What fit of madness can explain why an overweight, unathletic, out of shape man in his late forties and his wife would choose to spend their first full day on vacation, after nearly twenty four hours of travelling across the world, on bicycles, pumping and straining to reach an ancient hilltown when a perfectly good city lay before them right at their feet?
Read more »

Rather than a smooth, flowing moving picture, today’s account of our adventure is a choppy, jerky series of still images, garnered from snatches of consciousness and punctuated by periods of deep, if unrestful sleep. It is a travel day, from Washington, DC to Florence, by way of Philadelphia, Frankfurt and Milan,
Read more »

It's been a long absence from bella Italia. Nine months, to be exact. But that powerful itch needed a good scratching, and so we are in the final stages of designing an industrial strength back scratcher.
Read more »

The scene: a portly, middle aged, American man is standing in front of a large block of marble in a dusty medieval workshop, dressed in khakis, a polo shirt, tennis shoes and baseball hat. The camera pans back to reveal a few younger men, dressed in renaissance striped leggings and funny hats, crowded around the older man as he places a chisel on the marble and draws back the hammer.
Read more »

So much for the magic of Florence. We arise after a poor sleep, the result of unusually good weather. Paradoxically, this winter’s unseasonably warm temperatures are not compatible with our hotel’s heating system, which generates enough heat to warm a small city, regardless of the outside temperature. Even when the in-room heating is switched off, billions of BTUs spout up the elevator shaft and stairways, roasting all life on the upper floors of the hotel. Our room is perched atop this bonfire, requiring us to open the windows at night or risk melting away, normally a pleasant state of affairs, but on the weekends the ragazzi like to party like its 1499 (the pre-curfew age) all night long. The oppressive heat, their less than melodious soccer fight songs, the mosquitos and our rumbling stomachs are more than we can handle. Although fatigued and cranky, we are happy to call the evening quits when the sun finally rises, forcing the revelers and the mosquitos elsewhere. We vow not to let our the evening affect the enjoyment of our last day in Florence. We go through the motions at breakfast in the hotel and Bill retires to the room to catch up on some work as Suzy heads out for some shopping.

After a while Suzy returns and we head out for some more shopping and sightseeing. Along the way we stop by the Palazzo Davanzati, a renaissance palazzo converted into a living history museum, giving visitors an idea of how life was lived in renaissance Florence by an upper class merchant of the time. We visited this museum during one of our early visits to Florence but for more than a decade it has been closed for renovation. It has become a standing joke between us, as we get our hopes up to see the Palazzo reopened. The day before, we have wandered by it and the placards announcing the renovation (which have been posted outside the palazzo for all these years) are still in place. This morning, however, the doors are open and there is at least the possibility that tourists are once again being allowed to enter.

So we enter into the outer courtyard, a space that has been open to the public during the renovation as a sort of preview of coming attractions space, but today there is a difference. The doorway into the inner courtyard, with its staircase up to the rooms of the palazzo, is also open. We creep into the courtyard, no security or ticket takers in sight, and get a glimpse into the palazzo. It is inviting, but there is no one to tell us whether the palazzo is open or not. After a few minutes we give up, happy for the opportunity to see the inner sanctum once again and planning to return on our next trip to Florence.

We prepare to depart Florence but despite our continued queaziness decide we need to have lunch before driving to Perugia, two hours away. The hotel staff recommends the nearby Trattoria del Porcellino, only two blocks away and just around the corner from the Mercato Nuovo, the outdoor market of touristy souvenir stalls graced by the statue of il porcellino, the bronze wild boar whose snout you rub for good luck. We are slightly wary about dining so close to such a dense tourist area, but looking in the windows at the crowded trattoria it is apparent that this is more of a local hangout than a tourist commissary. We wait ten minutes for a table and then sit for an improbably memorable meal.

I say improbable because we really can’t believe that a restaurant directly next to one of the most touristy destinations in Florence won’t be another fixed price, English language menu of spaghetti and meatballs. Improbable, too, because our stomachs, after weeks of overuse, are telling us not to enter. It seems foolish to sit down for a lunch given these realities, but we do. And with great optimism, Suzy orders a bottle of acqua frizzante (effervescent water), joking that it will calm our stomachs and make us able to dig into the meal. Improbably she is right.

