ORVIETO WEEKEND

Montepulciano to Orvieto – Day 9 – Saturday

I got up at my usual hour, even though it was Saturday, because I had a complicated day of traveling ahead.  Bus schedules on weekends and holidays in Italy are limited and seem to be a secret from even the locals.  Fiorella thought there was a bus to Chiusi at 9:30.  She gave me a ride to the bus station at 9:00.  It turned out that there wasn’t a bus until 10:00.  This bus was scheduled to arrive at the Chiusi station at 10:50.  My train was supposed to leave at 10:59.  This sounded pretty tight, but I already had my train ticket, so figured I could make it if the bus wasn’t late.  Few people were travelling at that hour, so the bus made good time until we got to Chiusi and got stuck in traffic.  If I had known where to go, I would have gotten out and made a dash for it, but I had no idea where to find the station or how far it might be, so I stayed in my seat and fretted.

We arrived at the station at 10:57.  My fellow travelers and I made a dash for the platform.  I didn’t even have time to check which platform I wanted.  I just followed the other runners.  Fortunately, the train was “in ritardo.”  I encountered my friend, Lucy, on the platform.  She was leaving and was taking the train to Rome.  It was nice to see her and to have someone to chat with on the ride to Orvieto.  I was sorry to part from her, but hope to see her back in the US, since she doesn’t live too far from me.  The train was a regional one and we were in the second class car.  We had no trouble finding seats and it wasn’t bad at all for a short journey.  Honestly, I had been more crowded in first class on the way from Milan.

Umbrian Countryside

I left the train at the Orvieto station.  I had planned to go to Bagnoregio and Civita on Sunday, but realized that bus service on Easter Sunday might well be impossible.  I decided to go to Bagnoregio straight from the Orvieto station.  I bought round trip bus tickets from the clerk at the convenience store in the station and proceeded to wait.  Of course, there was no posted schedule.  My guidebook said there was usually a bus at 12:45.  It was noon, so I waited and hoped for the best.  I got lucky.  It rained a bit while I was waiting, but there was a shelter.

Umbrian Vineyard

The bus ride took about an hour, but it was interesting to drive through the Umbrian countryside.  Umbria is different from Tuscany.  The terrain is more rugged and there are more trees.  It doesn’t look as manicured, but it is still green and scenic at this time of year.  Many houses have colorful flowers planted in window boxes and they looked cheerful even on a wet, gloomy day.  The passengers on the bus were about half locals and half tourists going to Bagnoregio.

We arrived in Bagnoregio sometime after 1:30.  The shuttle bus that runs from the bus station to the base of the bridge to Civita takes a break between 1:00 and 3:30.  As there was no luggage storage in Bagnoregio, I was forced to carry my luggage all the way to Civita.  Fortunately, I had foreseen this circumstance and packed light.  I had only a shoulder bag, but it was heavier than I would have liked because of the computer, guidebook and indispensable dictionary.

Bagnoregio sprawls along the top of a ridge.  The bus station in slightly below the town on one end and Civita is about a mile away across a bridge that connects to the far end of Bagnoregio.  Bagnoregio is not particularly interesting, but, being on top of a mesa, there are some nice vistas of the surrounding countryside.  I met a darling orange cat that insisted I pet him.  I stopped and scratched him for a bit.  He was a younger version of my own cat, Pumpkin, so it was good to get my cat fix.  Leaving my cat behind is one of the hardest things about traveling.  I have always thought that it should be possible to get a hotel room that comes with a cat.

Civita

Civita is called the, “city that died.”  The last of the original inhabitants is now too frail to make the trek across the bridge.  Today, it is occupied solely by people involved in tourism.  Civita was a major Estruscan city and there is conjecture that it was a sort of Estruscan Mecca.  Bagnoregio was originally a suburb of Civita and the two were once connected.  Erosion and a major earthquake in 1695 served to strand Civita on its own pinnacle of tufa.  Formerly, there was a donkey path across the saddle, but that was damaged by bombs during WWII.  The current pedestrian viaduct was built in 1966.

Civita is noticeably older than the other hill towns I have visited.  Many of the buildings date back to the 12^th and 13^th centuries.  The entrance to the town is through a cut in the rock that was carved by the Etruscans 2,500 years ago.  Today, the trench through the rock is crowned by a 12^th century Romanesque archway.  The passage made a good place for tourists to huddle during cloudbursts.

Bridge to Civita

Palace Facade

Having traveled hard all day, I was hungry after lugging my bag across the bridge and up the steep path to Civita.  The rain held off long enough for me to sit outside and eat a sandwich of prosciutto and cheese and enjoy a glass of proseco.  The café was right on the plaza and I could see most of Civita from there.  There isn’t a whole lot in Civita, but highlights include the façade of a renaissance palace whose aperatures now lead to thin air, a small museum displaying ancient olive and wine presses in caverns carved from the tufa and a chapel located in a cave that might once have been an Estruscan tomb.  Civita is essentially an island in the sky.  The views are incredible.  A profusion of spring flowers made the little city one of the most romantic places I have ever seen.

Wisteria and Garden in Civita

As gorgeous as Civita is, there is not a lot to do there.  After I had seen the sights, it started to thunder and sprinkle and I decided to make a dash across the bridge before the weather deteriorated further.  It sprinkled all the way back to the bus station, but the deluge didn’t begin until an hour or so before the bus arrived.  I had been waiting under an overhanging balcony, but when the sky opened up, I made a dash for an outdoor coffee bar with covered seating.  I had a cappuccino and waited for the rain to stop.  When it finally abated somewhat, I returned to the bus stop.  Considering that Civita is one of the major tourist destinations in Umbria, the bus stop is quite unimpressive.  It is merely a square painted on the pavement behind someone’s garage.  There are a couple of small shelters without seats across the road, but they had motorcycles parked in them on this rainy day.

It started to pour again just before the bus arrived and we had a wet journey back to Orvieto.  It was the last bus of the day and was fairly full.  In Orvieto, sheets of rain were falling.  I dashed back to the convenience store to buy a Carta Unica, a ticket that includes entrance to all the major sights in Orvieto, restaurant discounts and admission to the funicular that takes one from the train station below the city to the top of the bluff where Orvieto is located.  The funicular runs up the steep side of the rock outcropping and finally through a passage carved from the stone one the wall becomes vertical.  Most ancient cities in the region are on the top of rock outcroppings, but Orvieto is unique in that the rock is vertical for long stretches and forms a natural wall.

