^UP^
Wednesday 5th June
Driving yesterday, so car out of limits today. I didn't do much in the
morning, but after lunch I thought I'd walk
up to Chianni's higher
satellite vilage, Rivalto. The sky got rather grey for a while, but by
the time I was ready to go out it was
clearing. In fact, ideally, the
sun stayed hazy for the uphill part and it was cool. I did hear distant
rumbles of thunder, but after I'd had a quick tour and was ready to
walk back down, the sun came out properly.
Rivalto is smaller, quainter and more scrubbed than Chianni. It looks
as though many of the houses have been restored recently, and I'm sure
some of them must be holiday homes. But I wouldn't hold that against
the village. I like clean and quaint.
When I came back into Chianni, I passed the pizzeria. I hadn't
forgotten my pizza craving from the day before. The thing about Italy
though is that establishments all close one day a week, and knowing my
luck, Wednesday would be it for "Regina Margherita" (owned by a genuine
Neopolitan, apparently). I didn't see any signs on the place saying
which was their day off. It was definitely closed then, but you'd
expect that in the afternoon.
When I got back home, I tried an internet search, and the concensus was
that yes indeed, it was closed on Wednesday. I had plenty of food if I
wanted to cook my own dinner, but I thought I might treat myself to
make up for the repeated pizza disappointment. One of the other two
restaurants then. But the one I'd tried and very much enjoyed before?
Or risk the unknown one?
Well, since it was a treat, I went for the known one, particularly
their deep-fried vegetables, which are divine. One disadvantage of the
place is that they'll only sell you wine by the glass or by the bottle;
no half-litre carafes. Though their house Chianti is only €8. But
the
extra 50%, plus the free prosecco on arrival, had an effect on me and I
was fairly staggering home (400 metres walk/stagger).
Thursday 6th June
In the morning, I checked out "my" private garden. Since I arrived,
Franco had cut the grass, tidied up and put up a wooden rail across the
end. Beyond the rail, the land drops quite steeply, (their little olive
grove), and there's a superb panorama of the valley, the Val d'Era (or
just Valdera).
After lunch, I was off to San Gimignano. I'd seen that there was a wine
tasting up near the castle, starting at 17:30. Buy a glass for €6,
try
as many wines as you like.
The trip was about an hour, fairly easy driving, and thankfully mainly
free of cyclists. I was following the main road into town from the
North, assuming that I'd have to use one of the pay car parks, but I
noticed a small, free one with a space available. About ten minutes'
walk into town, which is
nothing.
I walked towards the centre and came into Piazza del Duomo at its
bottom end. Actually, the church isn't officially a cathedral, "uno
duomo", having been demoted at some time in the past. Santa Fina's body
is still in it though. Remember the film "Tea With Mussolini" when Judi
Dench and her ladies were defending Santa Fina? I saw it being filmed.
The town was quite busy
with tourists. At both the famous gelaterie in
Piazza della Cistera, there were queues out the door. Likewise the
public toilet off the square. English/American, German, French and
Dutch could be heard everywhere. I wasn't particularly purturbed by the
crowds -- I've seen worse, especially in Florence -- and I was happy to
explore and see if anything had changed in the nine years since I'd
been in San Gimignano. (Seventeen years since I first visited.)
By five o'clock though, a definite change had occurred, compared with
earlier in the afternoon. The majority of the visitors had left on
their tour buses, leaving only those staying in town or having their
own transport, like me. Oh, and a sprinking of residents.
I walked up to the castle, "la Fortezza", and found the little square
by the gate ringed with small tables, each belonging to a local winery.
All were offering their wines, mainly white Vernaccia and red Chianti,
but quite a range of other,
modern styles; and even some vin santo.
There were also some heavenly cheeses, and a table with cured meats and
salami.
