Roaming Our Way in Tuscany, still……
Second day of our road trip in the Tuscany countryside. This drive isn’t as scenic as yesterday, more hills, curva, trees and towns, fewer vineyards. Still, lots of 13th century architecture and some pretty amazing castles. First stop, Volterra, site of the film “Twilight” but more importantly it was home to the Etruscan’s at the end of 4th century BC. To protect their home, a wall was constructed that measured over 7300 meters, ~24,000ft, around the town center. Still standing today along with the fortress and the ruins of a Roman theater.
Volterra
Easy to see why they chose this town to film a “Twilight” episode. The main square, Piazza dei Priori, is magnificent with the town hall and Church of San Francesco. Today these buildings house the museum and the local policia.
Roman Theater ruins
Narrow streets typical of most Tuscany towns
Unique light fixtures
Hand-forged flag holders
Museum in Volterra
Really unusual marble work
Modern archway
Had a coffee and pastry so back on the road. Early driving today, cool weather around 70F, people are working so not a lot of traffic which is a good thing, these roads are worse than the roads in Ireland! Talk about curves (or curva here in Italy). These roads wind up and down hill and around turns that I swear are 360 degrees! The drivers we do meet are those in training for Le Mans and race by a hell of a lot faster than me. I’m truly surprised we haven’t seen a fatality, yet. In 2016, Italy ranked 14th in road accidents resulting in injury or death among the 28 EU countries (175,791 accidents), but their trying to improve that! Next year I hear they’re trying to hit (no pun intended) 13th!!
Pastries and coffees
Back on the road, we’re driving to Massa Marittima, a little over an hour drive from Volterra. Same scenery, lots of trees and hills, reminds us of driving in the Santa Cruz mountains in California. Really different industry here. Massa Maritt (short version) is known for mines of iron, mercury, copper and foundries for iron works. Of course, there are olive-oil mills here as well.
Parked il (Italian for “the”) hot rod and made our way to the town center and the main piazza, Piazza Garibaldi. Here is, you guessed it, a 13th century cathedral dedicated to Saint Cerbonius (if you read up on Cerb, he was a Bishop in 545AD that was said to do some pretty amazing things, like tame wild geese and cure a fever) I’m starting to wonder what the hell people did before and after the 13th century if everything we’ve seen was built during that time. (I know, it was the Renaissance)
We really made good time getting here so we decided to push on further south, all the way to Follonica and the Gulf of Follonica, in the Mediterranean Sea (or Tyrrhenian Sea if you’re from Italy). Why not? We’re on a road trip, retired, a couple of wild and crazy tourist, well one is crazy. Hell, lets go to the sea, at least that wasn’t made in the 13th century!
Surprisingly, less than 30 minutes’ drive and we’re there. Beautiful little coastal town with a few hotels but mostly small homes on the beach and a few condo complexes. Get the feeling this isn’t top tourist country except for the Brits, they seem to be everywhere.
The Mediterranean coast
Promenade in Follonica
Beautiful flowered gate
Follonica Promenade
Parked our ride and started walking around the promenade. Temp is a little warmer, 80’s or so, humidity blasting through the roof, but a nice breeze coming off the sea. Not a lot of people, locals or otherwise, and quite a few shops and restaurants are closed. We found a couple for our lunch choice and settled on the one that was on the beach. Wanted to catch some of that sea breeze and cool down a bit. The only unfortunate thing about this restaurant was that it specialized in fish dishes, good for Mom-Bear, bad for me. Oh well, there’s a chicken patty and fries on the kid’s menu – saved!
Oooh yum! Straight from the kids menu – chicken patty and fries
Shrimp, mussels and risotto
Lunch was good, got through the language barrier with the waiter, a very nice man, and had a good meal. Not much else going on so time to head back to our abode but not before stopping by one last attraction, and it’s a bit unusual.
Although not as prevalent as cathedrals, abbeys and monasteries are plentiful in Italy. The most famous one in this area is Abbazia di San Galgano, that’s our next stop. Probably the most famous monastery in modern Italy is Monte Cassino, site of the 1944 battle to win Rome from the Axis forces. Slight segue, on Feb 15, 1944, Allied bombers dropped 1,400 tons of munitions on Monte Cassino. The monastery was completely demolished! However, the German forces occupying the area, reassembled and used the ruble for defensive positions. The Allies assaulted Monte Cassino four times before routing the Germans. The cost was high, 55,000 Allied casualties; 20,000 German.
Sorry, got back into War and Wine, Too mode (WW2). The abbey is in amazing condition considering it was built around 1211-1218 AD by Cistercian monks. There is no roof but the columns and capitals all have retained their carvings and structure. You can easily imagine the grandeur of this building back in the day.
The abbey
Relief on the column capitals
The special artifact of this abbey is associated with a story we all know, sort of. Seems San Galgano was a knight, who was known for his fierce temper and violence. Legend has it that an angel came to him one night and told him to follow the Lord, live in peace. Gal, to his friends, thought about it for a while and then told the angel that he would try, but it would be like trying to cut stone with his sword. Upon saying that, he raised his sword and struck a rock with all his force fully expecting it to break in half. But it didn’t, instead it stuck in the stone, all the way to the hilt. The sword in the stone. Sorry, we didn’t get any pictures, closed for remodeling.
Heading home, have another road trip tomorrow. This time to Florence to tour the Galleria dell Accademia to see Michelangelo’s sculpture, “David” and climb the 463 stairs to the top of the Cupola. Need to rest them legs!
Close with pictures of the town of Cedda where our farm stay is located. (Sorry, that’s all that’s in the town!)
San Pietro church in Cedda – dating back to 998AD
Saluti….