Genoa - The Last Italian Port of Call

Friday, October 28, 2011 Eva 0 Comments




Our last stop-off in Italy before heading into France was the birthplace of Christopher Columbus (a fact still being questioned among historians) – the port city of Genoa.  We left from the Cinque Terre, detouring off at pretty Santa Margherita, a short distance away from our base in Levanto, which we turned into a major feat of time and driving due to misinterpreting ambiguous GPS directions.  We also wanted to drive through Portofino, 2 minutes away from St Margherita, but were turned away by a police roadblock at Portofino’s one and only entry road.  The town was “full” and no more cars were being allowed in!  How quaint does that sound.
Onwards to Genoa on the Ligurian coast, theoretically an hour’s drive away, where we’d booked an overnight hotel stay near the harbour before driving into France.

Ok, Miss Moneypenny, our GPS electronic gal – “the all-knowing one” whom we depend on to find our way through Italy or we’d still be lost – kept silent when Genoa’s tricky motorways rapidly split into two directions at regular intervals. We drove through the city exit tolls twice until we could make sense of Moneypenny’s directions, with Max by my side blowing his brains off in frustration.  She was patient and unresponsive as Max unleashed a barrage of choice words at her.
"Recalculating....recalculating" was her mantra as we took many wrong turn-offs.  “Arriving at destination on left”, says Moneypenny as Max swung the car into the hotel’s driveway located on the right. It was a great relief to finally arrive. 
Genoa is a grungy, mangy kind of place. It is the least Italian city we’ve explored and yet there was something about it that we liked.   Maybe it was refreshing to be in a gritty place after all the prettiness of Chianti and Cinque Terre. Tall apartment blocks spill down Genoa’s steep granite hillsides which fan out along the coast.  A melting pot of cultures, there is every shade of skin colour that points to its long history as a trade port.  As you walk its streets you pass by eating places such as sushi bars, kebab joints and others with names such as Shanghai Kitchen or Orient Express. Foccacia with pesto and spaghetti with pesto sauce are some of the local Ligurian specialties.

Alleyway, historic centre

In the old historic part of town across from the harbour are homeless street people with dogs.  The vicoli (narrow laneways) are dark, depressing and forbidding.  Old buildings are so tall and so close together that sunlight doesn’t penetrate down to ground level.  Squeezed in from all fronts by aged buildings is one of the most amazing-looking black and white striped churches, Cattedrale di San Lorenzo.  Two huge beautifully-sculpted marble lions sit guarding either side of its entrance.
The renovated harbour, Porto Antico, is a palm tree-lined waterfront with restaurants, bars, luxury yachts, the Biosphere, a pirate ship and a contraption called Il Bigo that looks like a giant hoist that takes you up in a rotating lift for panoramic views of the harbour.  Genoa Aquarium, which we visited, spreads out across the pier and onto a floating engineless barge with great exhibits. There was a festive atmosphere about the harbour as eating stalls, vendors and performers had set up for a temporary event that we couldn’t make out – possibly political PR – but we enjoyed joining in the celebrations.


Both sides of modern sculpture,
Porto Antico


Whilst strolling the harbour front I was approached (but not Max) by someone handing out leaflets to a Tattoo Convention being held in Genoa on the weekend.  Now seriously - I ask you, do I look like the kind of person who is into skin art?  It seems like nearly every second Italian sports a tattoo of some kind, so I guess there’s a niche market for a communal gathering for the inked-skin ones.  We’ve seen a huge variety of tats on a range of body parts throughout Italy – a few tasteful ones, some pretty ghastly ones and others in places that makes you question whether the tattoo owners were conscious when they chose their design and location.
We really couldn’t do Genoa justice in the short time that we had, although we would have loved to discover more.  Looking at the tourist map, it listed nearly 50 palazzi around the city centre (we wouldn’t even try had we had the time!), bucketloads of churches, museums and monuments and many panoramic viewpoints by funicular.  Genoa is a city daring to be explored.

