Amalfi, day two

The heaters had done their work in the night and we woke to a little mellow heat. But what we really woke to was steel sunlight coming through the window. The sun rises behind some mountains that lie across the water from us (Sicily?); a peeping gold to begin with and then a razor sharp blade of brightness powers down. The sky is the bluest of blues; this must be burning hot in summer. As it is, in midwinter, the sun is most welcome in our windows. There is no sleeping past 7.30am here. The sun is a taskmaster. And the curtains are no match.

We all got up and organised not only for the new day, but the new week. Living week to week, quite literally, is an interesting phenomena; very short term but quite detailed in the planning. And you don’t plan beyond the immediate week because you don’t know what kind of place you are going to for the next week.

Because the sun was so strong, we decided to see if the air outside was as warm as it looked. It wasn’t, but it also wasn’t cold. Paris decided that it might even be tee shirt weather. Not me. But neither was it for a puffy jacket. Have we seen the last of them for this trip? From our terrace, the sea ripples out for miles, torn in two by the bleached white path of the sun. We are rammed into the side of a hill, all windows one side (the side of the sea) and none the other side because it is pretty much underground.

It is a pretty but tough kind of place. No real resort-y places to stay. You are in a house (some are lavish of course) or a little hotel. But nothing of the scale we saw in places like Monaco. Well, there seemed to be more flat surfaces in Monaco than here.

We discovered the garden and found space in the banana lounges there. We all got books (except for Niccolo who was intrigued by the way that the banana lounges could be modified and made to lie completely flat) and sat in the early sun and read. You could imagine spending hours here, doing just this and then wandering, a little dazed, back into the kitchen to make something for lunch. Perhaps a sleep after lunch. And, if the weather was hot, a little swim (somehow, but how to get to the water? It feels like it just there, but is probably miles away). We admired the clean sharp yellows and oranges of the fruits on the trees (the most vibrant yellow of a lemon I have ever seen, but is it just a trick of the light?). We planned to go up to the town via some steps to see what we could see.

This is an ancient place (but what place isn’t?). And by ancient, I think I might mean that it has had its civilisation recorded in quite specific ways for centuries, and ways in which we might currently identify. Living in cities, drinking wine, organising elections, writing plays and poetry, trying to understand the world through both religion and science. It all feels strangely ‘modern’ in the sense that these civilizations were peopled apparently but individuals ‘just like us’. The people of Pompeii are not ‘other’ but just us in togas. And you can see why a toga might have been the right thing to wear here. You’d need some breeze here in high summer I’d think.

As noted last night, the roads are really just some kind of terrible roller coaster, so we thought we’d walk up to our little township. ‘Just up the stairs’ our host had said last night. ‘There are shops and an internet point … everything you might need’.

With the laptops, we set off.

Steps, hmmm. Well, there were hundreds of them cut into the side of the mountain. I pity the person who had to do this because it must have been done by hand; no possible way a machine could have worked on this cliff. And the steps are uneven, hacked at will; some with very high riders (how many times will I trip?), some long and low and flat. We climbed steadily; up past houses (that must be fun when you do the shopping) and the long narrow terraces with grape vines or lemon trees. And still we climbed. Sometimes we were climbing on winding paths, but most often it was the brutal stairs. At last, there was a road. There were also more stairs going up but I was for trying my luck on the road. Surely, where there is a road, there is a shop. This is our version of civilisation. The road. In Roman times, it was probably the Senate, or the baths. So we stumbled along the road for a while, came across a man fixing his truck and asked if he knew where Furore was. He indicated that we keep going up the road. Really?

And then around a corner, and there was a tiny township perched on the side of the hill. The little bed and breakfasts on the sea side, somehow built mostly on the air, and the shops of the other side. There was no internet connection anywhere in the town (I’m writing this in Word, and will load this up with lots of others when we get connected again). There was, however, a café and Paris was happy to drink good coffee in the strong sun. Apparently, in Furore, what you do for fun is wait outside the post office for it to open. Strange, because by this time it was half past ten or so. And yet, there they waited. There seemed to be a lot of waiting here, but no one minds.

We turned around and headed back to the house.

Down the stairs, that is, beyond our place, you get to the only fjord in Italy. So we thought that might be fun. We had been warned that there were a thousand steps (or more?) but it was sunny. Forty minutes said the sign ominously.

Is this something about my age? The kids leapt from step to step and had races and were laughing all the way down. I was shaking and sweating very early on. Is walking down steps suddenly as hard as walking up them? It appeared that way to me, and I would breath much relief when there was a flat bit along which I could walk at a steady pace. The descent was unforgiving; straight down. We met some goats. They thought we were most amusing. And after forty, thigh burning, knee cracking, back jarring minutes, we were at the fjord. What is a fjord? I’m not sure; but this was a tiny beach that lay in the gap between what appeared a crack in the cliff. No sunlight here; some boats pulled up onto the stony shore. A bridge crossed the crack high up above the beach (the road, the road!) and this dripped water. The view from the bridge was dazzling. But Myles was sweating with vertigo. We had to move on. None of us fancied going back up the steps but we had heard that you could catch a bus to Amalfi from hereabouts. But where? A bloke pulled his car up to the steps at the crucial moment and we asked him where the bus would go from. Just up the road, he said. One minute. Well, it was something like one minute if you have nowhere to be at a certain time, and you were not walking along a road that had no footpaths as was only one car wide with cars driving like maniacs along it. It was a rather long one minute. But finally, there was a bus stop. Myles remembered reading somewhere that you couldn’t buy tickets on the bus, so we went to the tiny petrol station that sat next to the bus stop and asked them. And it turned out they sold tickets to the bus; and told us that the bus was coming: now. Well, now is a relative term. And while the men who worked the petrol station had coffee with their friends and finally locked the door to go to where? The local bar?, we waited in the sun. Oh my god; the sun is glorious, it gold plates your back and makes you feel like the richest person in the world. So we were not concerned. And of course, at last, the bus did come. We got on. I went to ask the driver about what we did with the tickets but (terrifyingly) he was on his mobile phone. We lurched off, him chatting to someone and driving around corners that felt like they might crumble beneath the wheels with one hand. The smattering of Japanese tourists that were already passengers smiled politely at us. We grabbed seats. Myles sat on the sea side of the bus. I wanted to hug the cliff. We all felt dizzy when we pulled into Amalfi. It is the most surreal bus drive. At no point do you  really believe you are on a road at all. It feels like you are driving somehow parallel to the cliff, but not really on it. And beneath you are hundreds of metres of air and finally, the sea. I don’t suffer vertigo, but this gave me something akin to an uncomfortable thrill.

