As always it was a short sharp shower which cleared quickly after which the warm fine weather resumed as if nothing had happened. It was a photo opportunity not to be missed.
After the rain.
This afternoon it rained
Category Archives: Tuscany
Our place.
In the last post about our home for the next six months I may have given the impression that it is small – and it is. But, at the end of the day, it’s what we were expecting.
Of course it only took a week for Jean to perform a “tardis” like transformation on the place. Two furniture shifts later and with a little interior decoration our place now feels like – our place.
There’s a list of stuff we’ll get over the next few weeks ranging from decent wine glasses (those of you who have rented a villa previously will remember the thimble sized wine glasses that inevitably are found in the cupboard) to more coat hangers and various kitchen tools and, as mentioned previously, that barbecue.
As predicted, the weather has warmed up – 26 degrees today – the front verandah has become the major living area in the mornings and afternoons. Maybe we need to get a bigger table out there – something else to add to the list.
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- From our porch.
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- The living room.
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- Kitchen.
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- The couch – or guest bed – whichever is needed.
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- Our room.
Siena
There has been a town on the site of Siena since 900BC although the height of Siena’s power was in the 1400s. Traditionally Siena and Florence have been competing city states with the balance of power fluctuating between the two until this rivalry culminated in a final battle in 1555 which Florence won. Since then Siena has always been the second city in Tuscany.
Having said that, it’s our local town and our first city of Tuscany. We love it.
Our love affair began 10 years ago when we first visited. We had a rental car and very little understanding of Italian and we were determined to see this town. As we drove in we noticed that the wide modern roads were turning to narrow cobbled roads flanked by two and three story buildings and that the volume of traffic was dropping. The streets got narrower with more pedestrians, all of whom seemed surprised to see us. Sadly our Italian wasn’t good enough to translate the “residents only – no entry” signs that dotted the walls. Eventually we realised that where we had our car was a place where cars simply shouldn’t be – imagine driving through the middle of Queensgate Mall in Lower Hutt on a Wednesday afternoon and you’ll understand.
Our only problem was we didn’t know how to get out again. Siena is a maze, we had no idea where we were and at that time GPS was still a classified military secret. My suggestion was we park the car, get out and advise Hertz to come and get it. Jean was slightly more practical. She spotted a local taxi and figured that following that would firstly keep us out of trouble and secondly, eventually lead us out.
To this day I’m sure there is a bemused Sienese taxi driver who wonders why two crazy tourists in a dirty Punto rental car followed him around Siena for an afternoon. Whenever he stopped to pick up or drop off a passenger, we stopped and dutifully waited. But eventually the twists and turns became less and the roads became wider and we exited the old city through one of the many gates – still following the cab.
We now know the way to see the old part of Siena is on foot and to make use of one of the many parking areas and buildings that are positioned around the outside of the old city. The one we use most is in the University and the walk into the city is an experience in itself.
The heart of Siena is the Campo, the large semi circular piazza in front of the Palazzo Pubblico or town hall which has it’s own impressive clock tower. The tower dominates the city skyline and is an ideal vantage point to view the city. It’s 400 steps to the top and the climb is not recommended for those scared of enclosed spaces (the walk up has virtually no windows and is a narrow spiral staircase) or heights (the view from the top covers a fair chunk or the Tuscan countryside).
The campo is also the location for the twice yearly Palio when the various contrada or neighborhoods of Siena compete in a horse race around the Campo. If you are visiting Siena on July 2 or August 15 it’s a “must see” event.
This trip we couldn’t wait to visit Siena and specifically to spend an afternoon sitting in the Campo having a drink with the girls and simply take in the sights and sounds around us. And that’s the thing. While the Campo is a major tourist attraction with tour groups and tourists always enjoying the sights, it is still a place to find the locals doing what Sienese locals do best. Just getting on with life.
Tuscany is green.
No I don’t mean in the tree hugging, hemp suit, brown paper recycling way. The landscape itself is actually green – bright, glowing verde.
Everytime we’ve come to Tuscany in the past it has been midsummer. And the heat of the preceding months have done their work – the colours of summer are tans and browns and burnt ochres. The colour palate hints at green in the trees, cypresss and pines, but the overwhelming look is a faded patchwork of earthy tones. Fields of sun flowers are dotted in between hay fields that have been harvested and now lie dormant, brown and tanned in the sun, the hay resting in rolled bails drying and waiting for collection before Autumn.
But May is different. Everything is growing furiously. Crops have yet to be harvested and the countryside is bursting with life. It’s like some controversial artist has taken a brush and wiped the brightest green across the Tuscan hills and valleys. The Tuscan tourist board would not be impressed.
A neighbouring villa on a nearby hilltop.
As we drove to our cottage for the first time this green-ness took us by surprise. Were we in the right place? Had we inadvertantly stumbled into Tuscany’s greener and wetter neighbour Umbria by mistake? Were our memories playing tricks with us?
