How about we collectively respond to this short answer question...hopefully we can all let in on each other's tricks to responding
Text Two - Non-fiction (4 marks)
Just Back: a heavenly walk in Italy (Janet Rogers)
Nino, our walking guide, promised to take us to the best restaurant in Italy for lunch, but how he would manage to combine fine dining with a remote mountain walk, I wasn’t sure.
We were to walk the Path of the Gods, a high and heavenly way above the Amalfi Coast in Italy, across wild and precipitous terrain.
We took the local train to Castellammare di Stabia, then a bus, which wound up mountain roads past lemon groves and olive trees and meadows of yellow flowers.
At Bomerano, the village where the Path of the Gods begins, we stopped for coffee in a family-run café and Nino chatted to the owners. We admired, but resisted, the St Joseph’s Day cakes in the large glass cabinet: big iced balls, like profiteroles, full of cream with soft icing and a cherry on top. Then we set off in thick mist down stone steps out of the village. We knew the sea was somewhere below us, but we couldn’t see it. It was actually 1,800ft down and in places the rocky drop was almost vertical.
The path is an ancient track above the Mediterranean. For centuries it was the only route for local people and travellers. Farmers still work the narrow terraces. A man planting potatoes greeted us as we emerged from the mist. We could hear the clanging of goat bells high in the mountain, but we could not see the animals themselves.
Nino stopped to point out wild violets growing in rocky crevices and he picked a tiny white flower so we could smell its honey scent. We saw mint and wild thyme and high bushes of white heather. Then, as if we had stepped into the past, a man on a mule came towards us; the mule picking its way carefully over the rocky ground.
The mist cleared a little and we looked down on the village of Priano and the Convent of St Domenica with its neatly tilled terraces and vineyards.
At times Nino strode ahead, nimbly picking his way like the mule we had seen. At other times he walked with us, pointing out emerald euphorbia and lapillo, a white, light volcanic rock.
At midday we rounded a rocky corner. Nino had found a picnic bench on a precipice and he’d laid out a crusty loaf, sweet tomatoes, fat olives and a local cheese, caciocavallo, which looked like a giant pear.
As we sat, the mist lifted, the sun came out and the sea shone like tinsel. The bells in the church tower in the village below chimed midday and the sound echoed around the mountain. Bees buzzed in the purple rosemary. It was, without doubt, the best restaurant in Italy.
How does the text use language techniques to establish the beauty of the author’s experience?