On the steps of Cattedrale di San Lorenzo
and below
its beautiful detailed facade



Leaving Italy after almost 3 weeks, we are now well and truly gluten-ed out by Italian pizza, pasta and panini – and may we say, most of them of excellent taste and quality.  Our final night in the country, however, was spent eating Turkish kebabs washed down with ayran, a Turkish sour and salty kind of yoghurt that we’ve enjoyed on previous travels to Turkey.
The cost of food as we’ve motored through Italy has been excellent value.  An example - Max had to question the café if he was charged correctly (ie, undercharged) for a breakfast of 2 coffees (caffe latte) and 2 croissants = €3-80.  Admittedly, it wasn’t in Rome.  Any longer in the country, though, and my body would have popped out into the shape of a gnocchi ball.

Coming face-to-face with Genoa Aquarium's sea creatures

The opposite to Russian table service (ie, just as the fork leaves your lips with the last mouthful of food a waiter appears from the wings and whisks your plate away), in Italy once you eat and ask for the bill you could be left sitting staring at the walls or the scenery for a long time.  Looks like they’re in no hurry to take your money or have you out of there quickly.
Maybe it’s this time of the year, the end of the summer holiday season when everyone is more relaxed, but drivers in Italy have not seemed as notorious as the stories we’d heard.  Highways and motorways have not seen the busy crowded streams of traffic as we’d expected.  What we’ve found most impressive is how the Italians are terribly skilled at manoeuvring around and parking their vehicles in the smallest and tightest of spaces, not that they have a choice.

Arrivederci, bellissima Italia.  Farewell to panini, now we begin the baguette.  We head over the border to France next where we bonjour our way around for two months.

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Cinque Terre

Monday, October 24, 2011 Eva 2 Comments

Vernazza, one of the Cinque Terre villages

As mentioned in the last post, we were fortunate to have been offered an apartment in Levanto, a 5-minute train trip away from the Cinque Terre villages (literally translates as the Five Lands), when all around the region places were full for the summer.  On our arrival into town, Paola the hotel owner, left her busy little hotel behind, hopped on to her scooter and zipped away leaving us to follow her to her rental apartment.  This apartment is where she used to live when newly married pre-children, she explained to us as she showed us around but now it’s rented out to tourists.  Paola’s parents live in the apartment next door and we were introduced to the kindly mama.

The place was perfect for our 5 day stay, although in the end we wished we could have stayed longer, but it was fully booked.  A one-bedroom flat with separate kitchen, lounge room and bathroom (by the by, what’s with all the bidets in Italy and who uses them these days?) on the 4th floor of an apartment block in the centre of town that overlooked gardens below and a 3-minute walk to the beach – fantastic!  It felt as though we were going to be living like locals.  


A light Levanto lunch
Levanto is a much larger town than any of the five Cinque Terre villages, and proved to be a great base. It’s attractive in its own right with colourful painted facades in trompe l’oeil (the painting technique that makes something look three-dimensional).  Levanto has a long gravel and black sandy beach where, although constantly crowded, we still managed to find space to spread out two beach towels side-by-side – that’s a big accomplishment on a tightly packed Italian beach. For some meals, we dined on fresh figs, sweet golden peaches, Italian cheeses, prosciutto and Toscano ham with bread whilst sitting on our balcony after a swim. What a life!

Stepping outside the apartment, we were metres away from shops, restaurants, gelaterias, bars, cafes and pizzerias with the train station a 10-15 minute walk away.  The Cinque Terre villages – Monterosso, Vernazza, Corniglia, Manarola and Riomaggiore – don’t allow access into their centres by car, so being close to the train station was handy. 


Street in Levanto at siesta time,
with the Appenines in the background

Max in his Italian straw hat
on Levanto's waterfront

We were looking forward to cereal for breakfast which we hadn’t eaten in quite a while, and so we went grocery shopping.  Cereal is not a customary part of the Italian breakfast regime, but I was missing it after the same choices that we’d had for weeks on end in Greece and Italy - bread, jam, coffee, occasionally cheese and cold cuts. In Italy, Italian croissants (always filled with custard – puke! - please leave the croissants to the French) or pastries (always filled with custard, not again!). Unlike Max, I couldn’t face slices of nitrate for breakfast – let’s leave that for lunch. 