Amalfi is shut down for winter; the town had its eyes closed and was sleeping in the sun. We did manage to find a small bar with food open for lunch. The bloke who ran it had the most remarkable way of managing orders. He did each plate one at a time. For example, I ordered soup. And so did the woman at the next table. But he didn’t make them together. He made hers. And then, some time later, he made mine. He cooked Niccolo’s hamburger. Then he cooked Myles’ pasta. Then he made Zelda lasagne. Then my soup. And then he came out to tell us that Paris’ melanzane was no possible. He had run out (this was forty minutes later). OK. He’d have pizza. And then, he cooked that. It was kind of mesmeric. As we sat there, locals came in to have a tiny coffee, or tiny liqueurs (that they would throw back and then leave). We watched music videos. Then the bloke turned the channel to sport. He was trying to find the tennis (after we had a discussion about where we were from). We ended up watching American football. Close enough. After this, we meandered down by the water. You can see why Amalfi is one of the larger towns here; it is one of the few with flat land. There is an impressive church (the kids refused to have anything to do with it), and a few piazzas with some shops languidly open (but not with any real conviction). There were a few tourist dotted about the place. We thought we should shop for provisions. I went into a bar to ask if there were any supermarkets around. I was told by the barman that there was but it was closed. When would it open? He shrugged. Perhaps four thirty. Perhaps later. As it was only three, we decided not to wait around.

We returned to the bus stop. And then, the greatest comedy on wheels. Amalfi is the terminus for the bus. And so what happen is this: buses roll in from the top of the cliff. People get off. The driver gets off. He turns off the sign that tells where is might be going (or where he has come from), he puts on his jacket. He gets his bag. He disappears into the local bar. About seven buses came this way. The place was clogged with buses. We waited with locals who patiently watched this charade. Finally, one bus turned on a sign – Agerola. We all ran like crazy for the bus. The driver looked at us with some contempt and then put on his jacket and disappeared. But amazingly, within ten minutes he was back (he couldn’t have drunk that much in ten minutes, could he?). I asked about getting off at Furore. He assured me it was possible. Away we went. If anything, this was a worse drive than the first one. For one thing, we were much higher this time, and the roads were much more busy. But no one appeared concerned except us. Swinging around corners, passing cars with about a hair width of room, driving over passes that, when looked back at, apparently existed without support. Furore couldn’t come fast enough. True to his word, the driver got us off at Furore. We waved the bus off with some relief. Nothing was open in the town (too early?) and we walked back down the stairs on shaky legs to our house.

But not for long. We had to get food. So Myles and I braved the roads and drove into Agorola. The people we came across were amazingly friendly, helped us find a supermarket and a butcher. The shop keepers were lovely and helpful. Here is an interesting discovery. Chicken breasts here are sold with the bone in. I had ordered the chicken breast from the butcher through some rather humiliating pantomime. The butcher had asked if I wanted it cut up (I think, but now I realise that she was asking if I wanted the bone removed). I had said no. And then I had to bone it myself (badly) when we got home. So shopping was all good. Myles and I did have a bad moment when we realised that we were driving along some very dangerous roads and what would the kids do if we failed to return? But best not to dwell on that one.

We returned safely. We ate dinner. We had a gin rummy tournament (Myles won, the evil sod). We fell into bed with very sore thigh. Well, mine were sore.

Vicopisano, day seven; Amalfi, day one

Moving day. There is no need to recount how this goes. We have done this many times and it is never good. But we are better at it now than we were. And a car always helps.

We went down to our host’s shop earlier – did our usual internet thing – and I bought one of his plates. Beautiful thing it is too.

We headed out. The sky was closing in for rain as we left; we are beginning to think that for this trip we are some kind of weather gods. But was we drove south, the weather opened into sun and bright skies. We pretty much drove non stop to Amalfi; only having lunch at a chain restaurant on the motorway called Autogrill. This is Italy’s answer to the roadside café that were attached to petrol station when we were kids. Sometimes we would stop there (they were called The Golden Fleece from memory). Now they are all fast food. In Italy, service stations have preserved the good old road side café. Here, there are stations and there are dishes of the day. The boys had hamburgers from the grill station, and we had pasta and rice from the pasta and rice station. It wasn’t disgraceful by any measure. And the people at the next table were wearing elaborate fur coats, so perhaps this is where the jet set eat.

We sailed through Naples in the late afternoon and felt no pangs that we were not spending any time there. Big and sprawling and utterly filthy with rubbish absolutely everywhere. We were driving up into the hills and through some tunnels into the other world of the Amalfi coast. We were meeting our hosts in Agerola, just at the beginning of the Amalfi coast and they were going to escort us to our house.

If we had thought that the Cinque Terre was hair-raising in the car driving stakes, we were utterly speechless at the roads that now confronted us; this was roller coaster stuff. And meeting a bus coming the other way made it an extreme sport. It wasn’t too far to our place, however, just through the tiny town of Furore (which was to be our local spot), and then down some more narrow and precipitous roads and finally to our little house at the end of this most narrow street.