I don't know how many samples
I had, but then I'm very much an amateur
wine drinker. Others were taking it much more seriously. The flags and
drums of Santa Fina marched up for a demonstration to distract us for a
while, but by around seven-thirty or seven-forty-five, I decided I'd
better stop drinking alcohol if
I was to drive home. I could have
stayed for dinner, but I had some food I need to use up, and anyway, it
doesn't feel like holidays if you can't have wine with it. I got home
at nine and knocked up a quick grill.
Friday 7th June
I went down into the garden and took my airport copy of Scientific
American and read about dark
matter and hypernovae. (The photons in a
very massive star can get so energetic that they spontaneously convert
into electron-positron pairs. The energy is then locked up and can't
take its role in resisting the pressure of the collapsing core, which
implodes. Big time. Foom.)
Franco appeared with ANOTHER bottle of the
Chianti, and also showed me
the little room he's making off the garden, nice for evenings. "Molto
lavoro", I told him, "much
work". "Piano, piano", he replied. "Softly,
softly", it means, but the implication is "take it gently". WIse advice
for life too.
After lunch I took a stroll around town and found that the little park
"Il Boschetto" ("The Copse") was accessible, but not officially open
until the next evening, with a poster promising live music from "Ringo
Fox", apparently a group, I guessed from the poster, and not a
combination of Ringo Starr and
Samantha Fox.
Back into town and I tried the bank's cash machine. When I'd tried
before it wouldn't give me money and said "link failure". Same again. I
carried on around town and had a beer at Anna's Bar. Trying to blend
in, you see. Become a local.
I went back to the garden and sat until it became quite cool. I had
some food in the fridge to make
dinner, but I realised I'd have to go
shopping the next day in order to have any lunch. And tomorrow evening,
of course, Ringo Fox.
Saturday 8th June
I was away quite early, mainly with the
intention of stocking up on
groceries. Chianni was thriving, mainly with old couples doing their
shopping. I'd never seen so
many people about.
But I thought I'd go to the Co-op in
Ponsacco I'd been in on the first
day, but maybe see the town as well. Ponsacco being the nearest biggish
town. But having navigated to a car park near the centre (and the
Co-op) I had a walk around, and, honestly, there's not much to be said
for Ponsacco. Plenty of shops of all kinds, and cafes and so on, but
rather dull otherwise.
I stocked up in the Co-op, including some pasta for lunch. I came
home
and ate it, noticing how the weather was changing to cloudy. I stayed
home until dinner. I walked down to the pizzeria, hoping I wasn't
ridiculously early, but there was a table of eight English in full
flow, plus pairs of other nationalities. Pizza and a carafe of wine was
12 euros, in contrast with the resaurant up the road. They also do
pasta dishes, with no fixed menu. I was interested. Come back soon.
As I walked home, I met Franco. Actually, as
I told him, I wasn't going
home, I was going to the opening of Il Boschetto. "Via, via", he said,
uging me on. By that time it was after nine thirty. I saw the members
of Ringo Fox looking ready to go. It's a kind of universal muso thing:
get some water, check the mics. At ten sharp, they went on. It was
awful. Bad Italian pop I could have lived with. But this was the most
cheesily synthetic cheese-flavoured cheese: the kind of stuff that the
first Casio keyboards had
stored for demo tunes, except with synthetic
accordion more prominent.
The music was really bad, but I'd bought a beer by then, and you know,
the community atmosphere was pleasant. A couple of couples got up to
dance, and later split into line dancing: all in sync -- they clearly
knew what they were doing. I counted 7 line-dance participants at most.
The funny thing was that almost all the locals were in the 20s and 30s
age groups, not oldies as I had expected. There were even some younger
folks on the periphery: shake some action, I don't think so. I stuck 50
minutes of it and walked the 5 minutes home.
Sunday 9th June
I got up quite late to find the sky grey and the streets wet. The
forecast had said "showers", but it rained fairly constantly throughout
the day. I didn't go out at all, although I was feeling a little
stir-crazy by evening time.