A major thunderstorm was still raging when I reached the top, so I made a dash for a waiting shuttle bus and rode that to the Plaza del Duomo (cathedral.)  Tourists were huddled in every doorway.  I made a dash for the nearest doorway to consult my map and found myself in the midst of a German tour group.  The guide did her best to herd me onto their bus, but I managed to escape.  After orienting myself, I made a dash across the plaza just as it began to hail fiercely.  The streets were torrents of water.  I had several blocks to go through a labyrinth of medieval stone alleyways and I arrived at my lodgings soaked to the skin.

My Room at B&B Valentina

It had been difficult to find an available room in the old section of Orvieto for Easter weekend and I had been forced to splurge on a double room in the B&B Valentina.  This turned out to be very fortunate because when the friendly staff showed me to my chamber and I squished inside, I was greeted with a warm room with plenty of light, an actual king sized bed, plenty of light (!) and a heater and heated towel rack on which to dry my dripping clothes.  Everything I owned was wet.  My poor shoulder bag was not protected by my tiny travel umbrella.  I was able to turn up the heat, hang out my clothes and huddle under the down comforter until my clothes dried enough to wear them again.  B&B Valentina also has functional wifi in the rooms.  I definitely give this place four stars.  The room is furnished with lovely antiques, the linens are exquisite and, despite its location in a renaissance building, the rooms are spacious and offer every modern convenience.

By 9:00 pm, I had finally dried out enough to dress and go in search of dinner.  The rain had stopped and the stars were out.  Pizzeria Charlie had been recommended to me and was fairly close, so I decided to give that a try.  It was packed and I had to wait for a table.  The host was very affable and brought me a chair.  When I was finally shown to a table, I was seated next to a noisy party of 30 or 40 people celebrating some special occasion with large volumes of beer.  It didn’t matter whether I could speak Italian or not because the waitress and I couldn’t hear each other anyway.  We managed somehow and I enjoyed a crispy pizza Margherita for dinner.  I sat reading the history of Italy and watching the partiers carry on.  What a contrast to my wretched state upon arrival!

Orvieto – Day 10 – Easter Sunday

Duomo in Orvieto

Woke up early, but couldn’t bring myself to hurry this morning.  Breakfast arrived about 8:30 and I sat and munched fresh baguette and drank coffee while I worked on my blog.  About 11:00 I determined it wasn’t raining and decided I’d better go out and take advantage of the break in the weather.  I wanted to visit the Duomo, but there was an Easter service going on.  I did stand in the back of the church for a while to listen to the choir.

St. Patrick's Well

Fortress in Orvieto

Having determined that the Duomo was busy and there wasn’t a tour of the Orvieto underground available in English until 3:15, I set off to walk down the hill the ruined fortress at the other end of town.  It was a nice walk and the fortress offered spectacular Umbrian views.  I climbed all 496 steps down to the bottom of St. Patrick’s well.  The well is a feat of engineering built in the 16^th century to discourage enemies from besieging the town.  Stairs run up and down in a double helix so that people and donkeys heading down did not have to share the path with traffic trekking back up.  The bottom of the well was still filled with clear water.  I’m sure that I will feel those stairs tomorrow.  I still had a long uphill walk to get back to the Plaza Duomo.  I stopped along the way to get an Iskender kebap at a little shop on the Corso Cavour.  I swear the Iskender kebap was made out of pork.  Only in Italy!  The meat may not have been authentic, but the pide had just come out of the oven and was delectable.  It tasted just like the bread I got fresh from the communal oven in a village in Turkey.

After lunch, I had a couple of hours to kill before my tour, so I visited the several museums associated with the Duomo.  The Duomo began as a simple design, was redecorated in the baroque style and then restored to its original simplicity in the 18^th century.  All the art that was removed at that time is now in the museum.  I learned a few things today.  Painters take note: If you want your work to last, paint on canvas.  After 600 years or so, paint tends to flake off wooden panels and bugs get to the wood.  Do not work in fresco, especially in an earthquake prone area.  Frescos are too easy to paint over, anyway.  Sculptors, work in marble if you want your work to last.  Bugs tend to get to wood over time and ceramics get broken.  Beware, however, that any ugly creations or pieces you leave unfinished will also be around for centuries. 

Olive Press in Orvieto Underground

It started to rain heavily while I was in the museums.  I thought that the tour of the underground would be a good thing to do on a rainy day, but it turned out the trip to the entrance of the caves involved a long trek through the rain.  The caves were interesting, though.  The excavations were started in Etruscan times and the Etruscan caves were neatly finished with vaulted ceilings.  More modern caves were strictly utilitarian, with no such aesthetic considerations.  Caves were used for the pressing of oil because olives were harvested and pressed during the winter months.  Oil flows more freely when the temperature is warm, so they pressed the oil in the caves where the temperature was always moderate.

Dovecote Under Orvieto

Many caves were the result of mining the stone to make cement.  Mining the stone was eventually stopped in the 19^th century because the government feared the city might collapse into the mine shafts.  Many homes near the edge of the cliffs had dovecotes excavated under their homes where the pigeons could access the cave through a window carved in the outer cliff wall.  These dovecotes had many niches carved in the walls to accommodate nests.  Pigeon is still a common dish in Orvieto.  The practice of excavating dovecotes under the houses was finally forbidden by the pope in the 18th century because he feared that smugglers could sneak into the city through the openings and avoid paying taxes at the approved gates.  One of the last caves we visited was carved from the rock to serve as a bomb shelter during WWII.  While Orvieto itself was not shelled because of the cathedral, the lower town was bombed because of the railway line.  People living below took shelter in the stone above.

It was still raining when the tour was over, so I ducked into the cathedral.  The cathedral in Orvieto is notable in the entire structure is constructed of alternate bands of black and white stone.  The arcades are exceptionally tall and the windows are fenestrated with alabaster, all of which serve to make the church exceptionally light and airy, even on a gloomy day.  The chapel of San Brizio, painted by Signorelli, is not to be missed.  The palette he used glows with warm colors, making the chapel appear luminous, an effect that is further enhanced with tasteful electric lighting.  In sharp contrast is the older chapel on the opposite arm of the transept, which is quite dark and reflects an earlier, less realistic, style of painting.

View of Orvieto from Torre del Moro

By this time, I was getting cold and damp and my hotel room was sounding good.  The Torre del Moro was about halfway home and I ducked in there to get out of the rain for a bit and climbed another 173 steps up to the top of the clock tower.  The bells started to ring just as I stepped out onto the observation platform.  They were deafening.  Even though it was pouring, I couldn’t resist peering out at the panoramic views and taking a couple of photo of the rooftops of Orvieto.  After descending the tower, I made the final dash to my hotel and my comfy room.  Sure wish I could take this mattress home with me to Montepulciano.