Corniglia's colourful homes sit high on the cliff

Below, vines and fruit trees on terraces around Corniglia

On our first morning we discovered there were no bowls for cereal in the apartment.  I knocked on mama’s and papa’s next door apartment.  He arrived in his summer pyjamas (oops, at 8.30 am I’d woken him up) and he began rifling through the kitchen cupboards and drawers.  Holding the cereal box in one hand and making a bowl shape with my other whilst imitating eating he starts to narrow down the choices – spoon, side plate, stainless steel cooking pot.  Gosh, I must be shocking at charades – failed Non-Verbal Communication 101.  
Max says “for soup”.  Papa holds out a china cup on a saucer. Hmm, I’m thinking that should fit about 2 tablespoons of cereal flakes and 6 sultanas.  “Ohh, no”, I say, shaking my head, “that’s a coffee cup”.  “N-o-o-o, this is not for coffee”, he says reaching up to the overhead cabinet and bringing down a tiny espresso cup “ …THIS is a coffee cup”.  Okay, we’re in Italy, I should have figured.  Anyway, mama went shopping that day and there sitting on the kitchen table on our return that evening were 4 Goldilocks-sized patterned bowls –bigger than a teacup and smaller than a saucepan – that were just right.

We were here to visit the colourful little UNESCO-heritage Cinque Terre villages so we decided to see them first by ferryboat before tackling the coastal Blue Trail (the ‘Sentiero Azzuro’) that connects all five villages.  In this way we got a good clear view of all of them from the water and would better appreciate the sights before commencing the hot sweaty job of hiking.

The pretty villages cascade down the rocks to the water’s edge or otherwise sit clinging like barnacles to cliff faces, with the Ligurian Appenines curtaining the surrounding background.  Parts of hillslopes are farmed terraces and a railway track that passes through mountain tunnels links all the coastal towns and villages.  

Manarola spills down to the rocky water's edge

The weather was extremely hot and humid and we wished we’d taken our bathers (swimming costumes for non-Sandgropers) with us on the boat trip.  The brilliant blue of the waters taunted us all day long as we hopped on and off the ferry from one port to the next.  Beaches are not as we Aussies would define them. In Manarola, swimmers jump into the sea from huge granite boulders around the bays and were using the rocks and boat ramp for sunbathing.  In Vernazza and Riomaggiore a tiny patch of sand at each inlet is the spot for swimmers.  Monterosso’s long sandy beachfront was lined with perfect formations of patterned beach umbrellas to one side and a free-for-all crowded strip on the other. But, hey, when the sun’s beating down so hot, who cares as long as you can reach the water.


Swimmers take the plunge


Sentinels of umbrellas in military formations
Tans, tattoos and torsos were in abundance.  There were plenty of Euro-poses for photos – it’s a lift and a roll of the shoulder, toss of the hair and sideways sultry look at the camera. I’m still working on mine, it’s taking a bit of practise and I’ve yet to perfect it.


We enjoyed a delightful seafood lunch at Manarola, found the-Best-Lemon-Granita-Ever in Monterosso made with real lemons from the local orchards, and came home with bottles of limoncino liqueur and pesto, specialties made in the area. The villages are brightly painted and so picturesque, but expect to walk up and down many steps that connect different street levels.


Tiny backstreets linked by stairs

When you’ve seen it all at ground level there’s nowhere else but up after that.  So then, after paying our National Park fee it was time to tackle The Hike which we planned to do over 2 days.  We would walk from Riomaggiore to Vernazza and then pace it out by completing the final and most difficult leg, Vernazza to Monterosso, the following day so that we wouldn’ t drop dead from heat exhaustion and muscle aches.

We got an early start to avoid the worst of the heat. Problems with train delays, however, put paid to that intention.  The first section from Riomaggiore to Manarola, called Via dell’Amore, was an easy paved stroll of about 20 minutes overlooking the Ligurian Sea.  And it’s no wonder that it’s called lovers’ lane, the views are stunning.  Numerous couples in love have left ribbons and locked padlocks hanging on the netting covering parts of the rock face.


Spectacular coastline from Via dell'Amore

The one-kilometre trail connecting Manarola and Corniglia was closed because of a landslide earlier in the year so that meant waiting to catch a train onwards and then an over-crowded bus ride up the steep slope to this colourful hamlet.  Corniglia has tall, painted building squished together on tiny hillside streets and micro-sized piazzas.  It doesn’t have direct access to the sea by boat as it sits high above the water but its outskirts can be reached by road.

