When we knew this trip was going to be a realty, one of our new goals was to meet a traveling couple that helped inspire this adventure. Andre & Lisa have a website We Will Nomad, and roaming around they have certainly done.

I got an email while in Villanova that some our messages to them were lost in their spam folder. They reached out to see where we were, and we were close, about 150 kilometers, or about 100 miles away. Might seem like a long way for some, but that is short day trip for us. They recommended a wonderful campground that was nearby, so we met them shortly after lunch for an afternoon, and early evening of lots of great conversation.

It started with a tour of their property and the olive grove they own. Then we made our way up the stairs to the roof of their home to enjoy drinks and snacks, and of course, great conversation. The wind kicked up as the sunk, so we moved inside a glassed in patio.

Well into the conversation we were treated to handcrafted, tasty pizza, followed up with Figs grown on their property. They were delicious, but we didn’t want to take too many as their jar that was supposed to last all season was already half empty.

Andre gave us our first bit of advice, “You need to get your wine game on.” I’m far from an avid drinker of the grape, and Kasey has very specific tastes. I did finish a glass they presented me. He continued with a story about Rakia – the national drink of Albania. Apparently, it was good enough for them to bring a few bottles back with them. As they were making their way across a border, Andre broke a couple of bottles open, and the glass also cut through his skin. So, they were trying to was the Rakia and blood down the drain, which was also running out of their camper.

We asked them about places to miss, and while they were not specific, they did give us more insights on how to travel. Calling it “Slow Travel”, what most of us would say is stopping and smelling the roses. They encouraged to slow down, plan a little more and find places that we would enjoy. The one place they did mention, and made an example was Paris. Because it was so hard to find camper parking, or roads to travel into a city like Paris, it takes planning to find transport into the city and the points of view it has to offer. I was reminded about how we did the Lindt Chocolate Factory and the Gothic Church in Cologne, Germany.

That moved into a conversation on what could be called the “Breaking Point”. That time frame when you are really on the fence about ending the adventure and heading back, going on. Twelve weeks, that was Andre’s time frame. It didn’t take Kasey and I long to realize we are at twelve weeks. We had had to adapt a lot in these first three months, and we have lots to come, but we feel ready for the challenge.

Our final questions was “What do you wish you knew?” before you started. Andre and Lisa had the advantage of experience of backpacking through other areas, and being able to use a borrowed camper before they started seven years ago. It might have been the topic before the question was asked, but Lisa said dumping the cassette toilet for a separating toilet. She them listed the benefits. The other advice was something we plan on taking when we return to Italy, and that is to install a refillable gas system for cooking, heat and the refrigerator. There are a lot of LP Gas Vehicles in Europe, and a lot of the fuel stations offer refilling, so this makes it much easier that finding gas bottles, and refilling.

As I said, it was the evening, and when we returned to Holly our camper, it was dark. We turned in for the night. In the morning, we prepped for another day of travel. We wanted to get back to Bari to get set up for the ferry over to Albania. We haven’t done a ferry before, so we wanted to be there early. We payed for our camping, a bottle of olive oil, and made our way back north.

We made our way to the town of Zollino. It was a pretty easy drive, and we made our way into the Park4Night Spot. It had power poles, but none of the power worked. Pretty much as the reviews described. We were joined later on by another camper that a unique trailer behind with a motorcycle aboard.

The next day was Thanksgiving for us Americans, and we had picked up a few turkey parts to cook up along with some mashed potatoes and gravy. It was a small dinner celebration, but for being in Italy, we did pretty well. I guess we could have tried to have had a turkey pizza made?

On our way on Black Friday, we went, surprise, shopping. No big deals, nor long lines in Italy, just another day for them. We found a new store called Happy Kasa and we were able to get most of the items that we needed. We wanted to buy a fan to help blow dry our clothes that hang in the shower after washing. That was available at BricoCenter, a hardware, Do It Yourself Chain in Italy.

We made our way to Cisternino and a parking spot that is in town, but down in a large parking lot, that was a pretty quiet area. It also had about seven or eight camping neighbors while we there. It had a laundromat and bakery and gelato store near by. Gelato was done for the season, but we got our clothes cleaned and some bread. Later that night, I climbed back up the entrance ramp to the parking area and got a couple of pizzas. When I went out to walk Salsa at night, it was like a ghost town, everything was very quiet.