Our waiter speaks little English (to us, always a good sign, and again unexpected given the locale) but seems pleased by the amount of food that we order and the obvious gusto with which we place our order. He is particularly pleased that we have chosen bistecca alla fiorentina, the local grilled steak, Florence’s signature dish and perhaps the best steak in the world. After a while our antipasto plate arrives, two plates of mixed crostini, topped with liver, black olive paste, tomato and mushrooms. We skip the pasta course and head right to the bistecca, served with a side order of white beans in olive oil and sautéed spinach. The steak is slightly more cooked than rare and it is chewy and slightly tough, a trademark of the chianina beef that is used for fiorentina. With each chew, however, the rich, earthy taste of the beef fills our mouths, mingled with the ample salt, olive oil and a little lemon that has been drizzled over it. This, put simply, is the best steak we have had in Florence, at least in recent memory. Thank goodness we did not wimp out and skip lunch!

We pay up and return to the hotel, which has delivered our car out front. We load our bags, say our goodbyes and are soon on the road out of Florence (while driving into Florence is next to impossible, leaving it is so simple even we can do it), heading south toward our next and final destination of this trip, Perugia. Along the way we plan to stop at an upscale outlet shopping mall about 20 minutes outside of Florence.

We exit the A1 autostrada at Incisa and follow the signs to the mall which is ingeniously named “The Mall.” We arrive a few minutes later to a wood and steel outdoor complex of buildings connected by wide cement walkways and manicured lawns that looks like what I imagine the Microsoft of Apple “campuses” look like. The shops are very high end and very high tech – Gucci, Armani, Ferragamo and the like. We are here solely on a reconnaissance mission, just eyeballing the shops so we can recommend (or not) this as a stop for our friends and customers. It is very impressive.

Perhaps we would have stayed longer, but somewhere along the way we realize that we have left one of our bags, the results of our shopping spree in Florence, back at the hotel. After a phone call to the reception we decide that we have to return to Florence to retrieve the bag, which will add about an hour to our trip. Two days ago, with our fog light warning beeping every 15 seconds, we probably would have shot ourselves. After a few therapeutic days in Florence almost look forward to the excursion.

We retrace our steps to the hotel, pick up the bag and about an hour later we are at the Sinalunga exit on the A1, where we pick up the spur to Perugia. We notice signs for the Outlet Village at Valdichiana and decide to take a quick stop, again solely for research purposes. The Outlet Village is not nearly as upscale as The Mall, but it is much, much bigger. There are dozens of shops selling mostly clothing and housewares. Prices in most of the stores are good and there seem to be some incredible bargains to be had. We wander for a while and head to Perugia.

About 45 minutes later we arrive in Perugia and head for the restaurant of the Deco Hotel in nearby Ponte San Giovanni, where we have arranged to meet our friend Javier Casuso and his children for dinner. The Deco is run by the owner of the house we have been looking at renting for our new villa business and we have had a few conversations with Javier (who is our partner in the business) about whether this is the right property. We are leaning against consummating the deal with the owner, but in Italy this should be no reason not to have dinner in his restaurant!

We arrive on time and enjoy the cool air on the terrace outside the restaurant as Javier struggles to assemble his team, which live a block away and whose apartment is visible from where we are sitting. We can see figures dart back and forth across the windows and occasionally hear shouting, fighting and begging to get a move on. It seems that family life in Italy is little different from that in the U.S.

Finally, about 20 minutes late Javier and the crew arrive, faces we have not seen for nearly a couple of weeks, since they have been visiting us in Washington, D.C. over the Christmas holidays. It is good to see the kids again and, despite the usual kid behavior in restaurants (eating with hands, hitting everyone, running around the table – and I am only referring to Javier here) we have a terrific dinner of pastas and fish, which takes several hours. Not content with saying goodbye, Javier invites us to his apartment for a nightcap of espresso and grappa, as well as delicious little crème filled pastries that one cannot seem to find on desert menus anywhere in Italy, but which are abundant in the country’s numerous patisserie.