 
Hiking past olive and fig trees
 
Hiking from Corniglia to Vernazza, the longest section by distance, took 1 ½ hours to walk the 4 kilometres following the scenic coastline. The narrow trail undulated up, down and around hill sides past grapevines, olive and fruit trees. Yachts could be seen sailing by in the cool waters far below.  The humidity and heat were building up as we headed into midday.  Vernazza was a very beautiful sight to behold as we approached over the ridge and down the stone steps. Its church bell tower and stone castle towers overlooking the harbour come into view as you near the village.

 
Hiking trail between Vernazza and Monterosso

A lunch break of pesto pizza on the steps along the main street with other tourists was a welcome and cool respite, and then came time to challenge ourselves.  Could we continue knowing that the next section would be difficult and it was afternoon when the sun was at its peak?  We asked each other if we were up to it. Both of us felt that we still had plenty of fuel in the tank.  As we tend to subtly spur each other on, I don’t think either of us would have given in and admitted that we wouldn’t do it, whether we could or not. Anyway, completing the whole trail in one day would give us extra swimming and relaxation time we reasoned.  Good-o, then off we go!

Following the blue and white striped route markers through Vernazza’s backstreets, uphill and onwards to Monterosso took us nearly 2 ½ hours to complete the 3 km steep hike.  The path narrowed further as we slowly ascended.  In places the trail was rough with loose stones and uneven steps.  In others, thin dusty dirt paths barely wide enough to accommodate a fat goat’s belly (it is an old mule track, after all) followed the mountain edges where it would be a long rough fall if you lost your footing.  All the while, spectacular coastal views were to our left (west) and we stopped numerous times not only to catch our breath but to remember to look back over our shoulders for views of the villages hugging the cliffs and inlets.


The rough track narrows

It was hot sweaty work, although not as strenuous as we’d expected it to be.  Along the way, I was captivated by the numerous and unusual delicate spider webs that stretched like the finest of fine organza miniature trapeze artist nets across wild untamed shrubs.  We passed fig and cypress trees, tangled bushes of wild berries and terraces of untended orchards. Apart from buzzing bees, no animal or insect life was visible under the blue cloudless sky but cicadas could be heard loud and clear.



Look how high we've climbed!
Vernazza in the distance as we look behind us


We passed hikers coming from the opposite direction (much harder hike this way as it’s more uphill) who looked quite professional with their walking poles whilst others wore only bathers.  Some women walked in high heel shoes (? ? confounded by that!), others inappropriately dressed for the heat in synthetic long sleeved tops in the sweat-inducing humidity and yet others wore tiny tops and no hat under the blistering sun.

In the last half kilometre that steeply descended closer towards Monterosso, Max’s knees gave him a hard time and mine were beginning to complain.  We slackened the pace considerably as Max tackled the downhill steps slowly and painfully.  Once we reached flat ground his knees thankfully settled back to normal. A salt-encrusted layer of Ligurian dust coated us as we re-hydrated at the end of the trail and we celebrated the finish with one more of Monterosso’s icy cold lemon granitas.

Monterosso beach

We thought we’d pull up really sore the next day but surprisingly both of us were in fine form with no aches or pains, apart from a headache on my part.  Mission accomplished as well as a tick next to “hike the Cinque Terre” on our mental wishlist of world wonders to see and do.  We’ve sunned, swam, hiked and sampled the Cinque Terre delights.  Toscano salami and proscuitto with a great tasting Toscano pecorino cheese have been our favourite staples, but no vino.  Our bodies needed hydrating after the litres they’d lost up in the Cinque Terre mountains.  Both of us would have loved to have explored more hiking trails around this area, many that stretch up through vineyards and to inland villages.  As we say to each other, gotta leave something for next time, which is another way of comforting ourselves with the belief that we will return.






