I left Lyon a little after noon June 14, 1972 with a terrible haze still engulfing the city. It was so warm I didn’t need my jeans jacket and I stuffed it in my trusty K-Mart backpack with the other dirty clothes. I always looked forward to finding Laundromats in Europe where I could rest and feel clean again. Backpackers also meet interesting people there. It’s not uncommon for enterprising women to do several people’s washing – a kind of co-operative thing. When I left for the Alps I was down to my last t-shirt.
The next stops on the trip to Milan were Grenoble, site of the 1964 Winter Olympics, and Chambéry. The Alps were magnificent, but on the dark side there are countless small factories in the Alps which produce bad haze and terrible pollution in the streams. Hydroelectric plants fill the long stretch of railroad tracks and there are many quarries that leave holes in the sides of the mountains. Foundries belch out blast furnace fire and steam and their smoke settles in the valleys. Above many of the smoke stacks you can see where the vegetation, including trees, has died on the slopes. Many Alpine streams were laden with floating trash.
There was a 15 minute ride through the Frejus Tunnel north of where Hannibal is said to have crossed the Alps at Monte Viso at 12,602 ft. My first impression of being inside a mountain was that it was dark. (Well, there’s a first time for everything.) At the border I had my passport checked four or five times and I remember one dandy Italian officer with one of those halo caps who saluted and clicked his heels just like in the movies. At this time I didn’t have a Eurailpass, so clearing with the authorities took much of my time, but it was nice to have few people in my compartment – no smokers or personal menageries.
This part of Italy, the Piedmont, was personal for me. I knew Dad served one year in Italy mostly at Leghorn and ran truck convoys with the Peninsular Base Section (PBS) in the final push against the Germans in WWII. His farthest north run was to the truck head at Piacenza 35 miles SE of Milan on April 28, 1945. By May 5, 1945 the Fifth Army had captured 150,000 German POWs including the 16th SS Panzer Division who were placed in “cages” at: Ivrea (J22-71), Legnano (E04-80), Rho (K14-72, Tradate (K04-93), Reati (J809-849), Candia, Bernardo, and the Ghedi airport (509-53). As a POW guard Dad said, “You didn’t mess with the SS.” I could write a book about it. I'm sure there are many Baby Boomers whose fathers were there also.
I arrived at Turino at the headwaters of the Po River at 7:30 P.M. when it was cold and raining. After cashing in a Traveler’s Check I had only 2500 Lire, hardly enough to buy anything. I immediately went to a waiting room to eat an orange and miniature pizza. The bums milling about the area were bad enough to have the Italian police frequently comb the room to get them out. As I re-boarded the train for Milan, a gypsy woman wearing one of those long and colorful dresses pushed (bumped) me in the aisle and I immediately checked my wallet. I wanted to sock her. Authorities warn tourists to beware of gypsies, but I always put my big traveler’s wallet in my front pockets. Pick pockets prefer back pockets.