We say our goodbyes and drive about 15 minutes to the town (in definition only) of Bosco, where our hotel for the next three days is located. At night it is easy to miss the sign for the driveway to the Relais San Clemente, but after turning around we navigate the long private road to this exquisite property which boasts beautiful gardens, a pool and tennis courts, many outdoor activities and dozens of beautifully appointed rooms in a building dating back from the renaissance. It is dark, naturally, so exploration of the Relais will have to wait until tomorrow. For now we are content to fall sound asleep in the peace and quite of the countryside, windows open and cool air filling the room. We deserve a good night’s sleep and the Relais seems just what the doctor ordered.

This is one of those days where there is not much to tell. We are in Florence, birthplace of the renaissance and birthplace of our Italian love affair. It is here that we first fell in love with this country, its people, its food, its culture, its everything. It is here that we always find a way to come back, never doing much of anything except, perhaps, paying silent homage to this place and thanking it for changing our lives.

Our morning is spent in our hotel room working, working, working, trying to catch up on unwritten and unposted stories, making arrangements for the remainder of the trip, returning phone calls. We do all of this because we have to. Outside the clear bright sky is beckoning us to come out and play. Surprisingly, we resist.

Until lunchtime that is. Around noon we finally step outdoors and begin to reacquaint ourselves with Florence, an easy reintroduction not unlike when two friends who have not seen each other for some time fall back into the conversation they were having when they last saw one another. We shop, peering in the windows of countless beautiful boutiques selling high end clothing, fine jewelry and touristy souvenirs. And we shop some more, taking a half hour to cross the famed Ponte Vecchio, looking in each tiny jewelry store in search of the perfect gift for our daughter back home. And we shop, strolling through the outdoor market at San Lorenzo in search of bargain pashmina scarves for our niece-to-be’s wedding party.

We stop at an old favorite restaurant on the altrarno (the other side of the Arno), its wooden tables packed in a long, brick barrel vaulted cellar, having an unconventional (by Italian standards) lunch that is seemingly served in the wrong order. We stop for a glass of wine at one of the new wine bars that has sprouted up over this old city, enjoying the proprietor’s Chianti riserva under an awning in an outdoor seating area set up in the street which no longer permits automobile traffic. We give a homeless man a coin and, when his sad eyes make contact with the plate of small sandwiches proffered to us by the waitress to accompany our wine, slip him one filled with prosciutto, trying to avoid the disapproving gaze of the waitress.

We do all these things and more as we seem to float, effortlessly, through the streets and through the life of this city. For us, all seems at peace here. All is completely without effort. All is comfortable, relaxing. All is right with the world in Florence.

This is the place where we first came, fifteen or so years ago, taking an apartment on the altrarno, not speaking a word of Italian, not knowing how to buy a cup of coffee or order a pizza. With our son Austin in tow, this tow headed one year old was our ticket to the hearts and minds of our Italian neighbors. Enter the bread store in our neighborhood and you might be ignored for five minutes, the owner serving all of his regulars first. Enter the bakery with this tiny, smiling, blond haired baby, and you were sent to the front of the line, your order filled with a smile, even if you couldn’t explain what you wanted, and a few extra pieces of special schiacciata for il bambino.

After our first two month sojourn here, this is the place we returned to with friends and family, to share the delights we had discovered during our time here. Here we discovered grappa with my mother and father, the first versions tasting like zippo lighter fluid, flavored with grass growing from the cracks in the sidewalk. Here we improbably ate pizza with hot dogs with my mother after spending the better part of the day in a tow truck, our rental car having been incapacitated by feeding it regular fuel (it preferred diesel, thank you). Here we returned for a second grand vacation, this time with two children in two, but with the same result. Here we made our first Italian friends, giving us an even bigger reason to return. Here we shopped the San Lorenzo market, years later with our nearly grown up daughter and her cousin, drank coffee in the Piazza Repubblica until the wee hours of the morning as Greek expats and tourists celebrated their team’s Euro soccer cup victor and luxuriated in the newly renovated Savoy Hotel. Here we managed a group of 17 friends and family, making a grand convoy entrance through the unforgiving traffic of Florence (fortunately on an Easter Monday) and enjoying the kids’ faces as they tried to eat steamed cow’s foot.

