Life Without Phone Signal on the Italian Coast

It is a warm winter morning here on the southern coast of Italy, and the turquoise waters are shimmering quietly between the forested cliffs, with soft rays of sunlight filtering through the trees and reflecting off the gentle ripples of the sea. The air smells of salt and pine, and the only sounds are those of the waves lapping against the rocks and the distant calls of seabirds. If you're new here, hi, I'm Jessica, and I live in my wooden campervan Bilbo with my partner Risi and our adopted puppy Heidi. A year ago, we bought our second-hand van and converted it using natural and reclaimed materials. Since then, we've been travelling around Europe in the slow lane to reconnect with nature and grow roots in the wild. We've been parked in this gorgeous spot not far from the town of Vieste in Gargano National Park, which lies on the spur of Italy. Although it's the middle of winter, it's still 15 degrees outside, so while we usually start our day drinking coffee in bed these days, we couldn't resist the pull of the rising sun and decided to have coffee sitting on the cliff overlooking the sea. This park up has absolutely no phone signal, and we've been thoroughly enjoying being disconnected from the world and completely immersed in the beautiful nature around us. It may seem inconvenient to most people, but we absolutely love having no signal while we sleep. It makes our mornings just so much more intentional, and we can always just drive a few minutes if we need to be connected for work. But today, we didn't really have to be anywhere, so we started the day at a slow pace, reading our books and preparing a healthy breakfast to eat by the sea. This has got to be one of our favourite views ever in our one year living in the van, and because it's out of season, there was absolutely no one there, so we've had this little slice of paradise entirely to ourselves for a few days now. On days like this one, it's just so tempting to lie in bed all day with the back doors open, reading our books and letting our eyes wander across the landscape. But we had spotted that there was a tiny little trail right next to our park up, so we decided to scramble downhill to see what lay hidden between the cliffs. It was a very steep descent, and we had to navigate quite carefully because clearly not many people were walking here. But after 10 minutes, we were rewarded with an incredible hidden beach, surrounded by forest which we had all to ourselves. The water was a perfectly clear turquoise colour, and it was a beautiful sunny day. We honestly couldn't believe that this unknown place was right next to where we had parked up, and our puppy Heidi absolutely loved running around looking for rocks to play with. The water is actually the same temperature as most beaches in the UK in the summer, so it was actually really pleasant to swim in. We felt so grateful gliding through the clear waves with the gentle warmth of the sun on our skin, and the perfect quietude of the place made it feel almost otherworldly. We did some water training with Heidi because she's still not super comfortable going in the water, but she's making really good progress, and to her credit, she is a very strong swimmer, even though she's not super keen on it. This place was so peaceful, and we could have stayed here forever, but being surrounded by cliffs, the beach was actually completely in the shade, and once we got a bit chilly and hungry, we decided to head back to the van. Wherever we travel, we make an effort to only buy local and seasonal produce, and one of our favourite meals recently has been fennel pasta with fresh tomatoes, garlic, mushrooms, and my goodness, these tomatoes in Italy are unlike anything I've ever tasted. Usually Rissi does most of the cooking, but fennel pasta is my speciality, so it's one of the rare times you'll find me in the kitchen. So as much as we enjoyed having a little taste of winter van life, we are very happy to be in the sun now by the sea. It's 15 degrees, it's really lovely, it's what we needed after our week of misfortune. First our diesel heater broke, we don't exactly know why, but it just spews out a lot of white smoke when we try and turn it on. So we just didn't bother, we couldn't find anyone who wanted to fix it for us, and we're not brave enough to try ourselves, so we just left it and we drove as far south as possible. And then our locking system stopped working, which was fine for a bit, but it meant that we couldn't leave the van together, which is a bit rubbish, and it kind of limits where you can spend the night, because although the alarm was still setting, so the alarm would have gone off if someone tried entering the van from the outside, it's still a bit disconcerting when you're trying to sleep and you know someone can't walk into your van. So it took us about a week or so to find someone to sort that out, and it turned into a much bigger job than we