Monday 10th June
It was showery in the morning again, with even a loud crack of thunder,
but I was hopeful that the sky was showing signs of improvement. By
early afternoon, sure enough, it was intermittently sunny and rain
looked unlikely. I went out for a walk. In contrast to my previous hike
up the hill to Rivalto, this time I went down the hill to the little
church of Madonna del Carmine, which can be seen from the garden.
(I tried the ATM again on the way past. Still no money.)
The church has a seventeenth-century style of facade, but looks as
though it was restored somewhat later. The body of the building is of
indeterminate age, although there are big round windows punched through
which look contemporary with the front. There was a long explanatory
sign, but too wordy for me to bother translating the whole thing.
I walked around the church and spotted that there was a break in the
hedge, and across a patch of
rough ground I came to a paved road. Happy
enough that I couldn't get lost with Chianni sitting up on the hill
behind me, I carried on and eventually recognised that it was the road
to the municipal swimming pool. I hadn't seen it -- no interest in
swimming -- but I could see folded parasols over the hedge. There was
grass- or brush-cutting going on, leading me to suspect that it was
still being tarted up for the season.
I went on past and came out lower down on the same road by which I'd
reached the church originally. I wasn't inclined to go any further into
the countryside, and turned back. I could always have another look at
the church, or find a patch of shade to sit down in. A car passed,
slowed and stopped: it was Franco. We waved, said "ciao" and he drove
on.
Then a couple of minutes later, as I was going up the neatly-cut lawn
that slopes up to the church,
Franco's car came back. He had decided
that he just had to tell me that he had had his first communion in that
church at the end of the war. He said that it had seemed to him that
they had prayed and the war was over. I didn't fully grasp everything
he said, but I got the gist of it. Of course we couldn't look inside,
because the door was locked. I've been calling it a church, but it's
not used for regular mass, so probably it's technically something else,
like a chapel or oratory or something. Franco said I should go and look
in the main parish church up in
the town as well. It was open for mass
every morning at eight...
He left me and I sat in the warm sunshine for a while before walking
back; a slightly different route to get to know my way around more. I
got home and sat in the garden for a while. When I came out, Franco was
in conversation with a younger woman, whom he introduced as a Russian.
Olga, she confirmed. From Saint Petersburg. I explained my origins too,
and Franco asked her if she
spoke English. No, four languages, but not
English. Her Italian was pretty good. I think she was after Roberta to
talk about the business of holiday house renting or something.
Before I went up to make dinner, Franco insisted on showing me the
progress of his works on the garden belonging to the rental apartment,
"my" garden. He'd been cleaning and fitting out a little cellar room,
accessible from the garden, and had just put a table and chairs in.
"Come down in the evening, have
something to drink," he suggested.
Maybe, although why not just sit in the garden? Actually, it would make
a great, snug place to work or read in BAD weather, with great views
over the valley. Of course, we weren't going to have bad weather.
Tuesday 11th June
I'd thought of hoing to Lucca, about an hour's drive, but hadn't made
my mind up whether to go in
the morning or wait until after lunch. When
I got up, it was very grey and dull, even though the forecast had been
for sun. I guessed that the cloud would burn off during the morning and
leave the rest of the day brighter, making it seem like a better
decision to wait until afternoon to go out.
One thing that was slightly on my mind was that I knew I'd need to put
petrol in the car before going far. I'd seen the local filling station,
and it had one of the automatic
cash and card machines for paying. I'd
had varying luck with those in the past. I particularly remembered one
in a small village in Umbria, where I couldn't work it out at all, even
when a couple of local teenage boys tried to help. You'd think that if
anyone could work a petrol pump it would be teenagers.
I knew I had enough to get to, say, Ponsacco this time, where I could
probably find a station with an attendant, but that felt like a
cop-out. I'd have at least to have a go
in Chianni.
Actually, come to think about
it, once you install one of those
machines, your petrol station practically runs itself, with very little
work. There was no-one there at all when I arrived. The machine was
really very simple, and even had an option to change language to
English, but the credit card bit wasn't working. I only had a twenty,
so that would have to do. It worked. I had easily enough petrol to get
to Lucca and back.