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The Walled City of Lucca

Wednesday, October 19, 2011 Eva 0 Comments

Allora (as the Italians would say), our next Italian stopover after leaving the Chianti area is Lucca in the north-west part of Tuscany.  It’s Sunday morning and the church bells are ringing crazily two doors away from our hotel.  In Italy you’re never too far away from a church or the sound of ringing bells.  The weather is hot and muggy today. It’s expected to reach 40 degrees, the first time we’ve experienced such high temps since our time in Uzbekistan.  It’s far too steamy to be out walking the medieval streets until the temperature drops a few C’s and the coastal breeze reaches us. We’re a long way off for a dip in the ocean waters which would be the perfect antidote to today’s heat.
This is the birthplace of Puccini, which we weren’t aware of (embarrassed to say we hadn’t done much research before our arrival). His operas are performed here and cafes and restaurants are named after him. Pasticcerias (patisseries) make references to Puccini through their wares, aka Madama Butterfly cakes. We didn’t get around to tasting any theatrically-sounding sweets, nor go to any operas, a shame; although 'La Boheme', one of my absolute favourites, was not being performed which made me feel a teensy bit better.  His birthplace was closed for renovation until next month – so no luck on all Puccini fronts.

Puccini's birthplace sits at the far corner of this piazza

We’re here, however, because Lucca is the only completely walled-in town in Italy with its original Renaissance walls still intact as it hadn’t been bombed in WWII.  We’d heard great things about this place. It has a fascinating history where it was a centre of silk production in the Middle Ages (although there doesn’t seem to be any evidence of this now) and Napoleon Bonaparte’s sister ruled the city for a while.

Our first evening here was spent strolling the 4km circuit that crowns the top of the city’s ramparts.  We joined cyclists, joggers, walkers and families with prams partaking in a little passeggiata (promenading) on this wide path that is lined with trees up at this height.  Earlier that day, for a higher elevation, we climbed to the top of Lucca’s tower of the hour (ie, historic clock tower) for panoramic views across terracotta rooftops, palazzos, churches and hill-surrounded backdrops.  Memories of past travels to the land of pizzas and piazzas came flooding back – I’d forgotten how the leg and butt muscles get a good workout climbing all those ancient steps and towers.
Max practising his Tyrolean hiker's pose
on Lucca's ramparts

Although Lucca is very close to Pisa and Florence we chose to stay away from these heavily touristed places. The summer heat, parking woes and tourist crowds made it a definite no-go zone for us. Florence, as we’d previously discovered, is uncomfortably jam-packed any time of the year, and we agreed that it would be best to come back to Italy in cooler climes to visit these locations.

We climbed more than 200 steps to the top of the Torre delle Ore
for panoramic views

So we took in Lucca at a leisurely pace. Several churches and cathedrals, its city gates and little streets, a Roman amphitheatre whose ruins had turned into a piazza with housing over the ages now with cafes and restaurants, sampling the gelati, naturally.……. We also had the chance to sit in front of our hotel room’s TV which we hadn’t done for simply ages, watching programs dubbed in Italian as well as some very old, ghastly Aussie TV series and movies (real shockers that must surely had been a bargain for Italian networks to purchase). We understood barely an Italian word emanating from the idiot box, but sat there mutely like zombies attracted to the moving pictures.

More interesting than Italian TV, a monthly antique market in the piazzas around the Cattedrale di San Martino and spilling into other side streets had us browsing old oil paintings, American 1960’s-1970’s costume jewellery, African crafts, retro furniture as well as vintage bric-a-brac. Max lingered over the timeworn English sports goods, an unusual place to find such a collection.  The term ‘antique’ seemed a little fluid.

Antique markets around the Cathedral



It’s August (I’m way behind in posting my blogs, as you can tell,) and the summer sales are on.  Comparing prices with those back home, clothing in Italy is great value.  I went from trying medium sizes to large…. then extra-large.  I gave up after devastating moments in front of many fitting-room mirrors with pants that would pull up just a little further than the knees and tops that would best serve me as either a straightjacket or a neck warmer. The only thing that fitted was a scarf. Come on, are all Italian women really that small? You’d have to be 10 years old to fit into some of those boutique sizes.  So, in fact the clothing was really good value – I saved a heap of euros.

We’re getting quite comfortable walking hip-to-hubcap with trucks, buses and cars down narrow squeezy roads. Whilst it would not be the done thing back home, here it’s acceptable for pedestrians to spill out directly onto the roads, especially where there are either no footpaths or they’re no wider than a handkerchief.  Often it’s the vehicles that slowly pick their way around and through the passers-by.

Street view of Guinigi tower with oak trees on top

We’ve spent a day or two longer than we had anticipated in this city – our fault due to not planning too far ahead or taking into account how busy the Italian coast would be in late August.  Often it’s a few days before moving on that we make up our minds about where we want to go next.  This time we got caught out without accommodation for the Cinque Terre region.  