could have anticipated. We had to rip out half of our kitchen, but when we reassembled it the drawers started closing a lot more smoothly when you put it all back together again, so that's a plus. Maybe my carpentry skills have improved a little bit since we built the van. Oi, oi! Heidi! What are you doing? Yeah it was really weird because 90% of the time everything kind of works, and the last time we had to do any actual work on the van was like nine months ago, when we were in the Pyrenees in the spring. We had to replace our brake pads after we went down a very very steep mountain, but yeah since then everything had been kind of working, and then everything happened kind of at the same time, which was a little bit worrying, but we think that the cold might have triggered it, and we're now in much warmer temperatures, so hopefully we won't have any more trouble. We are without a heater though now, and we probably will be without a heater for the whole winter because we just can't find anyone outside the UK who's willing to look at it, but when we were in Spain last winter we weren't really using our diesel heater all winter, so we're hoping that we're going to be fine without a heater in Greece. Yeah I think we probably will be as long as we don't go to the mountains. Yeah I do want to, yes I do want to go to the mountains. Maybe we can go for day trips and then just like park in the foothills, but we'll see. For now we're leaving our beautiful park up here by the sea because there's lots of really cool medieval towns nearby, and Rithi is a bit of a history geek. He has a degree in history, so we're gonna drive to one of those towns today and check it out, and then slowly make our way along the coast looking at all the towns, and we might also go to the woods for the weekend to do some walking there. Fiesta is built on top of ancient caves which have been inhabited since prehistoric times, where they provided protection from harsh weather and invaders for early settlements. Over the centuries Fiesta expanded and its structures were built above the caves using the natural rock formations as foundations. Long ago when Fiesta was a tiny quaint fishing village, a handsome young fisherman named Pitsamono was known not only for his skill at sea, but also for his striking appearance. But Pitsamono's heart belonged solely to the beautiful Cristalda, a local maiden whose grace and charm were the pride of the town. The two shared a love so deep that it seemed that nothing could tear them apart. Every day Pitsamono would sail out to sea and cast his nets to make a living, but as he worked he caught the attention of the sirens who inhabited the waters near Fiesta. The sirens were enchanted by Pitsamono's beauty and would sing to him to try and seduce him, offering him treasures and immortality. But Pitsamono's love for Cristalda was stronger and he declined the siren's offers, declaring that his heart belonged to Cristalda only. The sirens were furious and consumed by jealousy and so they started plotting their revenge. One evening the couple went on a romantic stroll along the shore when the sirens emerged from the waves. They seized Cristalda and dragged her into the sea, leaving Pitsamono helpless against their supernatural power. Overwhelmed by grief, Pitsamono was transformed into a towering white limestone monolith which stands on Fiesta's shore to this day, gazing out over the sea where Cristalda was taken. We were parked right by the seafront for the day so after exploring the town for a few hours we decided to go for another dip in the sea. We were getting quite a few funny looks from locals but if I'm being completely honest that's something you get used to living in a van. Well that was short but refreshing. I do feel a lot cleaner now. People are filming us. I guess the locals are not really used to people swimming here in the winter but the temperature of the water is like Wales in the summer. Yeah it's just what you're used to isn't it? Yeah. So now we're going to go to the supermarket to get some veg before we drive into the forest. We're going to do our laundry because we just do it once a month whenever we're in a town and it's convenient and then we're gonna have a nice dinner. We found a place that apparently has a vegan menu, not far from here. After that we're going to drive into the woods and just walk in the woods for a few days and be a bit away from towns again. It was closed. It was closed. That's a shame. Stomach was definitely ready for some pizza. Did you just say stomach and tummy at the same time? Stomach. Tasty. We're gonna have some stew in the woods. Oh yeah. Yes let's have some stew but first let's get into the woods. If you enjoyed this episode don't forget to subscribe for weekly van life adventures, how we live more sustainably on the road and the folklore we encounter on our travels. Until then I hope you have a lovely week ahead and we'll see you next time. Take good care. Bye.