I followed my sat-nav's instructions to get to Lucca, via Ponsacco and
Pontedera, but as I got closer I assumed I'd gone wrong somewhere and
the device was having to re-route me via minor roads instead of the
main one linking Lucca to Pontedera. It was only on the way home,
following the same road, that I could see all the roadsigns pointing me
back to Pontedera, proving that it really was the main road.
I'd spent time in the morning looking for free parking in Lucca.
There's lots of parking space near the old city, even some inside the
walls, but it's all a euro per hour. Even if I was only there for up to
four hours, well, for that I could buy a carafe of wine to go with my
pizza back in Chianni. I located a free car park at the bottom
right-hand corner, at the fruit and vegetable market. There was another
one diagonally across the city, but it wasn't near my point of arrival.
On arrival, it took me about fifteen minutes to actually find the car
park, and it was full. I was surprised, given that the fruit and veg
market wouldn't be operating in the afternoon, even if it was open
every day. I drove around a bit and still couldn't find a space,
getting further and further away. In the end I went back to the
original car park and found an unofficial space wedged next to some
apartments. Fits a Panda.
I memorised a couple of landmarks and street names so that I wouldn't
forget where the car was (happened to me in Siena once on my first
venture there). Entry to the city was by Porta Elisa, in about the four
o'clock position. I wandered across the city, reminding myself of the
features, and taking a few phtographs, until I came to the gate on the
opposite side, Porta San Donato. To be honest, that was driven partly
by the urge to use the public toilet in the tourist information office
at Piazzale Verdi. Ok, if it had got urgent I could have turned into a
bar or cafe.
I had spent three weeks in
Lucca in 2010, meaning that I had already
seen everything there was to see. This trip was just to revisit and
remind. I took to the walls near San Frediano and looked over into the
classical gardens of Palazzo Pfanner. I walked Via Fillungo, the classy
shopping street. I went into the circle of Piazza Antifeatro and tried
to use the "panorama" feature on my phone.
By late afternoon, I had a decision to make. Dinner in Lucca, or drive
home and have quite a late one? I decided to drive, based on the notion
that I had a spare four euros to spend on a carafe of wine. I certainly
wasn't going to drink wine in Lucca and drive home. Probably, if I
hadn't been on my own I would have decided differently, sacrificing
wine for my partner's new experience of dinner in Lucca.
I walked back to the car, passing the Irish Pub I'd enjoyed on my
original stay in Lucca. It was just too early for it to be open for the
evening, but I didn't mind. On my last visit, it hadn't been as much
fun at all.
I drove home, as mentioned, on a road that had pretensions above its
station. I got in, washed my face and went straight out to the village
pizzeria. In the room with the view over the valley was a big group of
children, I suppose eight years old (I'm not very good with children's
ages, but definitely primary school -- the four adults supervising
looked like schoolteachers). They were very, very noisy, but they had
definitely finished their pizzas, so I assumed it would not be long
until they left.
In fact, I had almost finished my pizza (and wine) by the time
everything was ended, and the children charged out in all directions to
create chaos outside. At that point, a group of women who seemed to be
the mothers appeared from another room, presumably where they had
enjoyed a quiet dinner. And you know what? They were every bit as noisy
as the children, and were still going strong as I left.
Next Week
^UP^
the time I was ready to go out it was
clearing. In fact, ideally, the
sun stayed hazy for the uphill part and it was cool. I did hear distant
rumbles of thunder, but after I'd had a quick tour and was ready to
walk back down, the sun came out properly.
the village. I like clean and quaint.
expect that in the afternoon.
Thursday 6th June
After lunch, I was off to San Gimignano. I'd seen that there was a wine
tasting up near the castle, starting at 17:30. Buy a glass for €6,
try
as many wines as you like.
walk into town, which is
nothing.
Franco appeared with ANOTHER bottle of the
Chianti, and also showed me
the little room he's making off the garden, nice for evenings. "Molto
lavoro", I told him, "much
work". "Piano, piano", he replied. "Softly,
softly", it means, but the implication is "take it gently". WIse advice
for life too.