Our host showed us some things – the thousand steps we could take down to the only fjord in Italy – the Fjord of Furore – where many films had been filmed (as she said). And the steps up would take us to the village of Furore and sustenance. We have had a talent for finding places with savage stairs. Perhaps we are always looking for a view. Perhaps. Now we are wiser – and will know what to look for, and what to ask for (few stairs, wifi, a washing machine, good heating). Up the stairs (Paris again looked grim at the prospect of carrying up suitcases), and into the house. The view from the terraces (yes, we have two, and a garden with banana lounges, and lemon and orange trees all around that are somehow grown across and over frames that you could happily sit under; like the most romantic pergola (but there are hundreds across the face of these hills).

Inside, the house was COLD. We have had long discussions about the coldest place we have experienced. Myles is adamant it is Yorkshire (the house was cold, but not freezing), but then Tuscany was cold to, until we managed to heat the house up. But this was so incredibly cold that I seriously wondered how we might survive it. We cranked up the heaters (not the wonderfully efficient wall heaters that we have become attached to, but those blow heaters that are mounted high in the wall) but we were still in our puffy jackets when we were preparing to go to bed. I raided every cupboard I could find for extra blankets and ended up piling tablecloths on each bed for warmth. I was in bed in my hoodie (with the hood up) and desperately trying to get my feet warm. It was looking grim.

Myles seriously considered sleeping in his puffy.

Finally, huddled in bed, we put the puffy jackets over us like blankets. I found a book on Pompeii (a fictional account by Robert Harris) and read it longingly. Not because I’m desperate to experience a terrible volcano eruption, but because the eruption happened during a long hot summer and description of the heat was making me quite faint.

At length, we warmed up and fell into a sleep. What would the morning bring?

Vicopisano, day six

Sunday and – could it be possible? – another glorious day. Myles had decided that we must go to the Cinque Terre – five small towns that hug the coast north of us. You can walk between them and sit in the sun when you are tired. We had been warned that, because of floods earlier in the year, some of the tracks between the towns might be closed but we were prepared to give it a crack. The problem with not having the internet is that you can’t check on these things – I can’t remember how I used to research anything – or indeed find things out at all. Perhaps I used to take chances and find out when I got there. Great moments or disappointment. Perhaps that is the way to live anyway.

The Cinque Terre, according to Samantha, was an hour and half away. A decent drive. But it was OK. The landscape is beautiful and we had finally found a radio station that we could all listen to without losing our minds. Sam managed to take us on every road but a motorway so we didn’t make particularly good time, but we were there by about 11.30am. The first town (or land) on this side is Riomaggiore. We dove (I mean this literally, you drive sort of straight down a hill and into a town head first) into the town and found a carpark. The bloke who gave us our ticket was very helpful and headed us in the right direction. It was a bright sunny and clear day, but (as every day is here) cold. We wandered down through the town. It sort of folds into a long footpath (no cars after a certain point) with houses and buildings leaning down into this footpath. The kids had to eat (holy hell; I’m so over this) so we bought them slices of pizza and made our way through the pedestrian tunnel and through to the train station, the ticket office and the beginning of the walk (called, at this point, the Via dell’Amore – the Road of Love). At the tourist/ticket office, we discovered that we could walk to the second town (Manarola) but the paths to the other towns were closed. Oh well. One town sounded fine. And the kids were thrilled because the first town was pretty close, and the others were a long way away, and they are never really happy about long, long walks.

We bought our tickets (these are for the national park, but they check them on your way through to the first part of the walk).

And then we were walking along a path that spread the Ligurian Sea at our feet. It was overwhelmingly blue; the kind of blue that makes you want to dive head first into it; the kind of blue that make you think that the world will go forever; the kind of blue that gives you a thirst.

Myles had been saying that he thought he was becoming immune to new sights of beauty; that he had seen too much. But this was something new, something that he felt he could respond to. The path was even, paved neatly with white stones and as we walked along it, we agreed again at how blessed we have been. The most sublime weather with sun gazing with love upon us, this incredibly landscape and no tourists. We were literally the only people on the path with the exception of some people sitting in the sun reading books or soaking up a tan. It was our solitude to devour and savour and we loved every minute. At every hundred metres or so there was a marble plaque celebrating some great lover, or icon of love – Eros, Paris (I took a photo – it didn’t say Paris actually, but Paride). And on every fence or gate or even wire, there were dozens – hundreds – of locks with the names of lovers. Just like in Paris. I like this idea very much. Zelda is slightly disturbed by it. She worries that if you fall out of love or you are betrayed, that you have to come all the way back to unlock the lock. I can see what she means, but anticipating the end at a beginning is a bit sad.

In about half an hour, we found ourselves in Manarola. It is another little town clinging to the side of a cliff, determined not to slide into the sea. All around the town are terraces growing mostly vines (though I’m sure there are other crops too) and photos of the people who work these fields. It must be back breaking, climbing what looks to be hundreds of metres to cut, by hand, grapes. And the sun must be fierce in summer and autumn. It was strong for us; and this was mid winter. We walked on passed Manarola. We knew that the path was closed but we wanted to see how far we could go. It turned out to be not too far, but we did see more of the sea, the clear water that you can look right down into and see the bottom.

We were forced to turn back and go into Manarola. Not that this was any hardship.

These towns are closed during this time. I can see (and we were told by some of the local people we spoke with when we had lunch) that it would be wall to wall people in summer. Every building it seemed was advertising rooms for rent, and every other building was some kind of restaurant or shop. Most were closed at this time of the year; in Manarola, there was only one place open. So in we went and sat with some local men who were eating and watching the news on the TV. The woman at the counter spoke exceptional English and we ordered lots of food. On the TV, the cruise ship that had run aground because the captain was a first class idiot was all over the news. We couldn’t take our eyes of it.

