Or How to Take the Train from Nice to Finale Traveling for me has always been a balance of letting go of my Type A tendencies to over plan and opening myself up to the unexpected things that happen when you move on the fly. While I’ve gotten better about arriving in towns without a place to stay, know the basics of city planning to find my way around without a map, and have ridden enough trains and busses to have a feel for schedules, every now and then I’m reminded that these are things I’ve learned over time. One quiet Sunday in Finale, it was by chance that I logged onto the social networks...

One of the best things about my extended stay in Italy this year, has been the time I’ve had to show Finale and the country to so many friends and family. Today, my final guests arrived. Big G and Joni made their way north from Rome and arrived at my favorite train station this evening where Bago and I waited for them. The Flagstaff trio posed for a quick photo before a walk along the beach, drinks and dinner. Related Posts:Balancing ActPhoto of the Day: Feeling JollyPhoto of the Day: The Borgo CastlesPhoto of the DayChaos Theory

A good friend sent me a care package of American magazines including the latest issue of Vanity Fair. Inside was a short article on the arrival of the Fiat Cinquecento to the U.S. market and a mention of a Fiat you won’t see anytime soon – the classic Jolly. This modified Fiat 600 was created for a very niche group of Riviera elite looking for cars they could carry on their yachts from beach town to beach town. With only 100 or so still around, they’re a rare breed. So imagine my surprise when I spotted one along the Finale boardwalk on Sunday. I had to turn the bike around for a...

Things started early for a Saturday morning. Bago called at 7 am with a weather report: rain at Monte Cucco, and lots of it. My views one valley over and beachside were foggy but dry. Pier was next on the phone, shifting our start time back two hours. By 10:30 it was drizzly in Finale and still pouring on the mountain. Word from Pier: climbing would become hiking. But by the time we all coverged in Borgo, the weather – in a word – was brutto. Even walking around the piazza sounded like a bad idea. What was wrong with sitting in a café all day, Bago and I wondered, as we drank our second macchiato...

These past weeks I have corrected an almost unthinkable error. After more than a month in Finale, I finally made it out for a climb. Actually, I’ve jumped right in, climbing six out of 10 days. In those days, I’ve been in some of Finale’s less-visited sectors, classic walls, and even road tripped to the other side of the Ligurian region. In true climber fashion, I found myself paired with a friend of a friend. The only thing we knew about each other was that we both loved to climb, and that he spoke no English. While I do believe there is a universal language of climbing – a spirit and...