Montepulciano, Italy - Wine Tasting and Site Seeing

One day last week (I think it was Thursday) we took a drive over to Montepulciano, Italy - another hillside town much like Cortona and just as quaint and homey.

Montepulciano and the surrounding area is known for it's wine. So on our way, we stopped at a winery and had a taste.




I had to include a picture of my lovely wife...awaiting a wine tasting.


The wine was decent. Not our favorite but not bad.

From there, we continued our drive up to Montepulciano.


As you can see, it is a pretty steep hillside town with quite the climb. From the photo below, it looks pretty flat but from the one above, you can get a sense for the steepness.



The residents do a wonderful job of keeping the quaintness and beauty of the town with their little gardens and flowerpots everywhere.



Once at the top, we arrived at the Piazza Grande (the main plaza or square) where the government clock tower and restaurants are. In the below image, we ate lunch at the restaurant just to the right of the clock tower building.



We also climbed the clock tower (not to the top of the tower but to the top of the building just beneath the clock). The stairs were very narrow and winding.

I had to turn sideways to get up them.



The view from the top was definitely beautiful.




After that we had lunch...and it was fabulous!


On the way back down, I took a different path over towards the town wall while the girls took the same way down. I wanted to get a couple more pictures of Montepulciano.




On the drive back to Cortona that afternoon, I was able to hang the camera out of the car window (Terrie is doing all of the driving) and get this picture of Cortona. The lower houses and buildings are part of Camucia, Italy (where the train station is for both Cortona and Camucia).



We're all in agreement...Cortona has been our favorite so far.

Ciao for now!

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The Cortona Apartment

As promised, here is the video to the apartment in Cortona, Italy.

As a reminder, here's the climb up into Cortona, Italy.

Our entrance is here...


In the picture above, I've noted where our entrance from the street is with a red arrow.

Here's the climb up into the apartment from the street (sorry if I sound a bit like Grandpa narrating the video). :-)



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Crazy Italian Drivers

As I mentioned in a previous post, the Italian drivers are quite crazy. They even park in every nook and cranny they can find.







Here's a video of our taxi ride in Rome from the Forum/Ruins/Colosseum to the Pantheon.

NOTE: For those who get motion sickness easily, be aware this may cause dizziness.



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Florence, Italy - The Sites and Shopping

We hit Florence, Italy (Firenze, Italia) on Tuesday and Wednesday. Original plans changed a bit due to some minor scheduling issues but all worked out well.

We started with shopping on Tuesday after having a great Chicken Club....and then hit the Duomo (domed church - it has a long name which I forget exactly). Everyone in Florence just knows it as "The Duomo".


The Duomo:
This building (or more accurately, the main building in the collection of buildings) is enormous!



There's no way from outside on the ground to get a good, straight on, picture. But you may notice how there are no people in the above picture. This is because I'm looking up at about a 60º to 70º angle - so with the wide angle, the bottom of the picture is about 20ft off the ground.

Inside is even more impressive. The picture from the back of the great hall doesn't even capture the outer side walls with the camera at it's widest angle. And the dome above the round stained glass window is entirely out of view. By the way, the round stained glass window is about 50ft in diameter. The ledges just below and just above the round stained glass window are walkways with people on them. The upper walkway is the base of the dome! There are 463 stairs to the upper walkway (and many, many more to the top of the Dome).



Terrie decided she was going to climb the 463 stairs to the base of the dome! The stairway was quite narrow.



I waited below while she did the hike. Here's the view down to the floor looking towards the front of the great room (same direction in which the floor view is looking). If you look straight across at the walkways, you can see people on them.



From the base of the dome, she could see the top. Yes, that is a walkway around the top and if you look closely, you can see the windows which people can look through




Uffizi and the Accademia:
We hit both of these places on Wednesday, and neither of these allowed picture taking....for obvious marketing reasons.

For more information on the Florence Uffizi.

I found the Accademia more interesting with it's many Michael Angelo carvings, including the famous Statue of David. It also has a musical instrument section as well, which I found fascinating.


Shopping:
We definitely enjoyed the shopping...I think the women, more than I.

There is a pretty famous bridge of all jewelry shops along the entire bridge. The interesting thing is how it became a bridge of jewelry shops...when once it was a bridge of butcher shops many hundreds of years ago. Short version, the butcher shops smelled horribly...and a law was passed banning them.

Here's a picture of the bridge from the Uffizi.



Here is a picture while on the bridge (too many people for me).



Here's a picture of the (very dirty) river from the jewelry bridge.



And a little taste of a jewelry.



That was Florence (or Firenze) in a nutshell!

Ciao for now!


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Assisi, Italy - The Gardens and Walkways

Assisi is another hillside town much like Cortona, however, with a few differences.

One of the things I noted right away about Assisi is it seems to be a bit more renovated and updated - even though the buildings and streets and infrastructure are still very old (and beautiful). Also, as you'll see in the below pictures, there seems to be more work done to make it appear clean and nice.

It's very common to see many nooks and crannies decorated up among these small Tuscan towns - but Assisi sure did have the edge on these.

Note: Click the pictures for larger versions.



As you can see, the side streets and passages are all decorated up with plants and appear as small gardens.






Even the common areas, even if not on the ground, are decorated up with plants and kept nice. This shot was taken from above, looking down on the little common area between houses and apartments.