So today we do nothing all that special or out of the ordinary. But with every step, every breath of cool, fresh Florentine air, with every turn around every corner we relive and silently recollect all of those experiences, building upon them with each return visit, brick by brick. Like the elegant bell tower on the Palazzo Signoria or the sturdy Palazzo Medici, these memories create works of art that we can cherish for a lifetime.

As we return to our room on the top floor of the Hotel Pierre, languid music suffuses the air, taking wing from the Piazza Repubblica a few blocks away where a Ukrainian woman is singing Italian ballads, accompanied by an accordionist. We open our windows, wrap ourselves in her melodies and drift off to sleep, another perfect Florentine memory to add to our collection.

Yesterday’s theme was “what a difference a meal makes,” but we left you without describing the difference making meal. If you recall, we finally arrived in Siena the previous evening after the sun had set, having endured a miserable day of driving, getting lost, adjusting to a new rental car and dealing with a much to early in the morning start. Our luck seemed to change when we arrived around the corner from the Grand Hotel Continental, however. After parking our car in an illegal space in front of the municipal building we slouched into the hotel and were greeted by a cheery “buona sera.” The staff seemed a bit surprised when we responded to their “how’s it going” inquiry with a torrent of complaints. They seemed determined to help us lift our spirits.

Why they thought that a good meal would do the trick is beyond me. Maybe there is something in the way we carry ourselves that says that food is our prime motivator and source of happiness. Perhaps it is the waistline that gives it all away. Whatever it is, the friendly manager suggested to us a dinner at the Osteria la Sosta di Violante and even made a reservation for us. We’re awfully glad that he did.

Siena is a lovely city. It is sophisticated, wealthy and important, but it lives in the shadow of its more well known neighbor, Florence. Strolling the wide stone pedestrian streets from the Continental to the Piazza del Campo, the main square in Siena where the annual palio is held, we were glad that the town was not overrun with American, Japanese and German tourists. There certainly were plenty of them, but not at the Florentine level. We stopped for a drink at a café on the Piazza del Campo, watching the passersby for a while and finally moved on to la Sosta.

Walking into la Sosta di Violante (via di Pantaneto 115, 53100 Siena, tel. 0577.43774) we knew that things had returned to normal. A single small room with perhaps 6 tables, nearly every one full and each with a group of people deep in conversation, smiling, eating, we felt as if we had come home. Our waiter cheerily showed us to our table, which we would occupy for the next three hours. Although he spoke only a little English, he was able to make himself perfectly understood and he seemed excited by our efforts to communicate in Italian and by our obvious interest in and appreciation for his cuisine. I won’t bore you with the details of what we ate that night (picci with pork ragu, picci with butternut squash and radicchio sauce, tagliata (sliced steak), chicken with a spicy mustard sauce, spinach, fagioli and of course grappa). It was a truly cathartic experience that cleansed the day’s earlier disappointments from our memories.

Waking up in Siena the next morning, the slate had been wiped clean. We open the shades and beautiful, bright sunshine streams into the large, high ceilinged room. Outside a beautiful countryside unfolds in the distance, while earthy terra cotta roofs frame the foreground. Although the early morning fog is fading, it wraps itself around the city’s duomo, an enormous cathedral of stone, adorned with black and green stripes in marble. We are anxious to begin our day.

We check out of the Grand Hotel Continental and leave our bags behind, asking that they bring the car around at 2:30 for our drive to Florence. We retrace our steps from the previous evening and then make a turn arriving at the rear of the duomo. We climb the steep stairs up and find ourselves standing where we had parked the night before on our first, aborted attempt to reach the hotel. Needless to say, the duomo is breathtaking, even more inspiring from the piazza than the view from our room.

We enter the cathedral for a brief tour, again overwhelmed by the scale of the church and its beautiful decoration. The floor of the cathedral contains an intricate series pictures in inlaid marble. We are particularly interested to find a design of deers that are on the floor somewhere in the massive cathedral, as that motif is used in the ceramic design Siena, one of our favorite designs that we sell at Bella Italia. After an exhaustive but unsuccessful effort to find the pattern, we head to the cathedral bookstore to find a book that describes the cathedral floor. There we find the location of the pattern and discover the reason we could not find it is that the floor is under partial restoration and the pattern we were looking for was covered with plywood. We settle for a few postcards and leave.