Happily the last few days have seen the start of Tuscany changing from spring to summer. Spotted across the landscape, some fields that were green have now been harvested and have, overnight, taken on that dried summer feel. In the mornings we hear the sound of tractors firing up and later that day another field has been transformed.
Already we can see the Tuscany we remember returning, slowly but surely.
The full view from the terrace.
We’re here!
After a 2 hour drive from the Portofino Coast with a stop off in Florence to pick up some doggie supplies we arrived at our place.
We were greeted by the owner Mrs Patrizia whose grasp of English was amost as good as our grasp of Italian and after much hand waving, nodding and gesturing she showed us around our home for the next 6 months or so.
The guided tour didn’t take long.
We’d figured that the whole cottage was about half the size of our living room at home and we were right. Three rooms – an open plan lounge, dining room and kitchen, a bedroom and a bathroom. The open plan area is compact enough that taking the dishes from the dining table to the kitchen means leaning back and putting things on the bench.
The cottage has an unofficial fourth room which will probably get used the most as summer progresses – the front verandah which is shaded in the mornings and catches the afternoon sun filtered through the surrounding trees. In the height of summer this will be the centre of living, I suspect.
Although the cottage is ideal for a week long summer rental, it lacks a few things we consider necessities for a 6 month stay and we are spending the first week making lists. Currently the list contains everything from a decent kettle (making coffee, no problem everything is provided but boiling water for tea means a saucepan of water on the stove) to more pillows, a barbecue (we are kiwis after all) and decent wine glasses.
One thing that took us by surprise was the lack of a decent oven. There is a gas hob and a small benchtop oven but nowhere for Jean to cook her famous Tuscan roast chicken. This something we are going to remedy and we are on the lookout for a decent benchtop oven. Either that or we are going to be buying one hell of a barbecue.
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- Our place – day 1.
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- The girls testing our couch for comfort.
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- An ideal place to watch the sun set over Siena.
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- The sun setting over Siena
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- The main house.
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- The pool – it is huge.
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- Main house from pool.
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- Cypress trees – near and far.
A new and exciting place to visit.
On our trip south we needed a place to stay for a night between Villefranche-Sur-Mer and our cottage. We wanted to avoid the big cities like Torino and Milano and so, once again, Trip Advisor was tasked with finding a place. More accurately Jean using Trip Advisor was tasked with finding a place.
On the Portofino coast a hotel called Cenobio Dei Dogi caught Jean’s attention and met our standard requirements of parking and dogs welcomed.
It was quite expensive – even with a discounted rate – but this was offset by free parking (it can be as much as €25 a night at some places) and no charge for the girls (which can also be as much as €15 a night each).
Finding the hotel which is situated right on the waters edge was a challenge as leaving the highway, which is high above the water, meant winding down the hill using the usual maze of one way streets and switchback roads that is typical of driving along the Italian Coast. Some of the roads are so close together and the switchbacks so tight that our Tom Tom GPS navigation system couldn’t tell which of two roads we were on. This is a recipe for wrong turns and the occasional wrong way up a one way street. Being Italy this type of thing warrants a blast on the horn from fellow motorists followed by a wave of the hand once you extricate the car and get back on track. You get the feeling even the locals have trouble on occasions.
Jean’s visit to Trip Advisor had given us an idea of what to expect but the reality far exceeded our expectations. The hotel was built in the late 50s or early 60s and that classic character has been retained. You are half expecting movie stars like Cary Grant or Sophia Loren to sweep into the bar or out on to the terrace for a pre-dinner aperitif.
We wiled away the afternoon on the Terrace, overlooking the Ligurian Sea enjoying a drink or two. The service was immaculate and friendly. When our waiter found out one of our dogs was called Poppie there was much amusement. He explained that Poppi was the name of his fellow waiter and this became an ongoing joke for the rest of the afternoon.
Hotel Cenobio Dei Dogi will be our last taste of hotel luxury for a while as our next stop is Tuscany and our new home.
View looking north from the terrace with morning coffee in progress.
Every journey starts with a single step. This is ours.
Italy is about as far from New Zealand as you can get – both geographically and culturally. We’ve experienced wonderful holidays it Italy for the last decade and the nagging question has always been – what would it be like to live there?
The only way to answer that question was to step out of our comfortable lives in New Zealand and into whatever a life in Italy has to offer. We did that on Wednesday April 6, 2011.
It sounds easy if you say it quickly. But it meant leaving behind family and jobs, renting out our house, storing our precious things and, most importantly, bringing our girls Poppie and Daisy along for the trip.
Poppie and Daisy are our dogs. Small, furry, white Bichon Frise. And they are definitely part of our family.
So what sounded so simple to say turned out to be a tad more complicated and I’m sure the fun is only beginning.
