The Steps Between the Views

In photographs of Mediterranean hill towns, gravity is mostly an aesthetic benefit. Houses rise attractively above one another. Lanes make elegant turns. A terrace gets its view.

On foot, gravity presents an invoice.

The route that looked inviting from above turns out to involve steps, more steps and a section that was evidently designed by someone with no interest in luggage. The sea remains beautiful whenever it appears, but appearances become less frequent than hoped.

This is not a complaint. It is part of the place acquiring dimensions.

A distant view flattens a town into a shape. Walking restores its resistance: the slope, the narrow section, the turn that conceals another climb. It also reveals how much practical movement a visitor's picturesque route might require. Shopping has to reach a door. A delivery has to fit. A person who lives here may need to make this journey regardless of the temperature or the view.

The traveller can stop to recover and call it photography. Residents are not always afforded that elegant excuse.

At the pause, details emerge. The edge of a step catches light. A handrail carries the line of the climb. A wall offers a short interval of shade. None of these competes with the panorama, yet together they explain the route more honestly.

For the camera, a small figure on the stairs can provide scale. For the writer, the stairs can provide proportion. The town has ceased to be something looked at and become somewhere the body must navigate.

Eventually there is a landing, a seat or the place that justified coming up. The view opens. It may be as lovely as promised.

But now the buildings in it have entrances. The lanes have gradients. The attractive cluster of houses contains routes taken by people carrying ordinary things.

The panorama has gained weight. Somewhere within it is a flight of steps that will be easier on the way down, though perhaps less easy than the photograph suggests.