I’d searched online and sent emails to numerous places, finally tracking down a hotel room that was a little more than what we wanted to pay, but in this season beggars can’t be choosers.  The owner and I emailed each other to and fro, until there was no response to one of my queries.  The day before our arrival in Cinque Terre a phone call from Max to confirm and check on details regarding our booking revealed that our reservation had been given away.   Unbelievable!  Merda (that’s shit in Italian)!

A heap of phone calls directly to accommodation places by Max at a public phone booth in the heat of the afternoon turned up no result – many were booked up until the end of the month.  A call to a regional tourist office and Max was told that the Cinque Terre was fully booked for miles.  #!@?! Insert very strong expletives here.

Yesterday afternoon I sent off a bundle of pleading emails to accommodation places hoping someone would take pity on us.  All came back to us in the negative. Finally today, we received one positive response – a hotel owner who had no hotel rooms left but her private apartment in the centre of Levanto was available due to a cancellation.  Yoohoo!  We’re finally moving on.



Tonight (our fifth and final night) we are dining at one of the many little Italian trattorias inside the town walls with one of the hotel guests, a British tourist who shares Max’s enthusiasm for the game of cricket.  We are looking for an alternative to pizza, so it’s pasta tonight.  I think we’ll be celebrating our great luck, as well. 


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Winding Through Chianti

Sunday, October 16, 2011 Eva 0 Comments


We picked up our new lease car, a Peugeot 207, from Rome’s airport to drive us through Italy and France over the next 2 months. It comes with a portable GPS (and a 30 second training session) – which we’ve never had the need to use before – and it’s been a huge learning curve on how to manipulate it so that it becomes your friend rather than your enemy.
Our GPS speaks to us in a commanding and cultured British-accented female voice.  She sounds as though she would be a twin-set and pearls kind of gal. We’ve named her Miss Moneypenny, as in James Bond’s secretary. Miss Moneypenny is certainly worth her weight in gold pennies but that’s not to say she’s always right.  There’ve been many occasions when Max has sworn his head off at her.  She’s confused me, Navigator number 2, by comments such as “Turn right” on mountainous hairpin bends.  Oh what, as opposed to going over the edge? We’ve plenty of time, Miss Moneypenny and I, to get very well acquainted.
Grapes, wild boar, pungent black truffles, olive oil, chianti classico wine and porcini mushrooms – these are the staples of the Chianti area and what we found on typical Chianti menus.

Radda-in-Chianti


We didn’t realise that the rolling hills of central Tuscany were so forested.  Anticipating it to be mostly cultivated land of neat rows of vines with the occasional line of cypresses was only part of the picture.  Thick woodlands cover the slopes and surround farmlets. Narrow winding roads climb and descend Tuscan hills, sometimes passing through canopies of forest trees.  Villages, stone castles and farmhouses nestle in amongst all the greenery. 
Small cafes tucked away in small corners of piazzas,
Radda-in-Chianti

The area we chose to stay in had pretty villages and hamlets with melodic names like Castellina-In-Chianti (beautiful medieval stone tunnel streets and a small square-towered castle), Radda-In-Chianti (pretty little piazzas), Greve-In-Chianti (cool arched arcades surround the medieval piazza and has historical links with Verrazzano who discovered New York’s harbour), Panzano (where Max scored a free bottle of white Chianti through a raffle held outside in the village piazza) and Montefioralle (a gorgeous tiny medieval stone village).  If you say these names with a broad Italian accent you get the right melody.  Florence lies to the north and Siena to the south.
Tiny 3-wheeler for tiny streets,
Panzano

By the way, when do hills become mountains?  I’ve always wanted someone to explain the difference to me.  Any ideas?  Some of those hillslopes were very steep and scary whilst I sat white-knuckled in the passenger seat as we reached high elevations then went back down again, with only the occasional gasp of fear as cars or the irregular truck approached from the opposite direction when it looked like there was room only for one of us on the road. On the other hand, Max with cool nerves carefully wound the car around tight bends and mountain-edged slivers of tarmac, only twice having to coax the car into a 3-point turn to get around sharp z-bends.  A few days of this kind of driving and then I began to relax. Luckily the roads were relatively quiet which surprised us considering it was peak summer season. 