We wind our way through the little streets poking around and into a number of shops. We are interested in the ceramics stores, which feature a mix of ceramics from all over Italy, some of which we recognize, but the prices are sky high. We press on to the Piazza del Campo and sit outside for a small lunch at a touristy restaurant, pizza and pasta, as we watch American school groups embarrass themselves and their countrymen with their total lack of regard for their host country and basic manners.

We finish lunch, enjoying the sunshine and relatively warm weather, sad that our brief visit to Siena is about to end. Returning to the hotel, we find our car waiting outside, with the bags already loaded. We really love this hotel! We get directions to Florence, sure that we will get lost as soon as we back out of parking spot and sure enough, within two minutes the car is beeping, warning us again that the fog lights don’t work, and we have already made several wrong turns. Today, however, we are back in stride and within a few minutes we are out of Siena and on the connector highway between Siena and Florence. We arrive at the outskirts of Florence a short while later, preparing ourselves for the inevitable disaster that awaits – attempting to find a way through Florence’s maze of one way streets to our hotel in the very center of town. On several previous occasions we have circled the entire city a half dozen time trying to penetrate to its center but today, thanks to the mystical power of the previous evening’s dinner, the car wills itself directly to the doorstep of the Hotel Pierre on the very first try. It is only 4:00 and the sun is still high in the sky. We live a truly charmed life in Tuscany.

Check in at the Pierre is a breeze, as we have stayed there before and our passport information is already on file. We drop off our bags and head outdoors to rediscover the city where we first fell in love with Italy many years ago. For us, returning to Florence is like coming home, and when, several hours later, we arrive at our favorite restaurant in Florence and are greeted by the two brothers who run it with big smiles and warm handshakes, it is like coming home to family.

What a difference a meal makes!

When we last spoke with you, we had just returned to the Hilton Rome Airport Hotel after enjoying the sights and sounds of Rome, but certainly not the tastes. The bad taste in our mouths (literally) from the previous day seems to have set the tone for the day, a day in which little seems to go right. But all of that will change.

We wake at the impossibly early hour of 5:15 so that Austin and Norma can check in two hours in advance of their “international” flight to London on Alitalia. From there they will catch a transatlantic flight to Washington on Virgin Airways, but it has been cheaper to book these flights as separate tickets. Buyer beware; cheaper is not always better. Although Rome to London is clearly an international route, requiring check in two hours in advance, Alitalia considers it a domestic flight in terms of baggage allowance. While Austin and Norma are permitted something like 50 kilos per person on the transatlantic flight, Alitalia permits only 20 kilos per person and the resulting overweight charge wipes out nearly all of the savings we had realized. Live and learn.

Despite complying with Alitalia’s 2 hour advance check in requirement on this international flight (for which international baggage limits do not apply), the first Alitalia customer service rep does not show up for work until a half hour later. Meanwhile, across the lobby, British Airways has been checking in its passengers on a Rome to London flight departing at the same time for over an hour. Passengers wait patiently in line while prim BA staffers, in 1950’s style hats, explain to them what will happen when they get to the front of the line, anticipating and solving problems so that the whole affair goes smoothly. The bedlam that is the Alitalia side of the concourse presents a stark contrast. Having to pay a couple of hundred dollars in overweight charges does not help the mood.

But in the end all goes well and Austin and Norma are checked in, clear security and are off to the States after saying their goodbyes and we head back to the hotel to sleep – at least until the sun rises.

A few hours later we head back to the rental car pavilion at Fiumicino to pick up our final rental car of the trip. The efficient check in process we have experienced with our two previous rental cars this trip from Europcar has now given way to the utter confusion of the Avis counter. In the U.S. they may try harder, but they hardly seem to be trying at all here. When Bill goes to the pickup area, the midsized sedan he has reserved is not available, so they offer an “upgrade” – to a gas guzzling behemoth station wagon unfit for Italian cities. Bill balks at their generous offer and we end up with a sporty Alfa GT, smaller than we had originally requested but with amazing speed. It is a bit cramped, but fine for the driving we are going to do, so we take it and head for the A12 autostrada, planning on meandering along the coast and making our way to the ancient city of Viterbo, a city in which a friend’s son had studied last year and who highly recommended visiting.