Back on our walk through the towns, we were charmed beyond belief to see a nativity scene on the hill side that involved not only the holy family and the wise men, but also dolphins and sea horses. There were more boats than cars or indeed people on the streets. The buildings are all painted a variety of colours – yellows and pinks and reds. And the hills all rose before us, with neat stripes organising the farming.

Myles decided that he could live here; all that water and sun, and no cars and the amazing quiet (though probably only at this time of the year). We liked the dogs we saw too; a fantastic sausage dog with a very cute jacket on.

With some regret, we walked back along the Via dell’ Amore and into Riomaggiore. Back at the car we decided to drive to some of the other towns. While they were not accessible by foot, you could drive to them. So we began to do so, along roads that were cut in impossible ways into the side of the hills. It was both breathtaking and nerve racking and after about half an hour, we decided to turn back home. It was a place to explore on foot, we decided. And we would return to do the whole thing at some point. Perhaps when it was hot (with thousands of others) so we could go to the beach in the fourth town (I think) and lie languid in the water after our long walk.

It was getting dark as we drove home. Zelda thought that it took much longer this way around. Perhaps she was right.

It was our last night in Vicopisano. We cooked everything in the cupboards. Inspired by the food in Siena the day before, I did potatoes sliced, boiled and then baked with very juicy cherry tomatoes and onions and garlic, in olive oil. There was fried fennel and an already cooked chicken, and the left overs of salad and beans and a dozen other things. It was great eating; potatoes are such a frontier in cooking. There is never a dull moment.

We watched some courtroom drama about a young woman who had been horribly threated in an asylum in the 1940s in Baltimore. Unlikely, I know, but somehow quite gripping. And then, parking and organising and thinking about showering the whole family, and failing too. And then going to bed; but everyone was wired and Niccolo wandering about for much of the early part of the night, and me and Myles reading until our bells (we have come to think of them as our bells) chimed in their precise and somehow dour way, 12 midnight. It was to be a long drive tomorrow – all the way from Tuscany to the Amalfi coast.

Vicopisano, day five

The sun was strong as we work to the rather stark bells of our town. No melody here; straight bells that tell the time, and then the half hour. We were determined to see more hilltop towns. The children were roused and made to dress (imagine their delight). We were going to see Siena and San Gimignarno.

It was still ten o’clock before we were in the car. Samantha told us that it was an hour and a half to Siena. Really? Oh well. If that was the case, then we must just settle into it. The car is an interesting phenomenon with the kids. We have these long silences. I’m not sure what they are doing in the back; Paris has lost his ipod so they are not listening to music (though I’m usually frantically scrolling through the stations on the car radio looking for something to listen to – I hadn’t realised how dependent I was on the talking bit of radio). But they are quiet, often for full hours at a time. And then suddenly, one of them will say something (this is not always the same person) and they will burst into conversation about something, usually about a film or a TV show or about the kings and queens of England (about which, they are obsessed). Sometimes they will sing (currently, they are singing songs from Horrible Histories, Total Drama and – bizarrely – ‘Total Eclipse of the Heart’). And then, silence again. It is very weird.

And then we were climbing into the sky again, and another town before us – this one was Siena. Sam told us to go right to the top of the hill, but – our experience at Volterra – we decided it was better not to drive right into the old town, but to park on the outskirts. There was a park too, on the side of the road, so it was to be. We walked up a steep road and then, again (like a kind of waking dream) we were in another town sprung from some other time.

I know we have seen a lot of churches and I have written about them. But, with the exception of the Sagrada Familia (which is special in a way that no other building – church or otherwise – is), the cathedral of Siena is the most amazing. The floors are incredible, with images inlaid but not as mosaics, as kind of whole pieces of marble or some kind of stone. All the walls are painted, the ceiling is the night sky, and there are busts of every pope around the church. The same striped marble effect in Florence and Pisa is here too, and more beautiful. But then you can go underneath to the church that was built before this one (and on which this one is built) with its colourful frescos of Christian suffering and multiple archways. The city has restored much of this, and have built windows in the ceiling of the old church so you can see up into the new one (‘old’ and ‘new’ being relative terms). So you can stand in the old church and gaze up into the cathedral and at its night sky. As if you are somehow imagining this new church from the stones of the old one. You not only look up, but forward.

Underneath this crypt is another smaller church of the same vintage as the cathedral that sits above all of them called the Battista. We didn’t quite work out the function of this (Myles proffered the idea that it was the ‘extension’), it is a smaller space anyway, with a wonderfully painted ceiling – not the night sky, stories. In this church, there are mirrors on some of the pew so you can see the ceiling without have to crane your neck. I don’t mind the craning, but perhaps the elderly appreciate having a mirror. I gazed into the mirror for ages (not looking at myself, you understand, but at the ceiling) and it was a strange feeling, seeing the roof at your knees. Sort of like chewing gum with your feet.

There is also a museum of some of the sacred art (the children were most gratified to see that these statues wore pants), and a view of the whole of Siena from the top. Out there, in the air, with the most glorious sun pouring down, it was all a bit special (if only half the family didn’t suffer vertigo).

Saint Catherine of Siena is an important figure around hereabouts. I did some work on her when I was doing some post graduate stuff; she was one of the most amazing anorectics of the Catholic Church and I think, if I remember this rightly, would drink pus to mortify her flesh and desires. And, I think, she is also the saint who has a vision in which she is married to Christ and he gives her his foreskin as a ring. Now I can’t be making that up, can I? I must look it up again when I get home (or if we ever get internet connection again beyond several minutes in a shop).

