Settling in and our first excursion

Our house in Tuscany, surrounded by olive trees and grape vines

No "wheels up" today.  I forgot we needed a day to get situated.  We stayed at the house to do some laundry, and get settled.  The Coop supermercato closes at 12:30 on Sundays, so we needed to get our shopping list made and head out.

It's great that we have a washing machine at the house, but it takes an hour-and-a-half to do a load, and then there isn't a dryer, so clothes take many hours to dry on the drying rack.  It's an all-day process for the 8 of us.

The grape vines and supports work well for laundry too

There are always at least 4 of us going shopping.  Good thing, because we have about a ton of food and beverages by the time we're done.  Amazingly, the money we spend on all of this is about the equivalent of one lunch for the group at a restaurant.

We were exhausted by our few days in Rome, and our attempt to see as much as we could in those few days, so a laid-back day at the house was enjoyed by all.

Dinner was much like last night.  Chef Ricardo, prep staff, clean-up crew.  We had turkey cutlets, potatoes, salad, and chocolate and cake for dessert.

Our kitchen, our favorite beverage, our dessert!

Today is Monday, and our first excursion in Tuscany.  We decided on Volterra, since it looked like that was the longest drive, and since we'd had a day to rest up for it.  The drive, which should have taken an hour or so, actually took almost 2 hours by the time we were parked.  We did get lost on the way, but only once!

We were ready for lunch by the time we got to Volterra.  "Wheels up at 9:00"  actually turned out to be departure at 9:30.  We ate at a place recommended by David Wagner, of Italia Roadrunners, called Il Sacco Fiorentino, which was very good.  Nice house wine.  Italian beer is turning out to be a favorite with some of the group too.

Volterra's main square, with the city hall building from the 1200's

On the edge of town are the ruins of a Roman theater, which are pretty fascinating.  They fell out of use hundreds of years ago, and people started tossing their garbage over the wall, into the theater.  After 800 years of this, the stage, the amphitheater, and all of the outbuildings were completely buried under the garbage.  In the 1950's an archaeology buff, working at the local school, started investigating where the theater would have been, and excavation began.  It's a very interesting place.

Roman ruins over the city wall in Volterra

The stage of the Roman theater

The shopkeepers and people working at the churches and museums take a few hours for lunch each day, at least in the small towns.  Of course, we Americani want to hit the ground running after lunch.  It's disappointing when the cathedral isn't open, or the cute shops aren't open.  There were several small churches and chapels in town that were open though, and they were beautiful.  We didn't feel like we'd missed much.  The few shops that were open sold a few things to our group.  Oh, and Volterra is known for alabaster, so there are many opportunities to purchase things carved from it around town.  We all bought something to remember our visit.

Volterra has also become famous as the setting for one of the Twilight movies.  We didn't see any vampires, but we know they were there somewhere.

On the way back, we stopped in Monteriggioni, a small walled hill town that was fun to see.  They had some ramparts built along part of the town walls, so we paid to climb up and see the view.

Marco on the ramparts

Our trip home was uneventful, but we needed to stop at the Coop again for provisions.  All eight of us invaded the little store.  I wonder whether they'll be happy or sad when they realize we're gone at the end of the week.

Dinner was leftover chicken, with some additional chicken, potatoes, salad.  Good, cheap wine.  John picked out some profiteroles at the Coop for dessert.