Carol writes:
MONTEPULCIANO:
Our visit to Paestrum on the Italian coast at the Gulf of Solerno (at the
ankle of the “Italian boot”), marked our furthest point south in Italy. For most of the 17 days we spent in Italy, we
had experienced delightfully warm, sunny days and cool nights. It was hard to leave such wonderful late Fall
days in southern Italy, but it was time to head north through a few of the
towns we had saved to see along the way as we headed out of Italy and back into
France.
It wasn’t
long before we found ourselves north of Rome in the heart of the famed Tuscan
hills. Each bend in the road produced
another picture-perfect Tuscan postcard scene.
Vineyards and olive groves on the outskirts of small hill towns
dominated an immaculate country scene.
Our
guidebook had recommended four small Tuscan hill towns as worthy of a visit, so
we decided to take a chance and see if we could find parking in one of the
towns so we could take a walk around. As
soon as we pulled into a large parking lot that allowed overnight campers just
outside the ancient walls surrounding Montepulciano, we knew we had found the
perfect overnight camping spot.
For the time
being, however…we had several hours of daylight left, so we took a long lazy
uphill walk through the narrow picturesque streets of Montepulciano.
The slow
uphill climb was worth it for the views we had of the valley below.
Before long
we had reached the high point of the town at the Piazza Grande, where we did a
little wine tasting at Contucci Cantina, followed by a brief walk through their
wine cellar with its giant barrels of aging wine.
SIENA: The next day we had a very short ride to Siena, a perennial
hill town favorite of travelers. Siena
struck us as more authentic than some of the other tourist cities we had
visited. We took a stroll through town
and dropped in on the Church of San Domenico, the parish of Siena’s beloved 14th
century home town saint, St. Catherine of Siena. Both the interior as well as the exterior of
the church was very plain, in keeping with Dominican ideals of simplicity.
What struck
us as a bit ghoulish was the display in little glass boxes of St. Catherine’s thumb
and head, with skin and facial features still recognizable…
One of
Siena’s two top attractions was its cathedral, the Duomo, which had one of the
most beautiful facades we had ever seen anywhere in Europe.
Lacy, ornate
statuary and designs, all cleaned and in good repair, covered the exterior. The
striped pattern of green stone with white stone was very lovely to the
eyes! The inside of the Duomo also had a
pretty big wow factor, with its giant green and white striped columns,
incredible
inlaid stone design on every spare inch of its floor,
and
brilliantly frescoed library.
Siena’s
other 3-star attraction was its unique bowl-shaped main square called Il
Campo. This was a great place to sit and
just relax and people watch. Better yet,
it was a great place to have drinks and a light dinner while savoring the view.
FLORENCE: There were two big reasons we detoured back into Italy before
heading over to Spain and Portugal for the winter. One reason was to visit Venice, which turned
out to be one of the highlights of our entire European RV adventure. The other reason we came back to Italy was to
visit Florence, the home of the Renaissance.
While trying to organize our 2-day visit to Florence, it soon became
apparent that the city fathers in charge of Florence tourism had done a monumental
job of needlessly complicating attempts to visit Florence’s world-class sights. The hated expensive one-price ‘combo ticket’
scheme of pairing up less quality sights with the two museums everyone wanted
to see was, well, most annoying! In
addition, both of Florence’s world-renowned museums, the Academia and the
Uffizi, could only be seen by means of a reservation for a timed entrance…for
an added cost per ticket, of course. Nevertheless,
for a chance to see some of the best Renaissance art anywhere, we jumped
through the hoops of the reservation system, at an additional cost of about $20,
and soon had a reserved 15-minute entrance window on our coveted admission
tickets. Turns out even when we arrived
an hour early to both museums, we were promptly waved right on in! Can’t figure out what the ‘timed reservation’
thing was all about…well, maybe I can.
The
Academia’s claim to fame was the statue of Michelangelo’s David, a 17-ft masterpiece in marble that literally took our breath
away on first sight. It was masterfully
displayed in its large custom-made niche that had natural lighting from a clear
dome above.
David had everyone’s attention. I couldn’t help but think that the dozens of
amateur art students who were carefully doing pencil sketches of David in their notebooks sure picked a
tough act to imitate…
During our
visit to the Uffizi the next day, we found equally grand Renaissance art. Our favorite room was the Botticelli wing,
where it was clear that Botticelli had taken his craft to a whole new level of
expertise.
Botticelli's "Madonna of the Pomegranate"
With its
pink, green and white Tuscan marble façade, Florence’s Duomo Cathedral was even
grander than Siena’s.
The Duomo’s
claim to fame was its unparalleled Brunelleschi dome,
incredibly
large and ingeniously designed as one-of-a-kind in its time.
We spent our
final hours in Florence at sunset looking at all the gold and silver jewelry
shops along the famed Ponte Vecchio, a covered bridge that spans the Arno
River.
Looking back
on our visit, we were glad we had come to Florence, both for its historical
importance and for its collection of world-class Renaissance art.
PISA: Our last planned stop in Italy was at the Leaning Tower of
Pisa. Al had visited Pisa as a young
naval officer over 30 years ago, so he was familiar with the scene. My first thought as I rounded the corner of
the nearby church was: What keeps this
tower from toppling over? The Tower’s
15-ft lean from vertical was most impressive.
We couldn’t
resist doing some silly shots that seemed so popular with the crowd.
The entire ‘Field
of Miracles’ complex was very lovely with acres of perfect grassy areas
surrounding the cathedral,
the
Baptistry,
and the Camposanto Cemetery cloister, which was especially peaceful and beautiful, even the sarcophogi.
We rounded
out the day in town with our favorite early evening Italian drink, a ‘spritz’
for each of us. What a perfect sunny day
we had in Pisa--such a fitting finish for our visit to Italy… Ciao!
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