Siena is also famous for a horse race and as a Melbournian, I feel much affinity with this. This race is called the Palio and it is run around the large Piazza del Campo in the town. Ten horses and riders take part (there are in fact fourteen districts these can be drawn from; they all have their own flags) and they run three times around the piazza. I hope they put down sand or something. Those cobblestones are slippery and the corners are a doozy. We did something far less athletic in Piazza del Campo. We had lunch. The table was in the sun and we ordered soups and melanzane, and wine, and vegetables and bread. There was olive oil. There were no complaints. I was ready to have a little sleep in the sun. But we are tourists. We must away to another point of interest.

And it was here that we found Niccolo’s new bag. He saw it and immediately had to have it. That kid knows his mind. And as it was 12 euros, Myles was happy to buy it for him. Job done.

We loved Siena very much. But before the sun left us, we wanted to see San Gimignano. It was three as we left and we pulled into San Gimignano at about 4pm.

Another gorgeous medieval town high in the Tuscan hillside. This one is ringed by towers – there are now fourteen left but apparently there had been up to seventy at one stage. It is dramatic, and must have impressed not only the peasants in the surrounding fields but visitors to the city. The streets are steep (few cars, if any, come in which is a blessing). We walked to the top and a walled garden where you could see the whole of Tuscany spread out like a picnic through a door in the wall. Very like a painting. And a woman was playing a harp and singing sad, Medieval sounding songs.

I sat in the sun with some older, Italian couples. They were liking the sun too, but one of the men couldn’t sit still. As we sucked in the sun, he waddled about checking whether the tap worked in the fountain, pushing branches aside in the bushes to see what was in the middle, checking that the screws were tight on the statue. It was restful knowing that I had no need to do any of those things.

So we saw another knockout town.

What is it about seeing? (Ah seeing. We are so dependent upon it. What about the other senses? I took a photo of a lovely valley, and as I did so, a cock crowed. This is for me alone, the crowing of the cock. I can replicate it for anyone. Though it did worry me that the cock crowed at sunset; is that right? Does this particular cock have issues?) This problem of seeing occurred to me at Volterra too, but was very apparent today. We go and we see. And then we leave, as if that is the point. I’m not sure that it is the point, but it does explain the concept of tourism, and the mania for arriving, walking and eating, and then leaving. In most towns, I ask Myles: would you live here? And he always answers (well, not always, but mostly): no. My question is clearly not serious, but I think it might be asked because the seeing a town seems somehow … well … slightly silly. And the seeing is accompanied by photographs (the proof of the seeing, the offering of the seeing to others). I think that there must be an impulse to live (‘could you live here?’) that moves beyond looking and into contributing. The looking and the seeing seems to be an act of taking. I’d like to come to a town and be more than just that (the vampire stuff that is now associated with Volterra is perhaps closer to the mark than Hollywood really meant). You know, get to know the people, tell a joke or two, meet in the local place for drink o’clock. Plant a tree. Cook some melanzane. For others. This trip is great and we have loved it, but there is something at this end of it that does feel slightly empty. Actually, if it were not for sharing the experience and being able to take about it with Myles and the kids, I think it might feel more than a touch empty.

Perhaps I’m seeing something in those ‘A Year in Provence’ narratives after all. You can’t always just come and see. Sometimes you have to stay. But perhaps you don’t always have to have a romance with the local dark eyed minstrel.

We are not going to stay here. Not this time.

Vicopisano, day four

Rain was predicted, and rain it did. We can’t go around complaining about the weather considering we have seen very little rain and a great deal of sunshine. It is, we believe, one of the warmest (if not the warmest) winter Western Europe has ever seen. So with rain, we decided to do other things. It was treat Friday, and so it was time to cook our treat Friday. Mostly we buy treat Friday, but today we were going to cook it.

Niccolo had decided long ago, as far back as Christmas, that he wanted to cook doughnuts with custard cream for the centre. We didn’t get around to it in Carcassonne; I can’t now recall why; possibly a surfeit of food already. However, this time, there was not a surfeit; it was treat Friday and we had the time as the rain tumbled.

OK, fine. We went to our host’s shop to get on the internet (email and whatnot) and to research recipes for doughnuts and custard cream. Anything that involves eggs and heat that is not fried eggs makes me nervous; so I was already feeling a little panic. And then there is the problem of buying ingredients in a country in which you only just speak the language and anything technical is a long way out of your range. Onward and upward though.

We returned to PAM (the great shopping centre in the skyish) and took our list. There were of course detours from the list (chocolate, for example, to melt for the doughnuts, glamorous breakfast cereal – that’s a mystery – pretty little bottle of Campari and soda and so on) but in general we were on a mission. The thing was, I couldn’t find anything that looked like cornflour. I knew that cornflour would be important for thickening, and I couldn’t come up with an alternative. Suddenly, Niccolo found a packet of doughnuts called (perhaps appropriately) Krapfen. He agreed to make the doughnuts from this prefab box, plus the custard cream from another prefab box. We guessed at the additional ingredients needs and were proved right when we found them in the supermarket (yeast in Italian … anyone?).

Outside of PAM, we discovered that the weather was lifting. There was the stirring of possible plans. Back at home, we cooked lunch and prepared the doughnuts (which required long resting and rising times). As we did this, Paris and I conducted a game of Gin Rummy in which I comprehensively beat him. We did not score (which probably accounts for my run of very good luck).

The sun began to shine through the windows of the kitchen. There were adventures to be had outside. So we left the doughnuts to rise beside the heater and headed out.

We decided to head for Volterra. Our host introduced this town to us as the place where some instalment of Twilight was filmed. Myles and I shrugged (knowing nothing about the films or the books; somehow this one has passed me by), and Paris actively shuddered. But it was getting late in the afternoon and it was relatively close, so we figured; why not? Vampires can be fun.

Perhaps I have lived a sheltered life. You’d think I’d have some knowledge of geography and towns beyond either straight ignorance or Hollywood. But in this case; no. But here is the other thing about this sheltered life. No expectations. I drove happily to Volterra with the family thinking and expecting nothing of this town. It was really only something to do on an afternoon in which the sun began to punctuate the clouds.

