At about 10.45 on Saturday the 12th we took a water taxi to Florence station. My fears that we were cutting it a bit fine were unfounded, and we caught the 11.27 to Florence with no trouble. It was a delightful journey in first class, with free refreshments, and we got to Florence around 1pm. It took us a while to get our bearings, but we eventually found our car rental firm which, in usual Italian fashion, managed to take 90 minutes-plus to find us a car that been ordered and paid for in advance. A very warm wait, but at least they gave us directions, and we found ourselves on the right road out of the city fairly quickly. We stopped in Greve in Chianti for supplies and reached our delightful villa at Lamole, up in the hills, shortly after 5pm, to be greeted by a lovely Italian woman called Yolande, who turned out to be Polish.
On Sunday the warmth remained, but it was a little overcast. We eventually drove to Greve, and after a little shopping walked to Montefioralle, a little walled town allegedly 20 minutes walk uphill. In fact about three-quarters of an hour. Another example of Italian time. Had lunch at restaurant there – in my case an excellent veal steak. Returned to Lamole, bought a few more provisions and an ice cream, for which the Italians are justly famous. In the evening a brief splash of rain was a portent of things to come.
However, it was dry, sunny and warm on Monday, when we left at 9am for San Galgano, south-west of Siena, a picturesque roofless abbey with a chapel on a nearby hill. The chapel contains a sword plunged into a rock, which allegedly happened in the 12th century when SG himself gave up a life of fighting and turned to more spiritual matters. Sort of King Arthur in reverse. I had taken my sole driving slot on the way there, but now Roger took the helm as we headed for Siena, where we had without doubt the best meal of the holiday in a restaurant called Osteria Da Divo, on the Via Franciosa. Totally wonderful, and within a stone’s throw of the Duomo, which was impressive. We climbed up some kind of building adjoining a museum and got a good view of the town, which is stunning. Also visited Santa Maria della Scala, a church which has become an art gallery. Dot bought some stamps, and we located the other must-see in Siena, which is the Piazza del Campo, a huge shell-shaped open space occasionally used for horse-racing. By this time I was exhausted, but we circumnavigated the Piazza and then set a course back to the car park. Back at the house, we watched a DVD of Where Angels Fear to Tread, which is a truly dreadful film. Equally dreadful was the realisation that the satellite television promised did not include a subscription to World Cup channels. As things turned out, this was not quite so dreadful as it first seemed. England 1 USA 1; England 0 Algeria 0.
Unsurprisingly, we woke late on the Tuesday, and it was raining. OK, the rain was surprising, but the late start wasn’t. We spent an enjoyable hour or two later in Panzano, a charming nearby town that you could almost see from our house, but not quite. The weather improved, and we walked around the old part of the town before happening on the Academy of Good Taste, run by an eccentric guy who span a bewildering yarn, spoke good English and eventually sold us a small bottle of fierce liqueur made from figs. I think. We eventually left it with Yolande. We then encountered the town’s other character, a famous butcher called Dario Cecchini. His shop is a mite unusual (for a butcher) in that when you enter you are given a glass of wine and urged to sample such wares as pork dripping and olive oil on bread. A larger than life character, he didn’t seem all that worried about selling anything, though we eventually bought some cold cooked pork. The Murrays were delighted to find that one of his assistants came from Toronto. On arriving home Dot and I made our first and only venture into the swimming pool. In the evening we went to the village restaurant, which serves good food and is extremely friendly. You get free limoncello afterwards, and the bottle is left for you to help yourself. Unhappily, you can only drink a certain amount of limoncello, a fact I guess they’re well aware of.
Just finished the wonderful A Month in the Country by J L Carr and have started a book I found in the house – The Great Lover, by Jill Dawson, who I shared an office with at the UEA a few years ago. She is an excellent writer.
Fairly quiet day on the Wednesday, with quite a bit of rain. I walked the Lamole loop (1.75 miles) and we drove into Greve and walked around, sometimes together and sometimes alone. Dot bought a bracelet. The shop-owner left us alone in the shop with countless precious items while she went to fetch the bracelet from another shop. Very trusting – quite common among Italian shopkeepers. In the evening we watched Mona Lisa, which I suppose can best be described as gritty.
We had refrained from going to San Gimignano on Wednesday because of the occasional rain, but we set off optimistically on the Thursday in bright weather. By the time we reached San Gimignano, however, dark clouds threatened. We had time to walk up to the centre of the town (after a brief bus shuttle ride) and climb the famous tower before it started raining hard. We dashed across into the church during what was almost a lull, and afterwards purchased an umbrella. While we sat under awnings for a snack, not far from a Meg Ryan lookalike, the heavens opened, and we all began to feel chilly. Not much we could do about that except eat, which seemed to work up to a point. The rain did ease off after a while, and we resumed our tour of the town, including a visit to a very impressive art gallery. This was my sort of town, and it was a pity about the weather. It poured again before we got back to the car, and even Roger had to buy an umbrella.
The only downside of San Gimignano is Poggibonsi, which you have to go through to get there. This is a nondescript town containing a jumbled mass of roads with no logic to them. On the way back I tried to avoid them but ended up on a narrow road up into the mountains. On the plus side we got a good view of San Gimignano, but we did have to go back and through Poggibonsi in the end. As we drove home the weather improved, but I began to feel quite ill: in fact I hadn’t been feeling particularly well all day. On arriving home I took antibiotics and stayed home while the others went to Lamole restaurant again.
Friday was sunny and quite warm again, but with a persistent wind. Barbara and Roger went off to visit another walled town, but Dot and I decided to stay at the house. We spent a lot of time reading (I finished The Great Lover, read a small book on Healing by Francis McNutt and started The Rough Guide to Bob Dylan, which contains lots of unusual information as well as the most literals I’ve ever seen in any book), then walked up to Lamole restaurant for a very slow lunch containing a delicious antipasti. Afterwards we walked up the hill a little way before returning to the house. B & R eventually made it home about 7.30pm, which is suspiciously late, but they said they didn’t get lost and had in fact found the best hill town in the world, or at least in Italy. We all had a late tea, packed and prepared for the return home.