A few hours later, once the rain had passed, I took a walk along the lamplit ramparts of the city.  It was pretty and atmospheric.  I seemed to be the only person alive in Orvieto.  I ate a very forgettable dinner of lousy lasagna at a “tavola calda” (steam table restaurant) and returned to my room.

Orvieto to Montepulciano – Day 11 – Easter Monday (Yes, the Monday after Easter is a Holiday in Italy.)

Checkout time was 10:30, so I got up early to pack.  I wanted to walk the path that goes around the base of the cliffs, but I knew that it could be difficult to get home on a holiday, so I wanted to leave plenty of time.  My breakfast arrived about 8:15 and I was out of the hotel by 9:00.  Valentina let me leave my bag in her quarters while I went walking.

It was thankfully not raining, but was very cold and windy except on the leeward side of the cliff.  Orvieto sits on an exceptionally tall block of tufa, so there are cliffs on all sides of the city.  Originally, I had intended to follow Rick Steves’ suggestion of descending to the path (called la Rupe) from Plaza Marconi near the Duomo, walking three quarters of the way around the city and then riding the escalator back up from the tour bus parking lot at Campo della Fiera.  I walked across the short axis of the city to get to Plaza Marconi, only to find that the pathway down to the Rupe was closed.  I had to walk back to the Porta Romana to get out of the city and ended up at the Campo della Fiera entrance to the path.

Fortress from Below the Wall

The walk around the city was very pleasant.  I was very much in nature.  I could hear the birds singing and the bees buzzing.  I got to see an actual hedgehog.  The path passed some Etruscan tombs at about the halfway point.  Having seen hundreds of tombs in Turkey, I didn’t feel the need to make the side trip to visit them, but I got a good view from above and took some pictures.  It was a pretty spot with lots of vivid green grass and flowering trees.  The Etruscans had built a very orderly cemetery that actually looked quite modern.  The path climbed up and down quite steeply and the circuit was a good workout.  I reentered the city by the Porta Maggiore and climbed up the steep street rather than taking the escalator.

Etruscan Tombs

The walk had taken longer than I expected (too many stops to read placards and take pictures.) My train left at 12:31.  I went back to Valentina’s to collect my bag and caught a minibus to the funicular.  Everyone and his brother packed into that funicular.  We were packed so tightly that the woman in front of me leaned her entire weight against me all the way down.  There was no way I could lean over to pick up my bag until 90% of the people had exited the car.  I made it to the train without incident.

View from Orvieto

The train ride from Orvieto to Chiusi is only two stops along the Firenze to Roma line.  It takes about half an hour.  I left the train at Chiusi and wandered about, trying to determine whether or not the buses were running.  It was pretty desolate around there.  The fact that the tobacconist who sells the tickets was closed was a bad sign.  I drifted out to the bus stop and noticed an older man peering at the schedule.  The schedule was completely silent on the subject of Sundays and holidays.  As it turns out, this is because the buses do not run then.  I asked the man if there were buses that day and he told me there were not.  He suggested that I take the Siena line to the Montepulciano station.  Montepulciano Stazione is actually a separate town about six miles from Montepulciano, but I figured a taxi would be cheaper from there.  I didn’t really want to shell out another 45 Euros for a taxi from Chiusi.

I had to wait a few hours for the train, so I had some pizza and then read for a while.  Getting to Montepulciano Stazione was uneventful.  I had hoped there might be other travelers with whom to share a taxi, but I was the only person who departed the train there.  The station was deserted.  There were no taxis.  My guidebook said it was 5 miles from Montepulciano Stazione to Montepulciano, so I decided to try walking.  I walked about a mile and then came to a road sign that indicated it was still 9K to Montepulciano.  I started to doubt I was going to make it at that point, but decided to keep walking at least until I got to some recognizable location before I called for a ride.  The walk through the countryside was gorgeous.  I walked through vineyards and olive groves.  Flowers bloomed everywhere.  The sun afternoon sunshine was warm on my face and it was a lovely time to walk.  The experience would have been entirely pleasant if I hadn’t been lugging my overnight bag.

There is a big regional hospital about halfway to Montepulciano and I started to see signs for that.  I thought that there might be taxis at the hospital, so I headed there.  By the time I got to the hospital, the steeps hills, heavy bag and earlier walk around Orvieto had conspired to do me in.  I called my friend, Savannah, and she came and rescued me.  Fiorella made me a tasty steak dinner and I went straight to bed.

CHEESE & PROCESSIONS

Montepulciano – Day 7 – Thursday

Today was market day in Montepulciano.  Our class went to the market to expand our vocabulary and force us to speak with Italians.  The leather goods here are wonderful, but my suitcase is heavy enough without adding to it.  I love the smell of the leather when I pass the shops on the way to school.  There are shoes and bags in every imaginable color available here.  I bought a pork sandwich for lunch.  The vendor was carving slices off an entire roast pig.  It was crispy and spicy and delectable.  I am not fond of all the condiments that Americans put on sandwiches.  The plain meat, cheese and crusty rolls that they serve here suit me perfectly.

Montepulciano from Below

The market was just outside the walls and it was good for me explore the area and discover the location of the bus station.  I will be making my first solo excursion outside of Montepulciano this weekend and needed to figure out how to accomplish it without missing my connections.  After class, I went to the tourist office and bought a train ticket to Orvieto for Saturday.  I managed to accomplish this task without the lady in the tourist office addressing me in English, so I was proud of myself.  The train station that serves Montepulciano is 16 km away, so I also needed to go to the bus station and buy a ticket for the bus that will take me there.  In the bus station, there is a tobacconist and a snack bar, but no ticket window.  Tickets are sold at the same window where one would purchase an espresso.  I imagine this could make for quite a crowd just before departure, but it was slow when I was there and now I am prepared for Saturday.

Valley Below Montepulciano

For the first time since I got here, there were no activities planned for the afternoon.  I walked outside the walls from the bus station to the other side of town and then climbed back up a long flight of stairs to explore the half of Montepulciano on the other side of my house from the school.  I encountered a couple of restaurants that looked like they might be good for lunch and discovered a Laundromat not too far from where I live.  It’s a steep climb, but I should be able to lug my laundry up there.  It was green and springlike outside the walls.  Lilacs and wisteria are in bloom, as are apple and pear trees and the famous red poppies.

I took a nap before dinner and then Fiorella sent the dog in to wake me.  We had pasta left over from last night for a first course and then nuggets of tender beef cooked in a sauce with black pepper and balsamic vinegar for the main course.  The meat was served with steamed finocchio (It grows wild in California.  Why don’t we eat it there?), spicy grilled eggplant and salad.