We drove through very pretty countryside, and then, after a time, we began to climb. Suddenly, we were high in the sky; looking down on a very organised landscape; vines and recently plough fields, and nicely managed forests. And above us, loomed a town.

We parked. And into the old town we walked. It is steep and completely self contained, with all the houses and buildings huddled together and tall. There are little alleyways under arched gates, and everything paved in stone. As the sun declined, and the town got dark, it was all a bit magical. At the top of the town is a very large piazza with a palazzo on one side, and a church on the other. All the colours were dark variations on the colours in Tuscany; orange, green, purple, brown (and black and white). Here is was a gloomy version, but not depressing or ugly, just stern. Funnily enough, this is a town known for alabaster – luminous whiteness among the dark. There were Twilight posters everywhere (so that was true) but who cared? Some kind of Hollywood version of this quite real Medieval darkness couldn’t be as interesting as the ‘real’ thing. I say ‘real’ here because it is now a tourist town. People live here (there is a very busy car repair shop just to the left of the piazza and there were folks walking their dogs), but it is so geared to tourists like us – food and ice cream and shops with souvenirs and  books that tell you the history of the town. It now lies somewhere between Hollywood and daily reality. But we really liked it. We did none of the things were have been programed to this point to do – the church, the museum, historical sites and so on. We just walked around and looked in windows and admired the darkness. We also discovered a new flavour of ice cream that might be specific to this town called ‘Chic and Shock’. Paris ordered it. It was a little like coffee and biscuits.

We spent the minutes of sunset with our legs hanging over a wall and looking out onto the Tuscan countryside that ripples away from this hilltop town. Well, me and the kids did. Myles can’t quite cope with heights on any level.

It must be amazing to live in a town like this one; to have such a presence in the countryside – to prevail over the fields and yards below you. And to have a history that extends over the shoulders of generation after generation. I think I would like that sensation. But perhaps you wouldn’t be aware of it. Perhaps it is something that would be invisible to you (or transparent) and just a part of how you see the world on any given day.

We journeyed back to our tall house in Vicopisano, sleepy and thoughtful.

The doughnuts awaited us when we opened the door. We had forgotten them.

I heated the oil and dropped them in. Clearly, deep frying is an art and I have no knowledge of it. I managed to cook them brown (not an appetising colour for doughnuts) but have them raw in the middle. So it just required that I break each doughnut apart and cook them again. Paris quite like them, said they tasted like churros. We dipped them in the fake custard cream, and in chocolate Niccolo melted by placing it in a bowl on the heater (alongside the clothes I was baking dry). As we stuffed doughnuts into our mouths, we watched a film on poverty in America on True Movies (our one English channel on the TV). We were in danger of being Marie Antoinette.

We retired to bed relatively early (though I discovered the children watching something on Paris’s computer at midnight later on, and got very angry with them) to read. I’m reading Jane Austen but it is not melding with my mood. I’m starved for something to read. I hadn’t realised how much I rely on my library. Myles is getting through ‘The Girl Who Played with Fire’. Paris is reading ‘Atonement’. Zelda reads ‘Dracula’, but only in the morning. It creeps her out at night.

We are inspired to go and see hilltop towns in Tuscany. That is our plan for tomorrow.

Vicopisano, day three

We decided to go to Pisa today but because it is just up the road, we thought we might take it easy and have a late morning. We stumbled around for a while, some of us writing, some reading. Making breakfast and doing the washing. Looking out the window at the bright air and sun, and the glorious landscape that runs straight from our front door to as far as the eye can see. We have a washing machine here, but no dryer. Technically, because it is sunny, I could hang the clothes in the garden, but there is no line and the garden is in shade and it would take a miracle for anything to dry in this cold. So I bake the clothes on the heaters that ring the walls. This means that the kids have to go from room to room to find clean clothes, mostly draped across chairs or directly on heaters. Getting dressed can be something of a trial for this reason.

We were desperate for some external connection and we have no wifi here. We have to go down to the shop of our host (he not only owns this place and a Bed and Breakfast, but runs a ceramics shop in the town) to connect to his wifi. So we sat in his shop for a while and did email and blogging and, for Paris, skyping. And we went in search of ingredients for lunch too, and a little walk around the town. It is really sweet, one square, but booming with people. And not only the elderly. There is a sense, a real one, that these towns are populated only by the superannuated. But while they are a big presence, there is much youth too. The square was teeming with young families have a bit of a run in the sun, and the shops are run by young women. This is a town not too far from major towns so perhaps there are people who live here but commute. It would make a tonne of sense.

After lunch, there was a pretty competitive game of chess between Paris and Niccolo (which Niccolo won – but, as he said, ‘Paris helped me’). I found a map of Pisa in our house and decided to program an actual street into Samantha, instead of our usual ‘Centre’ vagueness. It wasn’t far to Pisa, about half an hour and, like so many of these towns, you are suddenly there, without much fanfare or warning.

Pisa is a sleepy town (at least at this time of the year) and I’m a fan of sleepy towns. We parked in the carpark closest to the leaning tower and we were the only car there, along with some weeds and a few old bins filled with water. Pisa is, on this side at least, a walled town. We parked outside the wall and then walled through one of the gateways and into the town. And you are there, right in front of the leaning tower. I wonder if it is a phenomenon of being Australian (or generally from the ‘new world’) that historical objects or places are expected to be hidden away – to be driven too, to be heralded by signs and symbols and much bated breath. But here, all these places of interest are right in the towns, next to shops and road and people’s homes. It is less of a big deal.

The tower itself is all white marble and has been recently restored. They did a big forensic thing on it and worked out how to get rid of the black mould and where all the cracks were appearing and what to fill. As such, it is shining white and looks like new. The marble comes from Carrara. Apparently, it didn’t initially; it was from a more local town, but the replacement marble is Carrara. And it leans like the clappers. We were all vaguely keen to go to the top; even the more anxious about heights among us. I think it was something to do with the kookiness of the tower itself and the idea of going up a tower that was not quite right.

