More on Italy - 11-4-2006

Friday October 20, 2006

So, I think today has been our best day in Italy. It rained all night and this morning promised to be dreary as well. So, we decided to spend the day in Vinci. Susanna suggested that we also spend time in Montelupo. At Vinci, we lingered in the Leonardo museum, which showed off his many inventions. Gary really enjoyed that museum. We spend about two times as much time there as Susanna thought we would! We had lunch in Vinci before heading out to Montelupo. Lunch wasn’t very good, though. It consisted of sad penne pasta arrabiatta. The pasta was overcooked and the sauce was uninspiring. We began lunch with Bruschettoni (big bruschetta) with liver --- similar to a pate (this was actually pretty good). My lunch was a salad with tuna, mozzarella, tomatoes, olives and lettuce. Nothing amazing – but okay nonetheless.

After lunch, we set out for Montelupo. Either Gary’s driving or my navigational skill has improved --- or both! We made it to Montelupo without any problems. We arrived around 3 pm – unfortunately the shops there are closed between 1 and 4! Sooo… hello gelato! Gary got hazelnut/chocolate and I got coffee. Together they were amazing.

We came across an old church and ducked in to light a candle. It is hard to believe how beautiful renaissance art can be found in tiny village churches! This church was no exception --- it had several wonderful paintings.

Montelupo is the home of a thriving Tuscan ceramics industry. We visited several shops – some were open and some we simply pressed our noses to the window. We tried to kill more time by having a cappuccino… and succeeded in warming our insides while sitting in the drizzle outside.

We finally ducked inside a shop with the intention of purchasing some items. We found a wonderful Madonna, a small tile with “Beware of dog” in Italian (and a picture of a Dalmatian) and a couple of other small items.
The shopkeeper, Dario, enjoyed practicing his English with us. He told us the story of the Black Rooster seal that is on the Chianti bottles:

Florence and Siena were constantly warring over the land between the two cities. They finally reached an agreement about the land in question – on a specified day, the men of each city would walk toward the other city. The boundary would be established at the meeting point. They all agreed to set out at dawn. The men of Florence decided to use the crowing of the black rooster to signify dawn – as this type of rooster typically begins crowing one how before dawn. Thus the men of Florence met the men of Siena closer to the city of Siena than was originally surmised. To honor the black rooster, for the land in question is used to grow Chianti grapes, the rooster’s image is used on official Chianti wine from that region.

--- heh ---

Well the rain continued to pour throughout our visit with Dario so Gary and I hurried back to the car and got drenched in the process. We quickly made our way back to the villa with only one or two wrong turns under our belt!

At dinnertime, we ventured out into the village of Castelfiorntino. An American couple gave us a restaurant suggestion. We ended up at another pizzeria as we couldn’t find the one that they suggested! We parked in the plaza (named after our president – JFK) and walked to the restaurant. Funny thing --- we walked into the restaurant and saw another American couple who were also staying at our villa! We chatted with them (Sherene and Christopher) and compared notes on our day.

Okay, when it says “lardo” in Italy, they mean “lardo”!!! I decided to branch out a little at dinner and try something new – the bruchetta with lardo and anchovies. What was served to us was thin slices of PORK FAT on toasted bruchetta topped off with an anchovy fillet! UGH! I couldn’t eat that… neither could Gary. Okay – Italy – 1; Americans – 0. The pizza there was amazing, though. Instead of bread, they served a pizza crust (it was very thin --- like a cracker crust) with olive oil drizzled on it and kosher salt. OMG – it was delicious. Then we got a pizza with spicy salami, mushrooms and black olives. Then after dinner, we walked around the town center – and got lots of ideas of where we might want to shop on Saturday!