A Rare Bit of Open Space in Upper Montepulciano

I was starting to think about bed when the drumming started.  At first, I thought it was some kid drumming on a plastic water bottle of something.  The street is so narrow and the walls so thick that I cannot see the ground.  Eventually, the din grew so loud that I realized something organized had to be happening out there.  I threw open the casement and leaned over to see what was happening.  There was a full scale parade, complete with flags and drum corp, marching down my street at 11 pm.  It is the Easter holiday here and I’m sure this was some sort of religious procession.  There was something very atmospheric about uniformed men marching through this 15^th century street in the dark.  I could just imagine the Polizianos marching off to battle the Siennese with all their banners waving.

Montepulciano – Day 8 – Friday

I have been in Italy for a week, but it feels like I just got here.  Time passes so quickly.  There is so much to see and do and learn.  My head threatens to explode.

We passed the morning studying reflexive verbs and vocabulary for parts of the body and types of weather.  This was good for me, since my Italian vocabulary is long on food and short on everything else.  Today was a sad day because it was the last day for some of the students.  I guess I will eventually see everyone I now know leave.  I can only trust that new and wonderful people will arrive to take their places.

Gnochetti with Truffle Sauce

My friend, Donna, is leaving tomorrow.  She completed her course today.  She took her friend, Linda, and me out to lunch to celebrate.  The restaurant was in a cellar, but was very elegant.  We shared a divine bottle of dry proseco and the food was excellent.  I had gnochetti in a truffle sauce served in a bowl baked from fresh pasta dough.  The bowl wasn’t really edible, but it got high marks for presentation and didn’t need to be washed.

Valley Below Il Casale

After lunch, the school had arranged for us to tour a farm where organic cheese is made.  In Italy, dirt roads are called "strada bianca" because the gravel surface is whitish.  The farm was midway between Montepulciano and Pienza.  We went in private cars, since most of the people going lived in the direction of Pienza and weren’t returning to Montepulciano.  I drove with Donna and Linda.  The scenery was honestly the most beautiful I have ever seen.  Green rolling hills, fields of mustard, cypress trees lining the roads, stone farmhouses with red tile roofs and castles on every hilltop.  I felt like we were driving through a VanGogh painting.  Agricultural plantings in Tuscany are so beautiful that they seem to have been arranged by a landscape architect.

Goat Pen at Il Casale

Times are hard in Italy and it seems that every farm has turned to tourism to make ends meet.  Some rent rooms and others offer small campgrounds.  Il Casale, where we went to taste cheese, had a campground with a nice restroom and showers and a tasting room/breakfast room for the guests.  The farm raises sheep and goats and makes cheese from the milk of both.  Pecorino is made from sheep’s milk.  The owner was a Swiss woman named Sandra who has lived in Italy for many years.  She and her children run the farm.  She took us on a tour and explained to us how the cheese is made.  Pecorino goes through a number of stages as it ages.  Organic cheese which has not been pasteurized grows a lot of furry mold.  Sandra petted the cheeses as she spoke and it was obvious that they were made with love.

After the tour, we repaired to the tasting room, where we sat at a long trestle table to taste the products of the farm.  Besides cheese, Il Casale also produces wine, honey and several types of jam.  We tried three types of goat cheese, some fresh ricotta and six types of pecorino.   As the pecorino ages, it grows harder and stronger in flavor.  We began with a very young, soft, creamy cheese and worked our way up to the crusty old reserve.  There was also pecorino with truffles and pecorino aged in a tub of grape must.  We all preferred the three month old pecorino (reddish one on the right) because it was soft and creamy, but had a fairly strong flavor.  Most of us bought some to take home.  I brought a chunk to Fiorella and she liked it, also.  The cheese aged in grape must (the moldy one in the center) was also tasty.  The must gave it a sour finish that was a nice contrast with the cheese flavor.  I also enjoyed the carmelized pear, plum ginger and sweet pepper jams, both with the cheese and on the homemade bread.  They were especially delicious with the fresh ricotta.  After our tasting, one of the young men from the farm brought us back to Montepulciano.

This evening, Fiorella made wonderful spaghetti with calamari, shrimp and some form of mild white fish.  We sat eating dinner, drinking wine and watching a program on TV about the 6.3 magnitude earthquake that destroyed Aquila in Abruzzo three years ago today.  Nearly the entire city collapsed and 309 people died in the quake.  A medieval city is no place to be in an earthquake.

 There were no drum corps marching through the streets this evening, but there was a candlelight procession, accompanied by a singing priest, that passed by about 9:00.  The priest actually had a nice voice and his chant was quite haunting.  It reminded me of some of the better muezzins in Turkey.

MONTEPULCIANO & CORTONA

Montepulciano – Day 5 – Tuesday 

I have been trying to get a handle on why I wake up every morning at 5AM and can’t get back to sleep.  Late yesterday, it dawned on me that it probably has something to do with my espresso consumption.  At least I am probably not actually having a heart attack.  I normally drink only decaf, but a cup of coffee here is MUCH more potent than the occasional cup of regular that I drink at home.  I’ve been having two or three a day and it’s a miracle I have slept at all.  I probably wouldn’t have except that this is also a fabulous place to drink wine.  I can get decaf easily at cafes, but I’m going to have to have a chat with my landlady.

Tuesday morning began with a coffee cake that was both a visual and gustatory feast.  The cake itself was a rich, buttery vanilla, which would have been a treat in itself had it not been topped with apricot preserves on one side and cherry preserves on the other, all decorated with a lattice pattern of pastry.  My landlady, Fiorella, had whipped it up while we were eating dinner the night before.  She is a veritable tornado in the kitchen.  I discovered, today, that Fiorella is famous for her cooking.  I had been concerned that I might get stuck boarding with the only bad cook in Tuscany, but I have hit the jackpot.  Each meal is more wonderful than the last.

I spent the first half of the day working on the past tense again and writing vacation advertisements in Italian.  A German woman named Gabrielle joined our class today, so there are now four of us.  Sometimes the intellectual stimulation of switching between several languages threatens to send me into overload.  Several times I have found myself so lost that I can’t even speak English, but I generally manage to recover.  Yesterday, after class, I talked for an hour or more with Lucy from Columbia in Spanish and Italian with a bit of English thrown in when we got lost. 

I skipped lunch and took a short walk around the city, although Fiorella did try to feed me when I stopped by home to drop off my bag.  She actually does say, “Mangia, mangia!”  She would make an excellent Jewish mother.  This place is like something out of a fantasy.  Montepulciano has been rebuilt three times as the city grew and the walls needed to be torn down and the circumference expanded.  The current incarnation dates to the renaissance.  This means that the house I am living in is at least 500 years old and possibly 600 years old. 

