Yesterday we left Krakow, the city’s red-tiled roofs fading behind us as we wound south through countryside that grew increasingly hilly and forested.
The air smelled of damp earth and pine, and a crisp breeze hinted at the mountains ahead. The Tatra range rose like jagged sentinels, their snow-dusted peaks brushing the clouds and casting long shadows over the valleys below. Crossing them felt like passing through a threshold into another world, one where time slowed and the rhythm of life was set by the whisper of the wind through the trees.
We wandered through the quiet streets of Levoča as twilight softened the town’s ancient walls, our footsteps echoing softly on cobbles worn by centuries.
The inaugural concert of the Indian Summer Music Festival awaited, presided over by Nadia, a local and the wife of an old university friend.
Inside the early nineteenth-century theatre, music unfolded like a tapestry of memory and emotion. Beethoven’s First pulsed with the youthful ardor of Romeo and Juliet; Ullmann’s Third trembled with the shadow of Auschwitz, completed just before he was taken.to the gas chambers; Shostakovich’s Eighth burned with the relentless fury of Stalingrad. Every note rang with precision and intensity, carving through the theatre’s fine acoustics, leaving echoes of grief, hope, and defiance lingering in the air.
Stepping back into the night, President Tusk’s warning weighed upon us: we are closer to war than ever. The fragility of peace pressed quietly, a shadow over the streets we had walked. At our charming Slovakian cottage, rain tapped gently on the roof, a soft rhythm that carried us toward sleep, where music, memory, and the delicate present intertwined. Dreams arrived slowly, cradled in the gentle cadence of falling drops, as history, beauty, and the ever-present uncertainty of our times merged into the quiet intimacy of the night.
Ieri abbiamo lasciato Cracovia, i tetti rossi della città che svanivano alle nostre spalle mentre ci dirigevamo verso sud attraverso una campagna che diventava sempre più collinare e boscosa.
L’aria profumava di terra umida e pino, e una brezza frizzante anticipava le montagne davanti a noi. I Monti Tatra si ergevano come sentinelle frastagliate, le loro cime innevate sfioravano le nuvole e proiettavano lunghe ombre sulle valli sottostanti. Attraversare era come varcare la soglia di un altro mondo, un mondo dove il tempo rallentava e il ritmo della vita era scandito dal sussurro del vento tra gli alberi.
Nel tardo pomeriggio abbiamo raggiunto la Slovacchia e la città di Levoca, patrimonio dell’UNESCO, dove ci aspettava l’accogliente cottage di Eva: un rifugio accogliente lontano dal trambusto della strada, con il debole profumo di fumo di legna che usciva dal camino e la dolce promessa di riposo.