The crush of people in Florence was utterly overwhelming. Our immediate reaction was to run a mile, so we escaped down a few side streets and made a wonderful discovery for coffee and sustenance … a bakery and pastry shop called Cantinetta del Verrazano. Two double espressos and a couple of air-light twisted…
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 Just like owl feathers … I love the wings! Hirsh’s previous life as a CA was a great aid to the day. His timing was precision personified. Remind me to always travel with him in the future. Alarm went at 04h50 (OUCH!!); train boarded in Siena in time for 06h30 departure; ready standing in line…
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So … if you’re always asking questions like me, you might have wondered how the pencil-thin cypress, a conifer, got to feature on every hilltop, along every driveway, and beside every castle and church in Tuscany. It’s not even indigenous to Italy. The Cupressus sempervirens, also known (in more recent times) as the Mediterranean or…
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After trawling Montereggioni it was, naturally, time for lunch. As we continued our explorations through Castellina in Chianti (they make it all sound so romantic in these parts), Villa Cerna rose into view, set against a canvas of hills and vines. An open terrace with giant white umbrellas did the final painful arm twist. We…
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It’s only Day 3 and we’re already getting into a wonderful routine of shopping at our local supermarket, Simply … yes, I know, not very Italianate but their tagline is: Semplice La Vita, which means “A Simple Life”, I think alluding to convenience, but there’s also an abundance of fresh fruit and vegetables, a bakery,…
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      Before a drive to Siena, a skip, hop and jump from where our apartment is, a mandatory run in the countryside … testing our bursting lungs (the altitude!) and burning legs (those relentless hills!) but the scenery is priceless. Green-gold wheatfields, serried cypresses commanding the skyline, rough honey-stone buildings with crusty clay roof tiles,…
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So, I sit on an open terrace guarded by giant terracotta pots of trees and herbs, with 180-degree views of dips and rises unspooling to the skyline. Over here, silvery-green olive trees and rolled hay bales, there neat regimented vineyards and a horizon marked by long thin cypresses. It’s a Tuscan cliché. But an eternally…
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