Italian road trip(s)

After several days of horrid frustration, suddenly I am able to upload photos to the blog again, so there’s some catching up to do!!

Please check out the revised San Miniato post to see a few shots of this magical place. When the trip is over, I’ll be doing a Kodak Gallery photo album so if you’re not already on that mailing list, let me know if you want to be added.

Here’s a brief rundown of what we’ve been up to lately:
Saturday we visited Lucca, which lived up to the guidebooks’ promise as a charmingly beautiful yet sleepy Tuscan town with strangely few tourists given its architectural, cultural and natural splendor.

Sunday was a day of rest, with a brief excursion up the hill from our villa to see a truly undiscovered jewel, Serravalle Pistoiese, a tiny towered village so picturesque as to seem unreal, within less than 10 minutes of our Tuscan home, and not a tourist to be found. We wandered about in awe, taking in the gorgeous sunset, and were treated to a private tour by a delightful 70-year old man (who chattered away in Italian enthusiastically even though I made it clear that I only speak and understand “un po”) of the Oratorio with frescoes from the Giotto school. We managed to communicate the essential though, and it was the perfect way to end the weekend.

Monday was our first “setback” in that we decided to get an early start to head to the coast (I had to work that evening so we needed to be back at a decent hour). For all our previous excursions, we have been preferring the small country roads, which provide breathtaking Tuscan views framed by cypress and lime trees and a glimpse into “real” life as we pass through the smaller towns. Since we had less time Monday, we took the “autostrada” which despite being a modern, toll highway, only has 2 lanes, which were backed up for over an hour due to a horrendous 18-wheeler accident (the only vehicle involved, but burned to a crisp and the driver was helicoptered out…) To top it off, the snail pace was through a horribly polluted industrial area that marred the views of the Apennines in the distance and the Versilia coast to our left. When we finally escaped the mind-numbing traffic jam, it was time for lunch. We had some quick but tasty pasta by the sea, took a short walk to the water, dipped our toes in, then made our way back to the villa, exhausted from the strain.

Tuesday, our bad luck was almost repeated, in that once again we needed to take the autostrada since we were off on a pilgrimage to Assisi to see St Francis. After patting ourselves on the back for making an earlier-than-expected start, we quickly realized the error of our ways as we got stuck in rush-hour traffic heading into Florence (again, only TWO lanes on the major highway!!??!?)
St Frank was apparently with us in spirit though, as we were only delayed about 20 minutes this time and then were able to whisk through the spectacular Chianti countryside into scenic Umbria. We had lunch in Perugia, a town we wish we had more time to visit as it offers so many delights, but we were on a mission!! After we FINALLY made it to Assisi (getting out of Perugia back to the highway proved a more difficult task than our free map from the tourist office could handle) we couldn’t visit anything!! It turns out we just happened to be there the same day as Italian president Giorgio Napolitano was visiting the world conference on religion for peace.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20060904.wrelig0904/BNStory/International/home
For security reasons, only the monks, nuns and lucky holders of press passes and conference attendees could enter the Basilica and other famous sites.
We consoled ourselves with chocolate: I am writing to you now from the Etruscan Chocohotel in Perugia. The entire hotel is decked out in a chocolate theme, they give you a bar of chocolate when you check in, every room is a different chocolate brand (Mom and I are appropriately enough in the Cadbury Fruit & Nut bar!) and in the outstanding restaurant, there is an entire dinner menu based on chocolate… all washed down with a superb local wine.

We’ll be making another go at St Frank today.
Stay tuned for more news from the road and more pictures to be added soon!