay awake on the coach on the short trip back to the hotel, where we paid another visit to the lovely spa and its facilities before dinner and more wine - which, miraculously, most of us still had belly space for despite the multiple courses less than 5 hours previously....