We ease onto the highway, adjusting mirrors and seats, trying to make ourselves comfortable in this Italian rocket, when we notice a periodic beeping from the dashboard. This being a European car, the warning lights and messages are not flashing in Italian, as we would have expected and which we could make some sense of, but rather in German, apparently having been reset by the previous occupant. As we rocket down the highway, behind schedule, sleep deprived and attempting to deal with the aggravation of the incessant beeping from the dashboard, we struggle to read the owner’s manual so that we can change the language that the warning messages appear in to English or Italian, a task slightly complicated by the fact that the owner’s manual is written in Italian. Suzy attempts to read the instructions to Bill, but her terrible pronunciation coupled with Bill’s limited language skills, plus the necessity of weaving in and out and around the slower cars (which is just about everyone else on the highway), make this an impossibility. Adding to the tension is our growing realization that our leisurely jaunt up the coast and our confidence that we will “find our way to Viterbo” is clearly overly optimistic. We will be lucky to get to Viterbo in time for lunch, if we are fortunate to find a road that goes there. Suzy, with the owner’s manual in one hand is attempting to unfold a map of Lazio (the region around Rome), so we can find the small road to Viterbo, but the map, which has been folded a couple of dozen times to fit into its perfect bookstore shape and size, when unfolded is actually bigger than the car, obscuring the windshield and getting in the way of the stick shift. The small portion that we need is, of course, printed right over one of the folds, requiring the entire map to be unfolded and refolded backwards. Suzy finally manages to isolate the relevant section of the map folded into in a manageable size, alarm buzzers buzzing and terrified motorists swerving off the road to avoid being run over, and we begin a series of large circles, driving first in the direction of Viterbo and then, almost magically, returning to the A12. Several aborted routes later we decide to drive north on the autostrada, past Civitavecchia and take the main road to Viterbo. Perhaps a restaurant will be open when we arrive. At the very least we can get out of this infernal car and away from the telltale warning beep.

We arrive in Viterbo just as the last restaurant is closing. It is 2:55 and it starts to rain. Viterbo will have to be enjoyed another day. We park the car (we count our blessings that we did not rent the station wagon), and eat half a tuna sandwich and a bag of chips at a little bar before abandoning our dreams of Viterbo and driving to Sienna.

Clearly this is a day in which we should have never got out of bed. We navigate the narrow streets of Viterbo, lined with medieval and renaissance stone buildings, following the signs to Siena and Florence, able to unfold just enough of the map to see that there are two routes to Siena, the more direct yellow road and the less direct red road. We opt for the yellow and signs indicate that it is about 120 kilometers away, somewhere around 70 miles to you and me. The road passes through a small town, bobbing and weaving over and around hills, curve after curve when our progress is impeded by a three wheeled vehicle driving around 30 mph. After a few minutes we decide to take our lives in our hands and pass it around a hairpin corners, finally putting the pedal to the metal (this car really flies!) when around the next bend . . . there is another lorry. So we begin a series of stops and starts, periods of great boredom of driving 20-30 mph behind every form of transport invented in the western world, punctuated by a rush of terror as we hurl around the obstruction praying that we don’t meet another car head on in the process. After a while we decide to abandon the direct route. We head east toward the autostrada, fully aware that the drive to the autostrada and from the autostrada to Siena will take an hour, but looking forward to the prospect of driving in a straight line with more than one lane of traffic.

We arrive at the autostrada just outside of Orvieto, descending upon the A1 from the mountains to the west of this amazing town, built on top of a huge rocky plateau. The sight of the city, as we descend from the mountains to the autostrada that snakes its way through the valley below, is the only positive experience we have taken away from this day. We need to hold onto that thought, because as we reach the exit for Siena, the bobbing and weaving begin again. Only this time the sun has set; it is dark and it begins to rain again.

