“Just a stroll. No detours,” I told myself with the conviction of a woman who had just put on comfortable shoes. I drew a short, straight line in my notebook. It was a perfectly respectable plan. It lasted until the first corner.
An imagined story inspired by original Travel2City photographs. The four scenes bring together separate stops, rather than a one-day itinerary. The character, events and lighting are an artistic interpretation.
In Šibenik, a sudden rush of wings stopped me. Pigeons scattered above the narrow lane and briefly reorganised the entire blue sky. I looked up. “Which way, then?” I asked the noisy committee. Most headed round the corner. Two stayed on the roof, presumably objecting to the minutes. I waited for the air to settle, then turned after them. In my notebook, I recorded the first detour as a decision passed by a majority vote. Surely I wasn't going to argue with democracy at the very start of a stroll.
In Split, I stepped between old walls and discovered that the loveliest room on a journey need not have a ceiling at all. Clear blue shone through the tall windows. I crossed the stone paving a little more slowly than necessary. My dress moved just as it should with each step. For a moment, I let myself be the only guest at my own small fashion show. Then a pebble crunched under my sole and ceremoniously brought me back to earth. “Thank you for the applause,” I whispered. The straight line in my notebook acquired a second elegant bend.
In Trogir, I caught myself walking in precisely the opposite direction to the one I had planned. I was about to turn back. Then the water opened up in front of me, with a whole row of houses, roofs and a tower beyond it. Had I obeyed the plan, I would probably have been looking at my own cross expression in a shop window by now. Instead, I stood on the quay with the entire town before me. I kept the notebook closed. This detour had no need to justify its mileage. For a while, I simply watched the straight stone walls become wonderfully unruly lines in the water.
Above Hvar, I finally sat down. Roofs, harbour and sea lay before me; on my lap was a notebook with a line that now resembled a lock of my hair after a long day. I looked at it, then down at the town. From up here, all those detours looked almost sensible. I crossed out “the shortest route” and wrote “my route”. Beside it, I added a little arrow. Not because anything was missing from the view. It was just that, on the way up, I had noticed one more little lane. And it really was only one corner away.
“The shortest route would have been too short.”
From notebook to book
The Map with No Last Page
The world of Travel2City continues between the covers of a book. Discover The Map with No Last Page and more illustrated journeys.
