Moving on to Montepulciano!

Ciao!

Up this morning about 6 and we were out the door a bit before 7, heading to the self-service lavanderia where we went last Monday when we first arrived in Massa Marittima.  And, while the printed opening time indicated 7 am, it did take a bit longer than that for someone to arrive.  Lady got there about 10 after 7 to open things up, and we were on our way. Finished the load (washed and dried) by 8:30 am and back to the hotel for only a slightly later breakfast. Lots of people in the hotel now, and while we had the third floor I would think to ourselves for three nights, last night there were folks on either side of us.  Could summer or holiday season be coming to Tuscany??  

Loved this little bridge; looks Roman!

Siena from the distance!

R was looking for grape vines!

Such a pleasant change from our Massa hotel room!

Living room/kitchen, looking into two bedrooms

View (really!) from our balcony!

It is so beautiful here!

Looking up from front windows

House across the street!

San Biagio Church, right outside of town

Yet another city gate!

View from Piazza San Francisco

Great place for lunch!

And all those wines...

Our Caprese starter

R's carpaccio with parmesan

My tortellini with tomato and cheese

My "sort of" chocolate cake

R's vin Santo and biscotti

That's the gate we have to walk up to!!!

We packed up everything right after breakfast, and were out the door and heading east to Montepulciano by 9:30 am.  Another lovely drive, with just a bit of it being on a motorway/autostrata; we reached Montepulciano just about 11:45 am, a bit early, but we wanted to make sure we weren’t late.  Luca, our landlord for the week, was having to check in people to four different properties all about the same time, but it proceeded very smoothly.  We all met at the Duomo and the American family of five followed Luca, and I followed them. We wound all around the hill top, and then back into the old part of the city through another narrow gate.  Their rental is up the hill, so we waited for a few minutes while Luca got them settled, and then followed him down the hill a bit to our place for the week.

It is stunning!  The photographs really can’t do the place justice, as I sit and type at the dining room table looking out on our balcony and the incredible Tuscan hillsides.  And, after being so jammed in tightly to our little hotel room in Massa, we now have two bedrooms and two bathrooms at our disposal, as well as a kitchen/dining room/living room combination. As Robert says, just having a nice place to sit – like an actual couch – really is nice!  Weather is probably in the mid-70’s, with picture perfect fluffy white clouds in a beautiful blue sky!

We now have everything basically organized.  For some reason, many European places – hotels or rentals – don’t really have much drawer space available.  Both here and in Viterbo, we have made use of the second bedroom as basically a dressing room, with clothes on the bed. In this case, we have decided to use the second bedroom as the master, as the regular master bedroom is closer to the street, and the other bedroom has the stunning view.  We’ll see how it works out!  

Robert got all the electronics working (let’s hear it for WiFi!) and then we headed out looking for lunch.  The only problem with being in a hill top town is that no matter where you go, you find yourself either walking down and up or up and then down; there’s really no third way to go.  So, this time we walked up and through a gate and found ourselves at Piazza San Francisco.  There is an art gallery there as well as an Enoteca Bistrot.  In this case, the place has hundreds of wines from which to choose, as well as a full bar.  (Seriously, though, with all this wonderful wine around, who would even think about drinking anything else!  KATY, I’m talking to you!!!)

We had the place to ourselves, and ordered a wonderful bottle of Montepulciano Reserva Nobile at a reasonable price, and ordered lunch.  We started by sharing tomato/mozzarella/basil bruschetta, which was wonderful.  R then had their carpaccio with parmesan cheese, which he said was great.  I had their tortellini stuffed with eggplant, with a tomato and cheese sauce. Fabulous!  (Of course anything eggplant has my name written on it…)  For dessert, R had a glass of their Vin Santo and biscotti, which disappeared completely.  I had their chocolate cake, which was excellent, but not what I’d call chocolate cake.  At any rate, we happily returned to the flat after that – R working on Caltech business, and me to nap.   

We’re staying in today, and will be out and about exploring Chiusi tomorrow!  So! More later!

Lots of love,

m

xxx

Okay, family and friends … I seriously, and I mean SERIOUSLY NEVER thought we would see our apartment again!!  Whew…Robert is nothing short of a navigating genius.  I’ve always known it, but today he was truly amazing.  When we met Luca, and followed him to the apartment, I was NOT paying attention – I was too intent on following and not getting lost.  As a result, and without a good map of town, out we went to go to the grocery store – the Conad.  First of all, the GPS is pretty useless in this situation; it picks what it thinks is the fastest route (based, we think, on the recorded speed limits – if any) but that leads into a maze of tiny streets.  If only I could somehow record the moment when we were trying to get out of town, and came to a building!  Turns out, one has to drive THROUGH the building to get out.  Who knew?  Thank heaven, there was a guy on a motorcycle who was able to help us get through the old part of town.  We managed to find the grocery store and go in and pick up some essential supplies – like a new hair dryer, as the one here does not work!  As well as water, bread, juice, fruit, etc.  Then back to the car, which was the easy part.  Now … finding the apartment again!  Between Emmy (our often very confused GPS) and Robert, we got right back to our apartment and parking space!!  YIPPEE!  And truly, friends and family, it is SOOOOOO much easier getting TO the apartment than getting out of town!  There is what I think is a short cut, but R thinks it is a one-way street … we will pursue this and let you all know. (Editor's note:  It IS definitely an easy way out!  YEAH!). For now, we are in for the night and it looks like we’ll be taking Luca up on some of the wine he left for us to try (with price tags attached, of course) as we’re both just a bit frazzled, shall we say???

More tomorrow when we see if, once again, we can find out way OUT of town!

Lots of love

m

xxx