It is hard to really understand what goes on in the minds of Italian traffic planners or road designers. They seem unable or unwilling to allow simple traffic patterns where complex will do. They seem afraid or disdainful of straight lines. Perhaps this is the same streak of artistic genius that resulted in the brilliant inventions of Leonardo and Brunelleschi. But it is hard to see the brilliance in some of the routing that goes on in Italian roadways. We have been able to unfold a portion of the map showing our route to Siena. Based upon our reading of the map we have made what appears to be the logical choice of taking the autostrada north to the exit that is even with Siena, passing an earlier exit that also gave indications for a road to Siena. We exit at Monte San Savino, follow the signs to Siena and are immediately routed back south again, parallel to the autostrada we have just exited, retracing our steps, but on a two lane road seemingly reserved for farm machinery. We curse the entire way back to the previous exit where we finally pick up a decent road for our triumphant entry into Siena.

Triumphant it is. A half hour later we are entering the city walls of this historic power, not exactly sure where our hotel is or how to get there. We do know that it is near the historic center of the town, so we follow signs for the Duomo and the Piazza del Campo, hoping to find signs to the Grand Hotel Continental (who exactly decreed the hotel “grand?”). We drive down pedestrian only streets, getting more than a few ugly stares, passing “authorized traffic only” signs until we finally drive into a piazza directly in front of Siena’s impressive Duomo. It is indeed a spectacular sight. Unfortunately the hotel staff (who we call from our parking spot in front of the Duomo) tells us that we cannot get to the hotel from the Duomo. We must exit the city walls, drive around to a different gate and enter there. We hang up, slump in our sporty little car seats and cry.

How we eventually arrive at the hotel is a mystery. Somehow, with warning systems beeping, pedestrians glaring and signs prohibiting we pull up in front of the Grand Hotel, tired and cranky and fed up. We are expecting disappointment as we enter the hotel lobby, realizing that that a 5 star hotel in Italy does not necessarily translate into service or luxury, but may simply mean that the elevator and the air conditioning always work. From the moment that we are greeted with a friendly “buona sera” it is apparent that this truly is a grand hotel and that Siena is just the antidote for a day we would rather forget. We check into our room, get a map of the city, begin a stroll through the streets of this elegant, sophisticated city and end up having the best meal of the trip. We’ve said enough for this installment, however. It’s time to say good night.

Buona notte.

Today is a travel day, the last full day in Italy for Austin and Norma, and we arise early (for us) and check out of the Locanda della Posta bound for Rome. Our plan is to arrive early, sometime before noon, and check into our hotel which is in Rome’s Leonardo DaVinci Airport (also referred to as Fiumicino for the town in which it is located), return the rental car and take a cab into Rome, spending the day enjoying the wonders of the Eternal City. Austin and Norma’s flight is scheduled to depart very early the next morning, and we all think the plan is a good one, saving us from waking up early in Rome the next morning and having to make the 40 minute drive before the sun rises.

The drive from Perugia to Rome is surprisingly easy. It is a weekday but there is little traffic as we head south, past Deruta and Todi, crossing over the A1 autostrada via Narni and Orte. After slightly over an hour we arrive at the outskirts of Rome and turn on to the G.R.A., a kind of beltway or ring road that circles Rome. Lanes merge from 4 lanes to 3 lanes then 3 lanes to 2 and we are caught in a virtual standstill. The final 20 miles of our trip take nearly an hour but just after 11:00 we arrive at the Hilton Rome Airport Hotel, which is connected to Fiumicino’s three main terminals by a walkway and people movers.

The hotel is big and spacious, very much like an American hotel. Surprisingly, our rooms are ready and we return the rental car and drop off our bags. We discover the real beauty of the hotel, however, as we inquire about arranging a taxi into Rome. The hotel, we are told, has a private shuttle bus that takes guests into Rome every two hours, with return trips every two hours as well. We are there just in time to catch the 12:00 bus and, amazingly, considering that several hours ago we were zipping up our suitcases in Perugia, a few short minutes later we are bound for Rome. We spend the bus ride making plans to spend Austin and Norma’s last day shopping and sightseeing.

The Hilton bus lets us off in front of the Teatro Marcellus, a few steps away from the Capitoline Hill and the Forum, and very conveniently located in the center of Rome. We drag ourselves up the long staircase to Michelangelo’s piazza on the Capitoline Hill and enjoy his archetypical Renaissance palazzos that enclose the piazza. Around the back of the piazza is a terrific vantage point over the Roman Forum and we take a number of photos, including a number of Latin inscriptions that adorn the fragments of friezes that have been restored, hoping that this will earn our daughter Lindsey some extra credit in her Latin class.