Montefioralle

As well as enjoying the food and wine of the district, we stayed at two countryhouse B&B’s.  The first was in a rustic farmhouse set high up near a national park and the second was a charmingly decorated country house by the name of Il Casello with a lovely pool and gorgeous countryside views.  The area has vineyards, cellars and olive groves and is loaded with wild boar as well as wild deer.  Gunshots at dusk can be heard at times ringing around the countryside with the distant sound of the hunters’ barking dogs.  Feral piggy-wig sausage would be arriving on someone’s plate soon.
A moment of surprise happened as we headed back to our accommodation at dusk after a pasta dinner at one of the local villages.  A stout wiry-haired tusked boar emerged from the edge of the forest and stood by the road as Max slowed down the car to take the bend.  Whoa!!  A boar with road sense! The only time we got close to seeing one after that was on Tuscan menus (wild boar sausage, wild boar casserole, wild boar and truffle pasta sauce) and hanging up in the form of dried salamis in macellarias (butchers) and in supermarkets.



Motoring us around the neighbourhood, Max made the challenging drive up to the historic Antinori wine estate of Badia a Passignano to sample the local vino.  The estate is very picturesque set across hills and valleys with typical Tuscan-style buildings. Pricey wine tastings are held in a restored 18th century building that also houses a restaurant.  On site we explored the exterior of an extremely old abbey with a fascinating history and frescoes, but we were disappointed to find that it was closed for renovations when we were there. 
Antinori wine estate of Badia a Passignano

Chianti’s airforce of stripy mosquitoes are ravenous for exposed flesh in this neck of the woods on summer nights so insect repellant is a must.  We saw tourists sporting the results of the most blotchiest and heartiest feasts on legs and arms. Both of us came out unscathed, maybe the tanned skin is getting too tough for a mozzie proboscis to penetrate.

A short and sweet, although hot, reunion with medieval Siena after a 17 year absence was a daytrip away from our Chianti nest.  The Piazza Il Campo was packed with rammed earth, embedded with horse hoof imprints from the Il Palio – Siena’s famous horse race where jockeys in their satins tear around the piazza on bare-backed highly strung steeds to win the honour of a flag.  Leading up to the main race are many trials and parades in the preceding month.  Team Giraffa (the Giraffes) had won and their colours flew from flagposts outside palazzo buildings.
Siena and Duomo Cathedral

The wealth and power of ancient Siena can be seen and felt when we walked its narrow streets and passed by the numerous palazzos.  The Duomo Cathedral, crowning the hilltop overlooking Siena, was still as drop-dead gorgeous as the first time we remembered it.  Stepping inside, it’s gothic gone ga-ga - this is a sculptural confection of marble, painted artworks and dramatic black and white striped soaring columns reaching up to blue-domed starry ceilings.


Siena's Cathedral

Great gelati was a memory of our previous visit to Siena so we scoured the gelaterias for the best to taste. Artiginiale, which refers to it being handcrafted, is a label we look out for as well as judging the colour of the gelati – too brightly coloured is a no-sale for us. Max chose his favourite lemon whilst I indulged in my favourite flavour of the day – sometimes it can be rockmelon, other times it can be coconut, caramel, raspberry….
Gelati - confused for choice!

These have been some of the flavours of Chianti for us on our sensory meander through the sights, sounds and tastes of this one small section of the region. 




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Rome: An Account Of A Rat and The Ruins

Tuesday, October 11, 2011 Eva 0 Comments

Buongiorno, ragazzi from bellissima Roma where we’ve come to sample some dolce vita. We had to be somewhere on the continent in August, and Italy was the best option after leaving Malta and before we head into France. Checked out Turkey – way too hot; checked out Tunisia – too unstable; checked out Libya – doubly unstable. Everywhere too hot in more ways than one! So here we are in Roma, to continue our Italian travels, after flying across the sea from Sicily on a budget airline flight.
Street busker at work

Summer in the Eternal City appeared bereft of Italians. Where were all the Prada-accessorised, D & G-clad, perfectly tanned beautiful people? They’d vacated Rome for the beaches and coastlines, and so it seemed that the tourists outnumbered the locals. Away from the usual attractions, streets were quiet and many shopfronts closed. Rome wasn’t the potent sauna we’d been expecting of mid-August, with temps climbing to around the low 30’s, with a light breeze at times by evening. Maybe the summer scorcher was yet to come.
A Michelangelo masterpiece in the Church of St Maria Minerva