Montepulciano City Hall

The buildings here have been combined and divided so many times that it is impossible to tell where one ends and another begins.  Elegant renaissance facades often conceal older buildings behind.  The city hall, which appears to be a copy of the Medici castle in Florence, is actually two buildings with a courtyard between them.  In the courtyard is a cistern where a recent cleaning resulted in the discovery of a bust of Mussolini that someone had tipped in there after the end of Fascism in Italy.  During the renaissance, Florence and Sienna were rivals.  Montepulciano is located in the area dominated by Sienna, but was allied with Florence.  This made the town militarily important and the Medici pumped a lot of resources into developing the infrastructure.  One sees the Medici coat of arms in various locations in Montepulciano.

Theater in Montepulciano

The school had organized a guided walk through the city and wine tasting event for us in the late afternoon.  We wandered through the cathedral (I’m getting so blasé.  Oh, just another 17^th century church.), the city hall and visited the Montepulciano theater, which was also constructed in the 17^th century.  Like La Scala, although on a much smaller scale, it was originally built as a private club.  Today, it has been restored and is the center of a major youth music festival in the summers and hosts performances by several local orchestras and choirs, including an orchestra of six and seven year olds.  All children in Montepulciano schools are required to study music.  I’m impressed.  The thing I found most interesting about our visit to the theater was the experience of standing on the stage and looking out at the boxes.  Originally, there were no seats on the floor, although today it has been equipped with modern seating and those are now the expensive seats.  The stage actually sloped noticeably towards the audience, giving theatergoers a better view of the players to the rear of the stage.

In Italy, wineries are called “cantine.” We visited the Cantina Contucci, where they produce a Vino Nobile.  Vino Nobile was originally a wine produced for the local nobles and hence the name.  It is a wine of 80% Sangiovese grapes and 10% each of two other red varieties I did not recognize.  To be called “Vino Nobile” the wine must be produced to a very specific formula and the grapes grown in the administrative area of Montepulciano.  Vino Nobile is aged in large casks called “botte” rather than in a standard wine barrel.  I preferred another wine made at Cantina Contucci that contained 5% white grapes and had been aged in oak barrels.  It had a much more complex flavor lent to it by the oak in the barrel.  We tried a total of four wines and munched on some lovely pecorino while a young woman named Roberta filled us full of facts about Tuscan wines.

After the wine tasting, I returned home to a tantalizing scent.  Dinner was thinly sliced port loin in a mysteriously fabulous garlic sauce that made everything else I have ever eaten seem like fodder.  I may never cook again.  It was truly humbling.  I worship Fiorella’s cooking.  She also served a salad made with thinly sliced raw zucchini topped with parmesan cheese.  I don’t even like zucchini and it was delicious.  We also had a salad of cucumbers and ripe red tomatoes.  No one here would dream of serving the pathetic pink abominations that pass for tomatoes in American restaurants.

Montepulciano and Cortona – Day 6 – Wednesday

Our school day begins at 8:45 am and our first lesson runs until 10:15.  Then we get a half hour break.  This is a great excuse to duck across the street for a cappuccino.  Coffee is cheap here.  A cappuccino runs 1.15 Euros at the café across from the school.  It’s a tiny place and usually packed with people.  Having coffee there is a very Italian experience.  After the break, we have another lesson from 10:45 to 12:15, a quick break and our last lesson from 12:30 to 1:10.  Afternoon activities are optional.

Today, we put the passato prossimo tense behind us and forged on to direct object pronouns.  English has very boring pronouns.  In Italian, there are a bewildering number of options.  I really need to learn how to say, “My head is going to explode.”

After school, I had lunch and a bottle of wine in the Piazza Grande at the top of the hill with two classmates.  Knowing I would be eating pasta for dinner, I limited myself to a couple of pieces of bruschetta.  They were delicious and tasted of rich red tomatoes with lots of garlic and basil.  If the espresso kills me, at least I’ll die happy.

The school had organized an excursion to Cortona in the afternoon.  Our guide was Stefano, a handsome and amusing fellow who drove like a madman.  We descended from Montepulciano and passed into the Arezzo region.  Wines made from grapes grown in Arezzo cannot be called Vino Nobile, but Chianti is produced in the area.  We passed by numerous elegant estates, many of which now serve as bed and breakfasts for tourists.  Italian cypresses are plentiful, as are olive trees.  Today we saw one vineyard that had tulips blooming between the grapevines.

Monastery in Cortona

Crooked Chapel in the Monastery

Monastery from Above

Eventually, the road began to climb toward the city of Cortona.  We began our visit to Cortona outside the walls at a monastery where St. Francis spent some time in contemplation.  The monastery is built into the stone on the side of a ravine and has a waterfall running through it, or would if there weren’t a drought.  Today, it was more of a mossy trickle, but still picturesque.  We saw the cell where St. Francis had prayed and a charming little crooked chapel carved out of the hillside where no two lines appeared plumb.

View from Cortona

Stefano dropped us off at the top of the city with instructions to meet him in the Plaza Garibaldi at the bottom, while he brought the car around.  It was a steep walk through densely packed renaissance era houses.  From Cortona, one can see from Montepulciano to Umbria.  Many hillsides are terraced near Cortona.  Fruit trees, lilacs and wisteria are in bloom and all is quite colorful.  Stefano’s instructions were somewhat vague and we began to wonder if we would ever find Piazza Garibaldi.  We looked for someone to ask, but the street was deserted.  Finally, a white haired nonna opened a second floor window.  We breathed a sigh of relief and asked her where we could find Piazza Garibaldi.  Her answer?  “I can’t hear you.  I’m deaf.”  Figures!

Archway in Plaza della Republica in Cortona

Olive Orchard below Cortona

Eventually, we located the Piazza Garibaldi and Stefano and together we strolled along the main drag from Piazza Garibaldi, through the Piazza della Republica to the Piazza del Duomo.  We took our time and stopped for gelato.  The view from the Piazza del Duomo, at the edge of the wall, was impressive.  Cortona is a great place to watch people and there are some nice shops.  I bought a nice pair of green earrings for 5 Euros.  The walls of Cortona are interesting because they are the original Etruscan walls built 2500 years ago.  While Montepulciano was constructed with fine materials financed by the Medici, Cortona was built from cruder local material.  Instead of the white marble and travertine seen in Montepulciano, Cortona is built from darker stone.  The red tile roofs and pots of flowers make a pretty sight tumbling down the steep hillside.  Cortona is the setting of Frances Mayes’ book, Under the Tuscan Sun.

Shops in Cortona

We returned to Montepulciano in time for dinner.  Montepulciano was lively because the Easter holiday starts tomorrow.  Fiorella made pasta by hand and served it with a rich meat sauce and a salad accompanied by sautéed butterflied chicken breast.  I don’t know what she does to meat to make it so flavorful, but I suspect it involves olive oil and lots of salt.  After dinner, I sank into a food coma and retired to my room to do my homework and write.

