2010-02-01 45 10

Mon 1 Feb 2010 in Verona: 45.4945115, 10.8367276 geohashing.info google osm bing/os kml crox

Location

Today's location is in a kiwi orchard near Pescantina, not far from Verona.

Country: Italy; Region: Veneto (EU-IT-34); Province: Verona (EU-IT-VR); comune: Pescantina

Weather: mostly clouded in the morning, later sunny

Expedition

Danatar

The day before, I didn't visit the hashpoint in the Verona graticule because it was already dark when I arrived and I knew that this day's hashpoint would be near, too. I entered the coordinates into my gps (the car gps, because the new outdoor gps was still without working batteries) and started. The gps tried to lead my a different route than I had planned, so I had to fight at every corner to stay on the direct route; sometimes I lost, so I took many small detours. In retrospect, the other route would have been better...

After what felt like ages I arrived at the buildings north of the hashpoint. Most of the "vineyards" (more about that later) were fenced and I didn't want to cross the farm, so I turned around and tried to approach the hashpoint from the east. I parked the car near the building southeast of the hashpoint and walked along a small path towards the hashpoint, zig-zagging between the vineyards and avoiding all buildings and machines. I had to walk a small detour because I was on the lower side of a small but steep slope directly south of the hashpoint and when I was on top I heard people. They hadn't seen me yet but since I expected to need a few minutes to find the exact coordinates I didn't want to be suspicious. So I thought "okay, let's try how good my Italian is" and walked up to them.

Note: I don't speak Italian, I only listened to the first few lessons of a "Learn Italian" audio CD before going to Italy last year to learn a few expressions (Hello - I don't speak Italian - One vanilla ice cream please - Thank you - Bye.) and the most important words for basic conversation. But I speak French and some years ago I also learned Spanish, although I forgot most of the latter. The following conversation took place, my part italicized (in more than one meaning of the word):

"Good day!" - "G'day!" - "Do you understand English?" - "No, but he does a bit." (points to third man a bit further) - I thought: whatever, I'll just try it in Italian: "My name is Danatar, I am German, I make a gaym (I didn't know the Italian word for game, so I took something halfway between Spanisch and Portuguese) for find plaze..." - "He speaks English."

The third man arrived. "Good day!" - "G'day!" - "Do you understand English?" - "No". - Eww..."I make a gaym for find plaze." (he looks at me patiently) "It is an internet gaym for find... (erm, what's the Italian/French/Spanish word for random? think...think...)...plaze." (he looks at me patiently) "Plaze can be..." - "Place" - "Okay, place can be... house or... street or... (now it would be good to know the word for vineyard). Today place is there." I point towards where I think the hashpoint is, he looks at me patiently. "I can go make photo?" - "Okay" - "Thank you. What kind of wine is this?" - "Quivi." - Quivi wine? Never heard of that grape variety, I must have misheard. "Quivi?" - "Yes, kiwi." - oh..."Not wine?" - "Kiwi." - "Thank you, bye"

He went back to work and I walked back to the slope in order to first get the east coordinates right before going north between the vines kiwi plants. I looked at the gps and it said "0.00002 degrees to the west, 0.00001 degrees to the north". What? But I've been in this place before! The conversation was not necessary!

I took pictures of the gps, of myself and of the surroundings, then walked back to the car. The route back to Verona was much straighter and quicker. Having done the important things, I did touristy stuff for the rest of the day.

Danatar earned the Ambassador achievement by obtaining permission from patient and friendly Italian farm workers to access the (45, 10) geohash on 2010-02-01.

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  Two of the Italian workers going back to work.

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  Coordinates reached! With stupid grin

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  Kiwi plants

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  I walked this way

Note: The 2010-02-03 45 11 hashpoint, two days later on the other side of the graticule graticule border would also have been a virgin hashpoint, much easier to reach directly next to a street, but I didn't have enough time that day :-(