In Foreign Parts
Genoa & the Ligurian Riviera

In Foreign Parts.

Cycle tour from Munich, via Fern Pass (Alps), through South Tyrol, Lombardy, Milano, to Genoa, by

H. R. and F. E. Rieck,
of Coff’s Harbour, N.S. Wales.

Cornigliano Ligure, near Genoa,
25/10/07.

It gives me great satisfaction that in my advanced time of life I am able to perceive such a great change for the better all over Europe, and especially here in Genoa, which celebrated seaport 20 years ago, like Venice, looked like a deserted beehive, full of monuments of old glorious times, full of luxury, but now forgotten and crumbling to pieces.

When in the year 1887 I made a short trip to Europe, our then unusually large steamer had to lay at anchor far out in the bay of Genoa, as there was no wharf accommodation for such monster vessels. To-day we can see from our windows a crowd of giant steamers of all nations berthed close to newly arranged modern piers (molos). Sailing crafts are plentiful, from the local fishing shebecces, fitted with the pointed bird’s-wing like old style Latin sails, up to the lofty Yankee, British and German square-rigged clipper built sailing ships.

What a change has this Italian mountain coast country on the Mediterranean Sea seen since old Roman times. Since our arrival here, in looking from our balcony, close to the sea, or wandering along the beach or mountain roads, it struck me that the whole of this very lovely and highly interesting country in very many points resembles our own place near Coff’s Harbour. Here the Apennine Mountains protect the lands against land winds from the dry east and the North Polar winds, and, like our Coff’s Harbour coast, is protected against the damaging land winds. Here also, on the Ligurian coast, the temporising breath of the sea and the full sun the whole day, create such a mild (not too hot and not too cold) climate that the wide stretch of shore from Genoa to the French boundary (the Riviera) is studded with sea bathing places and mild winter quarters, which are visited by guests and tourists of all classes from the whole globe.

Originally this land between mountain and sea was very much narrower than that on our North Coast, for on many parts of the Ligurian shore not only the rocks on the headlands, but long stretches of steep rocky shore, have been blasted away to create space for roads, railways and electric trams. There is not such a wide back country as Coff’s Harbour has, along the Orara, Bellinger and Nambucca Rivers, and the many creeks running into the Pacific Ocean, and on the Don Dorrigo plains. Here on the Ligurian coast all the mountain slopes, high and steep, all the many gorges and gullies and valleys, are much more precipitous than at back of my banana plantation north of Coff’s Harbour, yet it is diligently cultivated by the brave, industrious Italians. The whole of these mountains, as far as one can see, are studded with grand villas and farm houses, like in the mountain countries of Leghorn, which I described in previous articles. By enormous labour and expense the land has been cut out into terraces, fenced and walled, and laid out in a homely and picturesque style.

The highest mountain tops around Genoa are crowned with strong modern fortification works, mounted by most powerful and extremely heavy Krupp guns. It is a deplorable fact that, although the Apennine Mountains in ancient times, many centuries before Christ, were densely covered with thick, almost impenetrable forest and scrub, at the present time there is not one country in Europe (except perhaps Spain) which is so poor in timber or wood of any kind as Italy. Here, close to the sea, the mountain slopes on the highest places are covered with grass and heather, protecting the remaining soil from being washed down; but on arid inland parts and in the hot southern regions of Italy the mountain tops, formerly covered with dense forest and shrub, show, instead of fertile soil of loam and humus, sterile and senile rock. This will be the fate of our beautiful coast lands in New South Wales and Queensland if the felling of timber of steep slopes and mountain tops is continued.

In the Ethnological Museums of Southern Europe (especially Switzerland) we noticed the remains of a time when the first settlers of these then wild lands built their log cabins and bark huts on high piles on the shores of rivers and lakes, and frequently within the watery regions of same, their log cabins and bark huts. Such were we, the first settlers at Coff’s Harbour, when the writer of these lines in the neighbourhood of the late Peter Moller, Esq., Billy and the other Bradleys, the Carrolls, J. Small, J. Marles, the late G. Shepherd, Wingfield, Newport, Fuller, Tom Albert, and many others, built their first modest huts in the year 1881, not in, but near, Coff’s Harbour.

What enormous changes has this Ligurian Riviera experienced in the past, and what great future awaits the paradisian Riviera of Coff’s Harbour and the whole North Coast of New South Wales! The very steep heights here are at present devoid of their indigenous flora of dense timber and jungle; but they are full of all classes of buildings of art, and full of very gay humanity. But the eternal sea, in breaking against the raw rocky shores and artificial bulwarks, sings the same old melody as thousands of years ago, and the same melody as the breakers on the shores of the Pacific along our virgin beautiful forest mountains of Coff’s Harbour, for which future will prepare similar changes as the past has done here on the Riviera di Ligure.

The present transatlantic, European and Colonial trade from the shores of the North Sea with America and around the Cape of Good Hope spoilt during the last centuries the old Levante trade, which, in ancient times, after the Crusades, built up the richness and glory of Constantinople, Venice, and Genoa. At present, long after the downfall of that trade and the grand times of the Republics of Venice and Genoa, it is interesting to behold the wonderful strides which in consequence of the opening of the Suez Canal old Genoa is now making towards their ancient prosperity. Following the mightily increasing traffic by the call of an enormous number of gigantic transatlantic and other steamers and sailing crafts of every few minutes, and the passing and repassing of railway trains in all directions, the streets all along the sea shore, as well as in the city, are thronged by an enormous traffic to such an extent that whole rows of houses are being pulled down to widen the streets for the passing of carts, electric trams, omnibuses, cabs, etc. The clang and bustle of manufactories, shipbuilding, wharves, and warehouses is getting so vigorous that old aristocratic families, who, since the times of the Governments of the Doges of Genoa (Doria, Grimaldi and others), are now selling their castles, parks, etc., to business societies for the erection of factories, warehouses, etc. In the neighbouring town of Sampiedarena we often visit such a grand ducal castle, which was bought by that town and turned into a public garden, while the castle itself is used as a State school (independent of the convents and church). This place, with its park lands, garden, ponds, cedar and poplar walks, artistically laid out in the Roccocco style, is a veritable monument of the old times of the Genoese Republic. We often sit and walk in this “Giardino publico” between broken old marble columns, statues and other classic ornaments, on terraces, connected with marble staircases, and giant palms, Lebanon, cedars laurel, and flower beds of all descriptions, and think of the wonderful changes that have taken place.

This village, where we had a rest from the hardships of our last great cycle tour over the Alps from Munich and through the whole Tyrol and Lombardy, is a place inhabited mainly by families of fishermen. On suitable days we see their fleet of small sailing boats, two of them dragging between them a long net, in all directions on the sea. Besides fish, a great many small octopus, stingarees and similar other dwellers of the deep are caught, which are all saleable and eaten by all classes of Italians.

We live here in a very nicely furnished spacious room, with French windows and Venetian blinds opening towards a broad verandah, with a view all along the coast and over the sea, which stretches out southward. Although the life in the Genoese hotels is extremely expensive, a private life as we live is as cheap and comfortable as on any of our journeys. Even meat, which we expected to find dear in this part of Italy, is cheaper than in England, Germany and France. Vegetables of all descriptions are cheap, also all kinds of fruit. Only tea, oatmeal, tobacco, salt, and sugar are dear, in consequence of a heavy duty. The temperature north of the Alps Mountains, so exposed towards the north winds, is so severe and cold that we resolved to spend the next European winter on the southern side of the formidable snow-capped wall of the Alps.