BELLA TOSCANA

Milan to Montepulciano - Day 3 - Sunday

My train to Montepulciano left at the civilized hour of 10:45 AM, so I had plenty of time to eat breakfast, pack and make my way the two blocks to the train station.  The platform numbers are not posted until the trains actually arrive, so everyone hovers around the departures board.  There was a crazy woman feeding popcorn to the pigeons sitting next to me, so I had to keep shooing them away.

The trains really do run on time in Italy.  So far, I have found Italy to be much more orderly than I expected.  I had a seat in a first class compartment of six seats.  Unfortunately, there are no floor level luggage racks, so I had to dead lift my 50 lb. suitcase over my head to stow it.  I suspect I will get good at this by the time I have been here two months.  This should discourage me from shopping.

From Milan to Bologna, the countryside was fairly level. Between Bologna and Florence, the trains passed through a range of rugged hills.  Everything was vividly green and many trees were blossoming in shades of pink and white.  The view was frequently interrupted by tunnels, however.  The lights in our coach stopped switching on when it got dark after a while, which made it impossible to do anything but gaze out the window.  I shared the compartment with five elderly Italians toting huge suitcases and shouting into their cellphones.  I feigned ignorance of the Italian language.

Florence lies in a valley between two ranges of hills.  I couldn't see much of the city from the train, but the train station was a large outdoor affair.  Once we left Florence, our path ascended another range of high hills (more tunnels) and then descended into the rolling hills of Tuscany.  Tuscany is so beautiful it almost brought tears to my eyes.  I cannot imagine a more fabulous time of year to be here than now in the spring.  It is emerald green and everything is in bloom.  It resembles the Napa Valley except for the medieval villages on the hilltops.  I can't wait to explore.

Partial View of Montepulciano

I left the train at Chiusi, which is the main Tuscan transfer point for intercity trains.  Usually, there is a bus that runs from the train station outside of town to the bus station in the center, but it doesn't run on Sundays. I decided to splurge and spend 50 Euros to take a taxi all the way to Montepulciano since I was traveling with all my luggage and was running a bit late and didn't want to keep my landlady waiting.  Montepulciano is about 16 km from Chiusi over country roads.  Everything is fabulously green and blooming.  Like most towns in Tuscany, Montepulciano sprawls across the top of a ridge.  The town is walled and entered through gates that make you want to hold your breath as you drive through them.

My Room

My landlady is named Fiorella Cioli.  She is a single lady in her 60s who lives in a flat above a restaurant a short distance from my school here in Montepulciano.  The house is ancient, but the interior has be redone in recent times.  It is very rustic and looks just the way you would imagine a house in Tuscany should look.  My room is small, but comfortable and I have my own bathroom and a sort of foyer between the two.  I thought I had seen every imaginable plumbing arrangement between my travels in Turkey and my trip to Russia.  My own bathroom is so small that I have to step over the toilet to get out of the shower, but this is the first time I have ever encountered a bathroom where the toilet is actually IN the shower.  I suspect this is the result of installing modern plumbing in a centuries old building.

I arrived about 4:00, had a nice chat with my landlady (who either speaks no English or isn't letting on that she does), unpacked and went over to the school for a welcome drink to meet the staff and other students.  We are a group of mostly middle aged and retired people, primarily from the United States and Germany.  When I returned, Fiorella made me an excellent dinner of pasta shells with a ragout and amazingly tender medallions of beef, spinach and salad which we washed down with red wine out of a bottle with no label.  Montepulciano is cooler than Milan, so I slept comfortably under a down comforter.

Il Sasso Scuola di Italiano

Montepulciano and San Quirico - Day 4 - Monday, the First Day of School

I am still waking up at 5:30 AM.  I have no idea why I wake up at that time, since it is 8:30 in the evening at home.  I lie there for an hour or so, formulating sentences in Italian and trying vainly to go back to sleep.  I finally got up at 7:00 and Fiorella served breakfast at 8:00 so that I would have time to get to school.  

The school is in another ancient building near the city gate, with a fantastic view from the terrace.  School starts at 8:45 and runs until 13:10.  I started my day with a placement test and an interview (in Italian) with the director of the school. I was placed in the second of the five levels offered by the school.  I had been studying on my own before I left with the goal of bypassing the first level, so this was gratifying.  There are three of us in my class.  A woman from Pennsylvania named Linda and a gentleman from Washington state named Hunter.  Our teacher is a young woman named Costanza.  She speaks almost entirely in Italian.  Today, we worked with the past tense and passed our time recounting what we had done over the weekend and where we had gone on past vacations.

Chapel on the Cover of "Under the Tuscan Sun"

I made friends with Judy and Savannah from Connecticut who have a car.  After school, we had lunch in the main plaza of Montepulciano and then went for a drive through Pienza to San Quirico.  I find it disorienting to drive around here because one moment I feel like I am on the way to my old job in Napa and the next moment we are passing through some 13th century village.

City Gate of San Quirico D' Oscia

Church of San Quirico

                                    San Quirico d' Oscia is one of those ancient villages.  It is 800 years old, but people live and work there today.  It was siesta time when we arrived and the place appeared deserted.  It was a little creepy.  We stopped at a small cafe and had something to drink while we basked in the sun on the plaza.  This is Savannah's fourth trip to this area, so she acted as tour guide and driver.

View from San Biagio

We stopped at the church of San Biagio to take a look around and enjoy the view of the surrounding countryside.  San Biagio sits part of the way down the hill from Montepulciano.  Everything here is stacked so close together that it is hard to get far enough away from a building to take a decent picture.  One day, I will determine how to photograph the church.

Savannah dropped me off at the city gate and I walked home, arriving just in time to read my email before dinner.  Fiorella cooked a wonderful linguini arrabiata and some kebabs with beef, chicken, pork and sausage, accompanied by crispy potatoes and salad.  We have come to agreement whereby she will stop cooking a two course dinner every night and will alternate pasta dishes with meat dishes.  Hopefully, this will allow me to do justice to her cooking without growing big as a house.

TWO DAYS IN MILAN

Milan – Day 1 - Friday

Arriving in Milan by plane is impressive.  You are descending as you pass over the Alps and thus have a close up view of the peaks and valleys stretching out to the horizon.  Unlike the obvious escarpment of the Sierra Nevada, the Alps seem to march off to infinity.  They are steep and rugged and snow covered at this time of year (late March.)

The Malpensa airport is in the countryside 28 miles north of Milan and, once on the ground, the Alps still dominate the horizon.  The countryside is green and orderly.  Much of it is forested, but the trees are planted in neat rows and appear to be plantations.  The Milan airport was a breeze.  Passport control was quick and there were no agents present at customs.  Signage was clear and abundant, so it was easy to find my train.  