But the ticket office gave us a fright. For one person, and this for all people regardless of age or income, it would be 15 euro to go to the top. Niccolo was no allowed to go at all (there were tears) as he was too young. And I was cross about the price. So no one went. We did lie down on the ground underneath the tower to get the full effect and the movement of the clouds did make it feel like the whole tower was coming down on us.

It wasn’t busy. There were a few tourists taking photos of one another pretending to hold the tower up (or push it over, depending on your preference.

The tower is a belfry for the church beside which it stands. Now a church standing there, wide open? We had to go in. This one, like the Duomo in Florence, has this distinctive geometrical design. Here, instead of green and white, it is black and white stripes right through the whole place. Amazing paintings inside too, and the ceiling is covered with metals casts of different flowers. The altar is a golden mosaic of Christ (very like San Marco, actually) and there was a terrific nativity scene with – yes! – a donkey. Niccolo was still upset and sulking because of the tower fiasco, but Zelda and I discovered a relic of the local saint – San Guido. It was his skull. She thought Niccolo might like this, and indeed it was this that finally coaxed him into the church. They stood in front the skull for ages.  Relics are something.

I wanted to look at the town so we went walking towards the Piazza del Cavelleri. This is certainly a sleepy town, with very little car traffic and a lot of people of bicycles, including elegant, older ladies. This is a very pretty place, with great colours on the buildings, made all the more dramatic by the dark shadows of neighbouring buildings providing contrast. Lots of churches that sit flush with buildings and a long street that contains interesting shops and cafes and, notably, a chocolate shop that made things like horse shoes, and nuts and bolts out of chocolate that made it all look very real and rusted. Zelda was all for going in and buying the lot.

Niccolo began to complain that I had not yet bought him a bag (a new school bag). So we went in and out of shops looking for the perfect bag. It must be a certain colour and shape and size with a long strap for over the shoulder rather than a back pack. The bag didn’t exist in Pisa. Perhaps it doesn’t exist at all.

Why is shopping an acceptable activity anyway regardless of the time or place? Here we were, a million miles from home in a completely new place and we were shopping. Hmmm. Not good. I looked at a few bags with him, and then we walked back to the car. It was getting dark, glorious pinks across the sky. We walked back passed the leaning tower and farewelled it.

It was a short day. We didn’t get excited about anything else on the way home. We came back and shared some bread, and played some cards and chess. The house is now warm, we have managed to get the heating right so we can curl up on our return from adventures and feel cosy.

Vicopisano, day two

Cold house, blue skies. It is hard to be cross here even if you must wear full body armour once you get out of bed. We wanted to see Florence today (is it ‘See Florence and die’ or is that Rome?). It is not too far from us, about an hour. We tossed up between car and train. We could catch a train from a larger town than Vicopisano called Pontedera just down the road, or we could drive and park the car in Florence. We drove to Pontedera to check out the train. All things begin equal, parking in Florence would be cheaper than the train fare, but the thing that really had us deciding to drive was that all the parking in Pontedera was meter and we didn’t have anything like the right change for an eight hour wait. So we decided to take our chances.

Samantha, as noted in a previous post, is close to nervous breakdown and cannot really be relied on to get us anywhere near where we want to go. But she is our only resource; we could buy a map, but I figure that Samantha is not only a guide but a relationship saver. After all, we can all be cross at her, but if one of us navigates, it could all be over; yelling matches and ripped maps, and people getting out of the car at inopportune moments. You can see my point.

Holding our breath a little, we programed her for Florence and set off.

The Tuscan countryside is amazingly picturesque, just like a Leonardo background, hills and trees and, in this case, little houses all dotted across the landscape. There is, of course, deep ugliness – industrial sites and suburbia and, indeed, the road down which we drove. But it seemed softened by the indecent beauty of the alternative. It is cold here, so there is frost and ice, but it is also sunny, so this ice and frost glitters in the sun and gives everything a kind of surreal shimmer. And the sun and sky here are real blue and real sun. Unlike the veiled sun of Venice, here is pours out like – how does that go? – a mighty pulse?

Like Paris, there was no heralding of the city, you are just suddenly and very much IN Florence. We were suddenly driving beside the Arno, with the Ponte Vecchio in the foreground and the streets narrowing to a trickle. Sam was doing her usual nonsense; insisting we drive down one way streets (the wrong way, as it happened), and refusing to find us another way. So we turned her off and took a chance on some road signs. Apparently, the carpark at Parterre had spots. And there were enough signs to get us there. (In our limited experience, the sign thing can go very wrong. You get a sign that lists the exact place you wish to go. There is an arrow directing you. You turn your car with hope in your heart. And then there are no more signs – though you might see one twenty minutes later on the other side of the street going in the other direction – and you drive with increasing sadness through streets that only ever seem to take you to the autostrada. Or a deadend.) It was two euro an hour. We were content.

Once we emerged, there was a tiny problem. We didn’t know where we were in relation to the rest of the city. We did have a kind of map (from the Lonely Planet guide), but it wasn’t great and it didn’t have a ‘you are here’ dot to orient us. We were by a small canal though and we figured that we should follow the run of the water because it was probably going into the Arno. The street was called Via Giovanni Milton which I thought was kinda funny. And I wasn’t going to forget it which was good.  After a decent distance, we came to Viale Filippi Strozzi, and suddenly, we were on the map. In seconds, we had worked out exactly where we were and wandered off to the old city with little hesitation.  

Florence is so beautiful (there is, it is told, a condition you can get when in Florence – the name of which escapes me – that renders you prostrate from the beauty. I think we were told this about Paris too …), and the old city is very free of cars which makes it a joy to walk around. All cities should do this.

