Sunday, May 30, 2010

Tuscany


Let me start by saying that driving in Italy was not nearly as bad as we thought it would be. The roads weren't crowded and the drivers weren't overly aggressive as we had heard. There was a fair bit of a learning curve in terms of following our directions, but our first major incident was paying for the toll road. We had gotten our ticket no problem, but when we exited, we had to pay. I inserted the ticket and saw how much we owed, but then I was clueless as to where to put the money.

With no other options apparent to me, I started putting coins in a little slot on the machine - all the way up to the 3 euros and 60 cents we owed - but nothing happened. With no idea what to do next, and traffic backing up behind us, I beckoned for the driver behind us to help. He was nice enough to come over and explain that I needed to pay with a credit card, which went in the same slot as the ticket. I had no way to get the money back from the little box and don't know where it went, but at least we were on our way.

By the time we got into the countryside of Tuscany, the clouds were breaking up and the sun was shining on the beautiful views.

We made it to our first stop with surprisingly little trouble, given the lack of clear road signs, and arrived in the small village of Gropina.

The main attraction in Gropina is the ancient and bizarre church there, but we were disappointed to find it closed. The sign said it would be open from 3-5 and it was only 4, but no dice.

A man working on a car directed us to a house where we could ring the bell for the keeper of the church, but she didn't answer. After taking in the views from this hilltop hamlet -



- we went back to try again and found an old woman leaning out the upper window in the neighboring house who tried to help us; first by trying the church keeper on the phone, and then by shouting out her window. She explained the lady was hard of hearing. It's amazing what you can do with a few common words and lots of pantomime.

Just as we were about to give up and move on, another couple of tourists (from New Zealand) appeared with a local guide. After speaking with the old lady in the window, the guide rang the bell once and, amazingly, the church keeper appeared. And she wasn't what we expected. Rather than a wizened old nun, she was a thirty-ish woman in a purple track suit and did not look pleased. Nonetheless, she let us in to admire the bizarre carvings in the church, which look more like something out of a South American temple than a catholic church. I've found lots of references, but no explanations for these unique carvings.



From Gropina, we headed for Siena and got really lost for the first time. After stopping to ask walkers and other drivers several times, we finally stopped at a winery and got some good directions. In the end we didn't arrive in Siena much later than we planned and still had enough time after checking into our hotel to take a tour of the city before the sun went down.

That included the impressive medieval streets -

- the Piazza Del Campo -

- (traditional home to the Sienese seat of government and the site of yearly horse races), and the duomo.


Following a lovely dinner on the Campo under clear skies, we took one more spin to see the sights at night, before turning in.



Much to our chagrin, the rain returned the next morning. But by the time we finished a wonderful breakfast, (maybe the best of our whole trip), and actually found our way out of the city - it took us several tries - the weather was already starting to clear. And by the time we reached our first destination of Massa Marittima, another beautiful day was upon us.

Massa Marittma is a hilltop city with a commanding view of the countryside, all the way out to the distant sea. We enjoyed the cathedral -



- and took a climb up a tower for even better views.



By lunchtime, rain was threatening again, but that didn't deter us from eating outside at a restaurant with a great view and the sprinkles soon passed.


From Massa Marittima, it was on to the ruins of the abbey of San Galgano. On the way, the twisting roads made it impossible to drive too fast to enjoy the scenery, including some really neat rock formations.

The remains of the abbey are impressive at any rate, but the dark clouds of an approaching thunderstorms added an even more imposing backdrop.


Up the hill from the abbey, we visited a small church where San Galgano's sword-in-the-stone is kept. The glass covering makes it hard to inspect closely, but it sure looks like an iron sword stuck in a big rock.

The story is that Galgano was a violent knight who saw the light and plunged his sword into a stone to signify his transformation to a peace-loving, religious man. The early appearance of the story has some scholars believing that the story of San Galgano may be a precursor to the story of King Arthur in Great Britain.

In the next room, there was another surprise. We lifted the velvet cover on a glass box containing two mostly decomposed arms. A plaque next to the box explained that they were the arms of someone who tried to take the sword from the stone. According to the story, wolves attacked the man, ripped off his arms, and brought them back to the church. How pleasant!

From there, we put the thunderstorms to our back and headed for our last stop of the day, the monastery at Monte Olivieto Maggiore, dating back to the 14th century.



We got to stroll the grounds, visit the church, and even see a library full of medieval texts and a pharmacy.



On our way to the car, we saw a small village on a nearby hilltop lit by the sun.



As it turned out, it was the town of Chiusuro, where we stayed at a small B&B run by the Monastery in an ancient farmhouse.There was only one restaurant we could find that was open, but they weren't serving until 7:00, so we wandered the town and took in the views.



Dinner was wonderful. We had pizzas made fresh for us by the owner and were the only two in the restaurant. While we were eating a thunderstorm rolled through and then we danced to some nice music that was playing after we ate.



The next morning, we took in the views of the fog-shrouded valleys around us before hopping in the car for our last day in Tuscany.



On the way to Montepulciano, we stopped in the town of Bagno, known since Roman times for its natural hot springs. In fact, the town square is a large pool of warm water fed by these springs.



Upon reaching Montepulciano, we first stopped at the 16th century church of Madonna di San Biagio.

Montepulciano itself is the highest hill town in southern Tuscany. We walked the steep streets and alleys, visited the cathedral and palaces in the Piazza Grande, and soaked up as much of the views as we could.


For our farewell to Tuscany, we had lunch at a wine shop and sampled the famous local Vino Nobile along with a boar proscuitto sandwich.


And so it was with some reluctance that we left the beautiful hills of Tuscany, but with Rome ahead of us, we certainly didn't want to overstay our time.

Click here to continue to Rome: http://theroadmoretraveled-nicksblog.blogspot.com/2010/05/rome.html


Pictures:

Part 1

Italy 2010 JPGS

1-151: Venice
152-224: Cinque Terre
225-286: Pisa
287-384: Florence
385-606: Tuscany (Gropina, Siena, Massa Maritima, Chiusure, Montepulciano)
607-960: Rome


Part 2
Italy 2010Part 2 JPGS

962-1040: Pompei
1041-1054: Naples
1055-1106: Capri
1107-1129: Naples
1130-1168: Amalfi Coast
1169-1186: Naples
1187-1233: Sicily (From Catania to Puntalazzo)
1234-1282: Sicily (Mt.Etna and Puntalazzo)
1293-1354: Sicily (Enna and Agrigento)
1355-1391: Sicily (Catania)
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