The Malpensa Express is a clean, modern train that runs from the airport to either of the two train stations in Milan.  The 40 minute ride was pleasant and interesting.  While the area surrounding Milan is clearly industrial, it is also unmistakably beautiful.  Everything was vividly green and the largest flowering trees I have ever seen grew in abundance.  Industrial buildings, modern apartment blocks, houses and fields were jumbled together in a very un-American fashion.  There was no clear transition from countryside to city, so I was somewhat surprised when we suddenly arrived at the Milano Centrale station.

I have been to Spain and Germany and thought I had seen fascist architecture, but the Milano Centrale station tops them all.  It is massive, with towering arched halls and three levels of shops and services.  You could probably spend an entire day there if you were a shopper, but I am not.  I wandered about a bit until I located the Trenitalia ticket counter. 

I had been warned that the lines were as monumental as the station and I had not been misinformed.  I spent an hour eavesdropping on conversations in Italian and Spanish and was pleased by how much of the Italian I was able to understand.  While I have been studying Spanish for ten years and speak it pretty fluently, I still have a terrible time understanding people when they speak.  Italians speak a lot and passionately, but they do not speak particularly fast and the language lends itself to clear enunciation.  So far, I have been able to understand most of what people have said to me and, when I speak to them in Italian, they do not seem compelled to answer me in English, as so often happens when I try to speak French or German.  It is somewhat exhausting to communicate constantly in a language that is still so new to me, but I am managing.

Eventually, I reached the counter and succeeded in activating my Eurail pass and making a reservation for my train trip to Montepulciano on Sunday.  Interestingly, a Eurail pass covers the cost of train tickets, but not the cost of reservations, which are required for long distance trains.  Reservations can be made online, but it is much more expensive.  The same reservation that would have cost me $27.50 online cost me 3 Euros at the ticket counter.  The helpful clerk explained to me that regional trains do not require reservations and would therefore be free with my pass.  We determined that I would not need a reservation for my trip from Montepulciano to Orvieto on Easter weekend.

While I probably could have seen my hotel from the station if I had used the correct exit, I went out the opposite side of the station, having no idea where I was, and grabbed a taxi.  By the time we navigated the maze of one way streets from one side of the station to the other, it cost me 7 Euros.  I will walk back.  I was too early to check in, but the clerk seemed to anticipate my every need, showed me to the baggage room and provided me with a much needed map of Milan.

Rick Steves calls Milan a “cold plunge,” but my first impression was very positive.  First of all, it was sunny and quite warm.  I shed my coat and sweater and walked around the city in a sleeveless top.  While there was a metro stop within a few blocks of the hotel, I had time to kill and decided to walk the mile or so into the center of town.  While Milan may be the New York of Italy, it is also an old city, dating back to at least the Roman Empire.  Streets are crooked, often cobblestoned and change names frequently, randomly alternating between tiny alleys and broad avenues.  I accidentally overshot the street I had planned to follow to the Plaza Duomo and chanced upon a lovely treed parkway with bicycle and pedestrian walkways that I followed for several blocks before heading back to the main drag.  Everyone seemed to be out walking a dog and it felt something like walking through the Duboce triangle in San Francisco.  I was comfortable.

The Corso Venezia seems to be one of the main shopping streets in Milan.  Milan is the fashion capital of Italy and many major houses are represented there, as well as familiar American stores.  Motorcycles and bicycles whizzed by me as I walked down the avenue.  As I approached the Duomo (cathedral), my path turned to the right into Corso Vittorio Emanuelle II, a wide pedestrian mall with a dizzying combination of modern and 19^th century gallerias on either side, featuring every imaginable fashion destination and an annoying profusion of vendors hawking woven bracelets and bubble guns.  I would have liked to stop in a sidewalk café, but I wasn’t hungry and it was just too much of a zoo for me to want to linger there, although I did stop to listen to the violin and accordion trio playing Vivaldi.

The Duomo in Milan

The Plaza Duomo was even more of a zoo.  The entire immense plaza was a sea of people.  Milan isn’t supposed to be a tourist mecca, but it sure looked like one to me.  I had one mission – to find the gathering point for the city tour that I planned to take the following morning.  I located it at the far end of the plaza, close to the metro station.  I was hot, tired, sunburned, my feet hurt and I was starting to get hungry.  I dived into the coolness of the metro station and took the subway back to the neighborhood of my hotel, where I grabbed a pizza margherita at a hole in the wall close to the hotel.  It was 5 Euros worth of heaven – thin, crispy, cheesy, with plenty of garlic and basil, just like the pizza I used to enjoy at Café Armani when I lived in Orange County.  Satiated (OK, stuffed is more like it.), I made my way back to the hotel and checked in.

My Hotel in Milan

There is no such thing as a single hotel room in most American cities, but they abound in Europe.  My room is tiny, but pleasant due to the cheerful maize colored walls, high ceiling and large window overlooking an inviting terrace to which I was disappointed to discover I did not have access.  What appeared to be a door leading outside was actually a window that merely canted in about 6 inches at the top for ventilation.  I have a single bed with a decent mattress, a desk and a luggage stand.  I can almost turn around in the bathroom without banging my elbow on something, but I do have a bidet.  Everything is clean, new and efficient.  I read for a bit and then succumbed to jet lag.  Waking at about 7:30, I briefly considered getting dinner, but was still quite full from my earlier pizza indulgence, so have spent the evening planning the next stage of my journey and writing this blog.  Now it is time to go to sleep so that I can be fresh for my tour of Milan in the morning.

Milan – Day 2 – Saturday

After two nights prior to my trip where I got only a few hours’ sleep and then one night on a plane followed by  a long nap, my body had no idea what time it was.  I awoke at 5:22 AM and could not get back to sleep.  My alarm was set for 7:00 and I made myself lie there until that time, hoping I might get a bit more sleep.  Ha!

The Hotel Cristallo has a pleasant, although very pink, breakfast room in the basement with a nice selection of food and a cappuccino machine.  Not having eaten dinner the night before, I was famished.  I lingered a bit, drinking coffee and studying Italian vocabulary, before setting off for the Duomo and the meeting place for the morning’s tour.