Walking down the very narrow and winding streets, many of the walls and building tops were decorated as well.



As we continued on, we found the house of "Papa Giovanni" - whoever that is. I wonder if he makes pizza?




Walking further down the winding roads, we came to the other end of town...


...which led to the town's basilica.






While walking around through Assisi, we had seen many areas under construction/renovation. But, as we were walking the 2.2km back to the car from the basilica, we came across some apartment renovation in progress...and found it interesting. Notice the wheel barrow in midair in the first picture and halfway into the window in the second picture below. I always wondered how they got the supplies up to the upper level apartments.





I didn't bother posting the pictures of the valleys here...they were stunning...but do begin to look the same after awhile....so I will post them at a later date.

All-in-all, Assisi has probably been one of the most enchanting places (if not for all of the people visiting).




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Cortona, The Apartment, and The Climb

I originally typed this on Sunday, but due to a glitch, I lost it so I am retyping this now. :-/

Note: Click on any picture to make it bigger.

Cortona, as you can see from the screenshot below - provided by Google Maps, sits on the side of a really steep hill.


For more information on Cortona, you can check out it's history on Wikipedia.

In part, I think, to give us the full exposure to Cortona, we met the apartment owner at the bottom of the hill and walked up into town. The other reason is only resident and town service vehicles are allowed into town (inside the town walls) as, since you can see, the town streets are quite narrow.

From the bottom parking lot, here is the entrance into Cortona.



After climbing the stairs, we continued upwards...



...and still had further uphill walking...


...and finally arrived in the town's main plaza (Piazza della Republica). This was one of many piazza's but this is the main piazza.



Crossing the piazza, we continued even further up to the apartment door (next to the "Restorante Tempora" - the apartment is several floors above the restaurant).



Hiking up the apartment outer stairs (3 flights!), we enter the apartment on the 3rd level and then have to go up two more flights of stairs to get to the top floor bedrooms. Here is the picture from the top floor, looking out over the piazza to the clock tower.



Here's a shot from the piazza looking up at our apartment building. Our rooms are the top row of windows and the very top center window. And yes, that is our laundry hanging out the top window.


I'll post the video of the climb from the street (just to the left of the above picture) up to the apartment and through the apartment later.


By the way, here's the clock tower from the piazza...taken from where I wrote the original posting (which was lost).


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Florence Italy Duomo and Lunch

I'm sitting inside the Duomo in Florence, Italy (Firenze, Italia) waiting for Terrie...


...and thought I'd blog about today's lunch.

We ate at a place just down the street in the piazza next to the art gallery and had a marvelous Italian Chicken Club. It had Eggs, Tomatoes, Lettuce, Cheese, Chicken, and some sort of awesome mayo spread. Oh, and no crust on the bread either.

Would have loved it with Bacon but was great without it!




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Best Panini Sandwich Ever!

While at the Piazza del Duomo di Orvieto in Orvieto, Terni, Italy, we ate lunch in the piazza at a little restaurant called Cantina Foresi.



I just had to say, the Roasted Turkey, Roasted Pork, big Mushroom, Cheese, and Olive Spread on the home made roll was the absolute best!




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Rome - The Colosseum, Ruins, and Pantheon

As I start typing this, we're already in Cortona, arriving here yesterday afternoon. But the Italia trip has been moving at a pretty fast pace so I've not had the chance to write about the last of Rome until now.

For our last full day in Rome, as you may have guessed from a previous posting, we did go to the Colosseum. We also toured the Ruins and the Pantheon as the Ruins are right next to the Colosseum and the Pantheon a short and very entertaining taxi ride away (as I write this, I'm still attempting to upload the video but life in the Italian countryside is a bit slower and things such as the Internet are not a necessity - and mobile phone service not quite as reliable).

Colosseum:
The Colosseum was magnificent both in size and in architecture. At first glance, to me, it appeared somewhat smaller than I expected (perception is definitely not reality here). I'm guessing this was somewhat due to the Colosseum being smack in the heart of Rome and the surrounding of the bustling city.



Upon closer inspection, you begin to appreciate the vastness of it's size and construction. Note how tiny the people are on the upper level.



Noise also travels quite well across the Colosseum. And the under-floor maze which was used by gladiators and others is amazing (note: the Colosseum floor is caved in and the maze below is the intricate "backstage" - or more correctly, "understage" - area where pre-stage preparations were completed).



Stepping back outside, and from different angles, you really begin to appreciate it's size.



Ruins:
After the Colosseum, we headed over to the Ruins. In the first picture, you can see active archeological digs in progress.


The Ruins were very fascinating when taking their current size and imagining what the buildings must have looked like and their mammoth sizes in the time of their completion.


And amongst the Ruins was Mussolini's summer vacation home.


All-in-all, the Ruins were very interesting.

Pantheon:
From the Ruins, we took a harrowing taxi ride to the Pantheon. The Piazza de Pantheon was quite lively and the Pantheon was packed with tourists. The only downside (other than the crowd) was the refurbishing of the Pantheon which was in progress.



After the Pantheon, we had Gelato! Yum!!




Later on that evening, we headed down to Trevi Fountain and had a great dinner as well as "The best gelato in the World!" according to the shop owner - and, to be honest, I've not had anything better.

So that was our last day in Rome.

Ciao for now!


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