The Duomo is unlike any other we have seen to this point. It is not muted colours for a start, but bold green on white and large geometrical shapes across the entire building. It is sparse, no intricate filigree across everything; just chest out and audacious in the centre of the piazza. We went inside; it is empty. This was quite shocking; are there no services held here (and if so, does everyone stand?). The roof of the dome is completely painted and is exquisite, and there are some wonderful paintings on the wall. But all in all, not the hushed, fearsome place most other churches are. There were even some male tourists wearing hats, so the church police aren’t so visible here. You can go down a series of steps and into what I first though was a crypt, but turns out to be a museum of the excavation done under the Duomo, and the artefacts that have been discovered. We didn’t go in. It cost money … But we did go into the historical gift shop and I bought a proper map of Florence so we at least knew where we were.

Having said that, now we just started to wander. The weather was glorious, perfect to walk in, and it was a real pleasure to be guided by what you see down a side street (oh my lord, what is that?), to find a series of marble statues standing around awaiting you, to be overcome by a huge palace. We stumbled on the Uffizi by chance, but because the weather was so good, we decided to come back later on in the afternoon and wander so more. Along the Arno, over the Ponte Vecchio. More gold than in all the bank vaults in the world and then some. The place was blinding with gold. And some of the most glamourous police officers seen anywhere in the world. Myles wondered if this was specific to the Ponte Vecchio and generally the more beautiful places in Florence.  Who cares? The police are half the fun.

We did one of those aimless wander up and down a street that alerts me to the fact that at least one member of the party is looking for food. So we went in to the first place we found and had some things to eat.

This kind of offered some time to organise the next place to go; and I decided (through some advice from others and guidebooks) that we would walk up to Piazzale Michelangelo to see the view. We crashed into an ice cream place first (it looked so good that I had some too; tirami su – happy days). Along the River Arno with its lonely rowers going up and down (prevented from full stretch by the little spill ways that scatter the river). In that open sun, there must have been worse things to do than row along the river in long ovals. Piazzale Michelangelo requires a walk up some steep steps. And a walk through Via San Niccolo (who was excited to see his name written somewhere other than the top of his work page at school). And then up the steps to the top of the Florentine world.

It was a spectacular view. The blue of the sky and the bright sun lit up the city, and warmed us. The view was all the more interesting because the city, at least on this side, stops abruptly at the old walls. On one side; a city cheek to cheek, with little space for light or movement, and on the other, a scene of pastoral serenity. You could herd your sheep right up to the walls, and duck in for a good coffee in a humming piazza and then return to the sheep without even breaking a sweat. Perhaps all cities should be thus – very much a city, and then not. Down with suburbia I say.

Piazzale Michelangelo is a carpark, by the way, with a replica of the statue of David. I’m not sure Michelangelo would be hugely impressed by this homage to him.

We were all lulled and cradled by the sun and then the three o’clock bells rang and we remembered we had a date with the Renaissance at the Uffizi Gallery. Paris queried the distance and, from our vantage point, I could show him in some detail. He agreed. And once he agrees, the others are a shoo in.

Back down the steps; Niccolo at a brisk gallop. When we got to the Uffizi, it was cheaper than when we had been there earlier, must have been the afternoon rate. We paid our money and went straight to the second floor. Not point in dallying in other places. And here, like the countryside, we struggled with what was real and what wasn’t. When I stood in front of the ‘Birth of Venus’, it was like standing in front of a replica, except I KNEW it wasn’t. I went up close, as close as the thick glass and the prohibitive rope will allow, to see the brush strokes. Where did he touch the canvass? It wasn’t easy to see. But I had to go with the idea it was real. The same with ‘Spring’. In the Leonardo room, there was a painting that I didn’t know of his, and this (why?) gave me a thrill. This, because I had not seen it reproduced a million times, felt real, felt authentic (authentic is a terrible word, isn’t it?). I looked at it for ages.

The kids were unmoved; they need a story, a narrative, to really engage. They liked the ancient statues (‘but why no pants?’ they kept asking, ‘why?’). And they look for dogs in all paintings; it is their favourite part. ‘Le chien,’ they call to one another, ‘le chien’. Luckily, chiens were well loved in the Renaissance and they litter the paintings. We liked the one and only Michelangelo painting (but it was very full of very pink people; I guess anyone who paints like this now would be considered mawkish. But not here). The Rubens and Rembrandt rooms were shut off for renovations. But there is a whole section dedicated to foreign painters that was great and a series of still life paintings that Paris and I loved by a female painter (perhaps one of the few here) called Rachel ... Something. At this point, I'm hamstrung because of limited internet access and Google not working. I'll try and find it out at a later date.

The Uffizi building itself is so lovely, every panel on the ceiling in the long hallways is painted; all the windows accept and welcome the light. It must have been lovely living here.

In the historical gift shop we found a stand with really cheap penguin books in English. We were drawn like moths. And I went in search of the loo. I have to say, the loo on this level of the Uffizi is worth a visit. You have to walk for ages, down a series of corridors, and you suddenly feel like you are in a kind of archaeological dig. And then the toilets are suddenly before you and all modern. It is very surreal.

We wandered back to the car. It took some time, but Florence is incredible. I almost wish we were staying there, but the country is really amazing and I’m a little over cities. We will be in Rome soon enough; a huge city. We probably don’t need another city.

Getting out of Florence was interesting, not really because of the traffic but because of Samantha who has really lost it (Zelda, in the back seat, intoned: ‘Now downloading a mid-life crisis – please wait’). She was all about: ‘bear left, and turn right’ and so on. Myles was close to killing her and crashing the car. I think I’m right about needing the GPS to save the marriage.

At home we ate and watched more middayesque movies on True Movies – our new favourite addiction. The kids are learning about all kinds of social issues. They are now terribly modern.