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Unfriendly Native
After watching the sunset, we pushed our bikes back into the trees and set our tent beneath the sheltering pines. In the morning we backtracked the short distance to Matzaccara. As we pedalled past a high school, students out on the sports field dressed in matching red track suits and white scarves stopped their soccer game and stared, then waved and yelled choruses of "Buono viaggio!" In all our time on Sardinia, we hadn't met a single unfriendly native. But that was about to change. We arrived in the port town of Portoscuso just before noon and spotted DELI written in ten-foot-high red letters on the side of a building. I leaned my bike against the wall. Sharon slumped over her bike, forearms resting on her handlebars. "I'm not all that hungry," she said. "Are you feeling all right?" I asked. "Yeah, I'm fine. But I only want one ham sandwich today." I wandered into the deli shop and came face to face with my first unfriendly Sardinian. She stood behind the deli counter wearing what appeared to be an ever-present foul mood - a drooping frown creased the corners of her mouth. I suspected she hadn't earned those ingrained lines from smiling. It would be the first time I ever requested three slices of ham and cheese. "Tre tagliare prosciutto conj formaggio," I said, smiling, holding up two fingers and a thumb. (I had finally caught on that European countries began counting the number one with a thumb.) "Tre?" the wicked witch bellowed indignantly, shaking her gap-toothed head. Obviously those frown-lines had been etched by gastric acid. "Tre?" she screeched again. My heart jumped. She possessed all the charm of a Bosnian land mine. I furrowed my brow. Was four the minimum? I wondered. Who knew? I had never had any problems before when I asked for four slices. I knew I should have stuck with my favourite number: "quattro." I stood there dumbly, shocked that she was treating me rudely, and nodded it was three I wanted. She harumphed and wrestled a hock of ham out from behind a glass case, banged it down on the electric slicer, and lopped off four slices. I had my answer: four must be the minimum. I thought it odd though, because one could request varying thicknesses. And I always asked for a generous cut, which made my slices the equivalent of someone else's eight or ten thin ones. I paid the cashier and returned to my bike glumly. "That's the last time I'm asking for three slices," I mumbled, as I pushed my bike around the corner of the deli. As I passed in front of the window, I saw the mean deli woman look out. Her jaw dropped when she saw I was on a loaded bicycle - obviously a tourist. She had broken the unwritten code of Sardinian conduct: Be hospitable to strangers. I hoped she felt as bad as I did. We ate a leisurely lunch at the dock, watching people come and go. Sharon was hungrier than she first thought, and ate half my second sandwich. But that was all right - I had stacked it with an extra slice of ham and cheese. Buffeted by a northwesterly, we rode out of Portoscuso towards the west coast. Our seaside route - missing large chunks of pavement - made it difficult to enjoy the panoramic sweeping vistas, and we spent a great deal of our time weaving a crooked path, concentrating on dodging bicycle-eating potholes. I was amazed how well our tires were holding out. We hadn't had a flat since leaving the Riviera. "At least the road can't get any worse," said Sharon, the master of understatement. Of course it got worse. It turned to sand. We lugged down in the loose terrain. I can't think of many surfaces more difficult to ride a loaded touring bike on than sand. With our added weight and our bicycle's skinny tires, we sank in and bogged down. It was like mushing a dog sled in July. For every sandy kilometer we completed, it felt like ten. We eventually reached the westernmost point of sand. Our calf muscles were knotted, and a fine layer of grit stuck to our sweaty legs. We wiped them off with our towels, but they still felt sticky and gritty. "Are we ever going to find a shower?" Sharon moaned. We discovered an old military bunker on a high cliff. A small trap door in the concrete roof opened into a cylindrical room about five meters in diameter. We descended a precipitous flight of stairs into a dank litter of crumpled yellowed newspapers, girlie magazines, and broken bottles. Thin rectangular slits strategically viewed the blue-black-amethyst Mediterranean. I breathed through my mouth in small quick sips. A smaller room looked as if it had been used for sleeping quarters. If it hadn't been for the musty smell, I would have spent the night just so I could say I slept in a bunker. I gladly ascended into bright sunlight, and breathed in lungfuls of fresh air. I stood on the bunker's roof, almost level with and blending into the surrounding landscape, and gazed at the coastline rising straight up in the North into a steep headland. Surf pounded the rocky cliff-face like a frenzied washerwoman on steroids. Sharon suggested we camp on the clifftop, next to the bunker. I had to admit it had a stunning view. But I dissuaded Sharon from setting our tent on the ledge. I wasn't worried about being invaded by the military in the middle of the night. Oh, no. I was concerned that my midnight pee-break may end tragically. It was several hundred meters to the sea and I didn't see any bushes to cushion my fall. |
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