I was away quite early, mainly with the
intention of stocking up on
groceries. Chianni was thriving, mainly with old couples doing their
shopping. I'd never seen so
many people about.
But I thought I'd go to the Co-op in
Ponsacco I'd been in on the first
day, but maybe see the town as well. Ponsacco being the nearest biggish
town. But having navigated to a car park near the centre (and the
Co-op) I had a walk around, and, honestly, there's not much to be said
for Ponsacco. Plenty of shops of all kinds, and cafes and so on, but
rather dull otherwise.
As I walked home, I met Franco. Actually, as
I told him, I wasn't going
home, I was going to the opening of Il Boschetto. "Via, via", he said,
uging me on. By that time it was after nine thirty. I saw the members
of Ringo Fox looking ready to go. It's a kind of universal muso thing:
get some water, check the mics. At ten sharp, they went on. It was
awful. Bad Italian pop I could have lived with. But this was the most
cheesily synthetic cheese-flavoured cheese: the kind of stuff that the
first Casio keyboards had
stored for demo tunes, except with synthetic
accordion more prominent.
I got up quite late to find the sky grey and the streets wet. The
forecast had said "showers", but it rained fairly constantly throughout
the day. I didn't go out at all, although I was feeling a little
stir-crazy by evening time.
It was showery in the morning again, with even a loud crack of thunder,
but I was hopeful that the sky was showing signs of improvement. By
early afternoon, sure enough, it was intermittently sunny and rain
looked unlikely. I went out for a walk. In contrast to my previous hike
up the hill to Rivalto, this time I went down the hill to the little
church of Madonna del Carmine, which can be seen from the garden.
hedge, and across a patch of
rough ground I came to a paved road. Happy
enough that I couldn't get lost with Chianni sitting up on the hill
behind me, I carried on and eventually recognised that it was the road
to the municipal swimming pool. I hadn't seen it -- no interest in
swimming -- but I could see folded parasols over the hedge. There was
grass- or brush-cutting going on, leading me to suspect that it was
still being tarted up for the season.
I went on past and came out lower down on the same road by which I'd
reached the church originally. I wasn't inclined to go any further into
the countryside, and turned back. I could always have another look at
the church, or find a patch of shade to sit down in. A car passed,
slowed and stopped: it was Franco. We waved, said "ciao" and he drove
on.
that slopes up to the church,
Franco's car came back. He had decided
that he just had to tell me that he had had his first communion in that
church at the end of the war. He said that it had seemed to him that
they had prayed and the war was over. I didn't fully grasp everything
he said, but I got the gist of it. Of course we couldn't look inside,
because the door was locked. I've been calling it a church, but it's
not used for regular mass, so probably it's technically something else,
like a chapel or oratory or something. Franco said I should go and look
in the main parish church up in
the town as well. It was open for mass
every morning at eight...
I'd thought of hoing to Lucca, about an hour's drive, but hadn't made
my mind up whether to go in
the morning or wait until after lunch. When
I got up, it was very grey and dull, even though the forecast had been
for sun. I guessed that the cloud would burn off during the morning and
leave the rest of the day brighter, making it seem like a better
decision to wait until afternoon to go out.
Actually, come to think about
it, once you install one of those
machines, your petrol station practically runs itself, with very little
work. There was no-one there at all when I arrived. The machine was
really very simple, and even had an option to change language to
English, but the credit card bit wasn't working. I only had a twenty,
so that would have to do. It worked. I had easily enough petrol to get
to Lucca and back.
I had spent three weeks in
Lucca in 2010, meaning that I had already
seen everything there was to see. This trip was just to revisit and
remind. I took to the walls near San Frediano and looked over into the
classical gardens of Palazzo Pfanner. I walked Via Fillungo, the classy
shopping street. I went into the circle of Piazza Antifeatro and tried
to use the "panorama" feature on my phone.