The most exciting moment during our short stay was THE RAT!   On a balmy evening, we sat outdoors in the Trastevere neighbourhood at one of the 6 or 8 tiny tables squeezed together and bedecked with red-and-white-checked tablecloths at a tiny family trattoria that sat side-by-side with a tiny pizzeria in a teeny-weeny piazza. An Italian female singer in costume accompanied by her guitarist arrived on foot across the cobblestones and did her busking thing around the tables in a gorgeous voice and beautiful face. Tips collected, off she and guitar man went and diners went back to eating their pasta and pizza and to their quiet conversations.

It was then that the rat (more like a mangy-looking mouse) ran across the piazzetta causing gasps from diners. “Ratta!” someone shouted. There was a moment of frenzied panic as some stood up and began backing away towards restaurant doorways. One woman stood on her chair in fear. The rat ran back from where it came and all settled down. It made a re-appearance minutes later. More shouts and panic, mingled with nervous laughter. We watched the reactions range from cool amusement to absolute horror, and tried to control our laughter. The pizzeria’s signora then dragged the young cook out of the kitchen with a broom in his hand and gestured for him to pursue it. Honestly, what was he planning to do with the broom, sweep it? It was the rat’s lucky night for it escaped through a smidgeon of a space under a roller door. The young cook found pieces of cardboard and stuffed them into the crevices so that the rat wouldn’t return. If anything, the rat seemed to have sparked some animation and lively conversation into the quiet little crowd of diners, and made a pleasant evening even more memorable for us.
The ancient Pantheon houses the tombs of Raphaelo
and Italian kings

We’d visited Rome on previous travels and had seen the major sights before, however we felt compelled to visit the famous antiquities again. Some sites can never be fully appreciated in one visit. Being in Rome and not re-visiting the Colosseum or Trevi Fountain would be akin to going to Paris and missing the Eiffel Tower or Louvre – unspeakable! So we sought out our favourite gems to see, as well as be on the lookout for Rome’s many hidden little springs and drinking fountains, some of which are quite ornate.

Water spring

Pretty quickly into our treasure hunt though, I was blaming the publishers of our Lonely Planet guidebook for changing the size of the font – how dare they make it impossible to read! Labels on maps, in particular, looked little more than trails of ant droppings – until the spectacles went on. I’m determined, when I get back home, to dig out my old editions and compare the size of the texts to see if they’ve changed.
Views across Rome from Palatino Hill


It was there, smack-bang in the middle of the scattered ruins of the Roman Forum that, after 3 ½ months of being constantly on the move, my right knee decided “BASTA” (enough)! I ignored the occasional sharp pains at first but they grew more insistent as I limped about following Max around columns and temples, refusing to give up and therefore miss out on all that wonderful history surrounding us. Besides, my imagination was all fired up trying to picture scenes of how it would have looked during the reign of Augustus and his wife Livia. After queueing for 1 ½ hours under a fiercely skin-burning sun to buy tickets (and that was the short queue), picnicking at the summit of Palatino hill with brilliant views across Rome and the Forum below and being in the midst of an amazing visual feast of relics, I was on a sensory high and wanted to absorb it all.

On a dodgy knee, we viewed the Colosseum from afar

The knee won out in the end and we caught the bus back to the hotel with a disappointingly unfinished tour of the antiquities under our belts. Our remaining day was spent relaxing in the hotel and resting up the knee which I was fervently praying would heal quickly. Not having experienced knee pain like this before, I envisaged worst-case scenarios – being pushed around in a wheelchair like a geriatric invalid on the slopes of Chianti, which would be our next stop, or worse still, having to cut the holiday short and fly home in agony. In the end, to the relief of my over-active imagination, the knee responded well to massage, ice and anti-inflammatory meds.

Ancient ruins of the Roman Forum


Luckily for the knee and for me, we begin the next sector by picking up our brand new Peugeot lease car to drive us through Italy and France over the next 2 ½ months. The timing of it couldn’t have been more perfect.
We've thrown our coins into the Trevi Fountain to ensure our return

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