TOSCANA

20 Days in Italy: Part III - Tuscany

By Joey Pasco

(See Part I here, and Part II here.)

Ah, Tuscany. La Toscana. Birthplace of the Renaissance. Prior to our trip, I was most excited to see (and photograph) those infamous Tuscan landscapes; I daydreamed of driving on winding roads, going up and down rolling hills, passing between farms and vineyards, sipping wine and watching sunsets in the fields outside our agriturismo.

“Go out the door, turn left, walk two blocks and the garage will be on your left.”

I’d never rented a car outside of the US before, and part of me was worried about driving on tiny roads with unfamiliar traffic laws in a place where the native language is one that I don’t speak. But we wanted to visit Tuscany, and there’s not exactly a public transportation option for touring the region. And besides, “road-tripping through Tuscany” has quite a ring to it.

So there we were, lugging all of our bags—again—from the rental car office to the actual garage itself, which was inexplicably located a few blocks away on a tiny street in the center of Rome.

We’d requested the smallest automatic-transmission car available. We didn’t need much room, and smaller cars require less gas, not to mention being easier to squeeze into tight European streets. What we ended up with was a brand-new Audi A4—not only bigger than we’d expected, but its newness only served to heighten my trepidation.

As I hesitantly pulled the car up the ramp to exit the garage and onto the one-way street above, I realized I would not be able to easily make the turn. There was a line of scooters and motorcycles on my left, and in front of me a parked car sticking out into the street. “Okay, breathe. Slow and steady,” I told myself as I tried to angle the Audi.

SQURRRMMP!!

I’d rubbed the mud flap of one of the motorcycles with my rear driver’s-side door.

Suddenly, like a scene from a movie where Superman appears out of nowhere to save someone from being pinned under a vehicle, my wife jumps out of the car and physically lifts the motorcycle so that I can make the turn. Only, now she can’t figure out how to leave the bike. Traffic is piling up, horns are blaring. Not knowing where the kickstand is located, she tries leaning it on another bike, but fears it will create a domino effect, knocking over several more. Some men (two or three) run over to try to help. As soon as one of them has a hand on the bike, Christina jumps back into the car, and we pull away from the scene.

And that’s the story of how we got out of Rome with our rental car, while upending only a single motorcycle. (And luckily the mud flap left no damage.)

It was supposed to be a 4.5-hour drive to our destination at Agriturismo Fattoria Fibbiano in the small town of Terricciola. We took our time, enjoying the ride and getting accustomed to Italian roads. We were delighted to discover the car had a built-in GPS, until we found that there had been restrictions placed on the device so that the language could not be changed to English. Luckily, I had my iPhone, in addition to a paper road map should we need to fall back on it.

We passed through a small town 45 miles northwest of Rome called Barbarano Romano, and decided to stop. It was the start of riposo, the time in the afternoon when all the shops close for a few hours. The Spanish call it siesta; Americans call it “nap time” and think it applies only to small children. The town was nearly empty, but for a few stray inhabitants (and a stray cat or two).

Our trek recommenced, and as we merged onto Via Aurelia, we realized we’d perhaps been a little too leisurely—we wouldn’t be arriving in Terricciola until nearly 9PM! Despite our tardiness, our gracious hosts greeted us with an upgrade to the honeymoon suite, as well as a bottle of one of their fine wines.

Terricciola

Our first morning in Tuscany dawned with a chill in the air. After breakfast, I strolled the grounds of our agriturismo to document where we’d be staying for the week. Then we met with Maila, a Fibbiano employee, who sat with us to go over some maps, pointing out all the destinations and things to do in the area.

Maila invited us to participate in a Tuscan cooking class taking place that afternoon on the premises, which we thought sounded like fun. We had several hours to spend until the class began, so we decided to visit Terricciola’s city center. Despite its small size, we enjoyed wandering the streets for a couple of hours. At lunchtime, we discovered what was to become our favorite restaurant in Tuscany, a place called i locandieri. Not only was the food delicious, but our waiter was so friendly and welcoming, we couldn’t help but feel like we’d made a new friend. He turned out to be one of the owners (and his wife the head chef), and we returned there twice more during our stay in the region.

We probably shouldn’t have eaten such a large meal before a cooking class. Then again, there is no such thing as a small meal in Tuscany. The rest of our class was made up of a small group of American travelers, and we all hit it off as we spent several hours together learning to make pasta and pizza, which we enjoyed with a selection of Fibbiano wines.

Lucca & Pisa

The next day we drove north to the town of Lucca, where I shot several photos of bicycles before having lunch in the piazza. Afterwards, we drove to visit the infamous tower of Pisa, and found it still leaning.

Volterra

Yes, the city from Twilight. The rainy weather seemed almost appropriate. We had thick European hot chocolate, and ate lunch early just to escape the downpours.

Florence

Somewhat surprisingly, Firenze was packed with tourists, despite the persistent scattered showers throughout the day. April is supposedly still the offseason, but you wouldn’t have known it. We climbed to Piazzale Michelangelo, where we took in a beautiful panoramic view of the city for about 3 minutes before getting drenched.

The Appennine Colossus

45-minutes north of the city of Florence sits the Parco di Villa Demidoff, home of the Appennine Colossus. This magical creation, sculpted by Giambologna from 1579 to 1589, was a must-see for me. Unfortunately, we were unable to escape the rain. Nevertheless, we walked the gardens, ducking beneath our umbrella, and I photographed the giant with some black and white film, feeling some disappointment and considering the idea of coming back another day when the weather was nicer. Just as we were exiting the park, the clouds parted for the first time all day, revealing blue skies and a sun preparing to begin its descent into golden hour. I handed Christina the umbrella and car keys and dashed back to the site with my camera to take advantage of this window of opportunity.

Val d'Orcia

Waking up to beautiful weather, we spent the entire next day driving through the hills of the Val d’Orcia (and unintentionally skipping lunch in the process).

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Siena & Monteriggioni

The following day we drove south to Siena, where we relaxed in the Piazza del Campo and did some people-watching. Noticing a sign out front inviting passers-by to “come inside and see the view from the terrace,” we discovered a restaurant called Vivace on Via Stalloreggi, and ended up enjoying a plate of local meats and cheeses (with some red wine, of course) on said terrace, basking in that breathtaking view. We had so many meat-and-cheese plates while we were in Tuscany, and never tired of them. Tuscan food—mamma mia! My iPhone camera roll is filled with photos of food, and I’m craving some Chianti now just writing this.

On our way back to Fibbiano, we stopped for some gelato at the medieval walled town of Monteriggioni.

On our last morning in Tuscany, our hosts invited us on a Fibbiano winery tour and tasting. We were joined by some travelers from Sweden (they loved seeing my Hasselblad camera), and we all had a great time learning about the wines and then sampling them along with fresh bread and some local meats and cheeses.