Detail of Duomo Floor

The Plaza Duomo was considerably less crowded at that hour on a Saturday morning.  I sat in the sunshine, waiting for the bus, for a few minutes and then took my place on the Autostradale bus.  As soon as everybody was aboard the bus, we disembarked and headed across the plaza and into the cathedral.  The Duomo is the 3rd largest Catholic cathedral in Europe, outsized only by St. Peter’s in Rome and the cathedral in Seville.  The cathedral took 600 years to build and was not completed until the 1960s.  The exterior is made entirely of pink marble in a delicate gothic style with many spires.  I delight in cathedral architecture, but this one seemed more like an imitation of a cathedral than an original edifice to my eyes.  The interior does, however, contain a gorgeous inlaid marble floor in red, white and black marble.  The white marble is much softer than the other colors and has worn away over the centuries, resulting in an interesting texture.  The ceiling appears to be richly carved, but is actually only cleverly painted.  Someone must have spent more time up there than Michelangelo spent painting the Sistine Chapel.

After exiting the Duomo, we strolled through the Galleria Vittorio Emanuelle II (the first king of a unified Italy) on our way to La Scala Opera House.  The Galleria is as large as any modern shopping mall and covered by a glass and iron ceiling.  It was originally built in the 1880s, but was bombed during WWII and later rebuilt in the original style.  The colorful mosaic floor is a true work of art.  Near the center of the Galleria is a vignette featuring a dancing bull.  There is a legend that if you spin on your heel on the bull’s testacies, it will bring you good luck.  There was a crowd of people making fools of themselves in the attempt as I passed by.  It is rumored that it is necessary to replace that part of the mosaic every ten years because it gets worn so rapidly.

La Scala Opera House

La Scala is something of a disappointment from the outside.  Its neoclassical architecture appears quite restrained in comparison to some of the surrounding buildings, although two recent modern additions lend it some interest.  One of these additions houses an entire second stage that can be rolled in and out, allowing the opera company to stage two different productions on successive nights.  We were only allowed a few moments to view the inside of the theater from one of the boxes, but the attached museum was interesting.  La Scala was originally a private theater where each box was owned by a noble family.  The boxes were decorated to the owners’ individual tastes and people could eat, drink, gamble and even cook if they liked.

After La Scala, we boarded the bus and drove through the city, taking in a few sights on the way to the Sforza Castle.  Milan will host the 2015 World Expo and there is construction going on everywhere.  An entire new residential district and two new metro lines are under construction to the north of the city center.  Cranes loom everywhere.  We got a brief glimpse of the fashion district, the public gardens, Monumental Cemetery, sports arena and Cadorna Station (where I will arrive when I return in two months) on our way to the castle.

Exterior of Sforza Castle and Moat

The Sforza Castle (originally constructed in the 14^th century) is the most evocative of any castle I have visited.  Its imposing rectangular walls enclose a vast courtyard and massive round towers dominate the corners.  One can easily imagine knights on chargers jousting there or huge armies massing before marching out under the portcullis.  The drawbridges have been replaced with more permanent causeways, but the moat remains although it is a grassy swale today.  The vivid green of the grass contrasts nicely with the red brick and black stone of the walls and towers.  A modern fountain splashes playfully in front of the gates.  Our visit was brief and I will make a point of returning to see the unfinished final Michelangelo Pieta in the Museum of Ancient Art housed there upon my next visit to Milan.

The highlight of our tour was a visit to Leonardo Da Vinci’s The Last Supper.  Only 30 visitors are allowed inside at one time and reservations are difficult to obtain if you are not part of a tour group.  A visit requires advance planning.  Our group was divided into two parties.  Visitors are herded into two successive air locks to prevent excessive humidity inside the room housing the fresco. No photography is allowed. When Leonardo painted The Last Supper, he was experimenting with a new method using dry plaster.  Usually, frescos are painted on wet plaster, which requires the artist to work quickly before the plaster dries.  Leonardo was attracted to the dry method because it allowed him to take his time.  This resulted in a wonderful work of art that unfortunately began to deteriorate almost immediately.

The Last Supper was painted in the refectory of a monastery.  After centuries of clumsy restorations, what remains of the original was revealed in 1999 when all subsequent layers were carefully removed.  That The Last Supper exists today appears to be the result of divine intervention because the monastery was bombed during WWII and the ceiling and sidewalls collapsed.  The original structure was completely polychromed, but the reconstruction was done in unadorned white plaster which gives the place an austere look, but accentuates the extent of the damage and the miracle of The Last Supper’s survival.  The fresco is iconic and so familiar that I feared seeing the original might be disappointing, but that was not the case.  To fully appreciate the depth of the painting, one must see it in situ where it appears to be an extension of the actual building, like a private dining room off the main body of a restaurant.

The bus returned us to the Plaza Duomo and it was then time for me to stop gawking at art and attend to business.  I needed to buy a cellphone and had noticed a Vodafone store around the corner from the plaza.  I settled on a basic model for 29 Euros.  Vodafone operates on the prepaid business model, so it seemed like a good choice.  I managed to purchase a cellphone in Italian and felt I was doing admirably until I discovered that they needed my passport before activating my SIM card.  Since I did not have my passport on me, this required a trip back to the hotel.

By the time I returned to the hotel it was 2:00 and I was hungry again.  I purchased some tandoori chicken and basmati rice with curry sauce from an Indian takeaway across the street.  It might seem like a sin to eat Indian food in the presence of all this Italian culinary magnificence, but my addiction to Indian food is powerful and the promise of two meals for 8 Euros proved irresistible.  I ate lunch, retrieved my passport and zipped back to Plaza Duomo to activate my phone.

Business transacted, I was free to purchase some gelato (cioccolata and mango to complete my Indian meal) and wander back past La Scala and through the back streets to the Brera Art Gallery.  The Brera Gallery sits atop an art school and was established in 1809 to house Napoleon’s looted art collection.  It contains Milan’s top collection of Italian paintings and a bewildering collection of art from the ancient to the modern, confusingly curated in side galleries.  After a surfeit of Madonnas, crucifixions and ascending virgins, I was charmed by an impressionist painting of a very old fashioned young girl sitting on a very old fashioned bed, holding what was probably a miniature, but who appeared to be doing nothing so much as checking her text messages.

While I love art and am fascinated by history, I have a low tolerance for museums.  They inevitably make me sleepy.  I had intended to make another stop or two, but instead returned to the hotel to take a nap.  After snoozing for a few hours, I devoured my leftover Indian food and succeeded in setting up my new cellphone, despite the lack of directions in English.  I have not, however, yet deduced how to make an international call.  Hopefully, someone at the school will be able to enlighten me.

Milan is very dry.  Riding on the metro today, I was attacked by a young woman’s long hair due to the static electricity in the air.  I woke parched every two hours last night.  Having left the shutters closed all day, my room is cooler tonight.  If it weren’t so noisy outside, I would sleep with the window open.  Maybe I will put in my ear plugs and give it a go.  I need to get a good night’s sleep to reset my internal clock.  Scott will kill me if I return home having developed the habit of rising at 5:30 AM.