The rest of the day is spent walking, sightseeing and shopping over miles and miles of Roman landscape. While we have visited Rome now a number of times, each visit has been brief and we do not consider ourselves experts – more likely only advanced beginners. We do know the lay of the land, however, and find that the city is eminently walkable, despite the crowds of tourists which are here even in the winter time. We walk up Via Corso, a fairly upscale area, heading for our three major landmarks – the Pantheon, the Piazza Navonna and the Trevi Fountain. We typically include two other points in defining our Roman universe, the Spanish Steps and the Campo dei Fiori, but today we are likely going to avoid the trendy shops and mobs of the Spanish Steps.

At this hour many of the shops are closed shops, so we wander to the Pantheon, one of the most studied buildings in Art History 101. No matter how many times you happen upon this structure, it popping into sight from between buildings as you enter the piazza, its magnificence never ceases to amaze you. We wander around the outside and inside for a while before heading for the Piazza Navona, where we expect to have a nice, if overpriced and touristy, lunch and do some people watching, waiting for the shops to reopen.

For the first time in our experience, the Piazza Navona is a complete disappointment. Only a few street artists are set up in the middle of the long oval piazza and there are few tourists or others milling around. The Bernini fountain, which figures prominently in Dan Brown’s Angels and Demons is under renovation and is completely shielded from sight by a wooden fence erected around it. Most disappointing, however, is that only one or two of the many cafes that line the piazza, and which typically are abuzz with activity, are open and those that are nearly empty. We decide to sit and have lunch anyway and are treated to the worst meal we have had on this trip, a fact which is not exactly surprising, but disappointing. We expected tourist-bad with a lively atmosphere. What we got was bad-bad with no atmosphere, kind of like a restaurant on the moon.

After lunch we wander down to the Campo dei Fiore, an outdoor food and flower market that is one of our favorite places to hang out in Rome. It is afternoon so the market has closed and where several hours earlier stall after stall of fresh produce, colorful fruits and fish and meat vendors was set up, the piazza is empty, save for a few flower vendors at the far end of the square. The Campo dei Fiori always seems alive, however, and there is a good crowd of people and a palpable buzz and energy. We stop for an excellent ice cream, something we have completely underaccomplished on this trip and wander through numerous trendy little shops that line the neighborhood.

Our shopping and strolling finally takes us past the Trevi Fountain, where we make our wishes and throw our coins in the fountain. Time is getting late, and we decide to search for a trattoria near the bus stop. After rejecting restaurant after restaurant we finally settle on a small trattoria literally around the corner from our pickup spot. Unfortunately our Trevi Fountain wishes have not come true – perhaps we should have thrown in more valuable coins – as this dinner is even worse than our lunch. Perhaps that is an unfair statement, because the food is better then the tepid pizza that hasn’t been microwaved long enough at lunch. But the experience of table, the very thing that makes for so many enjoyable meals here in Italy, is totally lacking at this Rome restaurant. Perhaps this jaded owner has had his fill of vapid Americans making a mockery of his proud vocation through their words and deeds. But we expect and deserve better than the shrugs and sneers we receive, plates and bowls slapped down in front us as if challenging us to a duel. We try everything Signore Personalita has to offer — gnocchi with tomato sauce, ravioli with tomato sauce, fettucine with tomato sauce and spaghetti carbonara, but the whole affair is soulless and empty. Our main courses are good enough — roast chicken, veal paillard, veal saltimbocca and veal Milanese, but both we and he are simply marking our time until the bus arrives. I will say that the profiteroles are excellent, swimming in chocolate cream, but it is too late to save this meal. A few moments later we hop on the bus and soon are heading off to sleep on one of those rare days in Italy where food not only did not play an important role, but where it made the experience worse.

Perugia is, in our minds, one of lesser known jewels of Italy. We wake early and decide to take a short walk before the city comes to life, stopping for a coffee at a small coffee bar. It is a slightly gray morning and because many of the shops take Monday mornings off, the streets are not crowded.

Clothes shopping, like many other shopping experiences in Italy, is a very different affair. It is not possible to go in and grab several sizes hoping to fit into the smallest one. Most shops display only a few items, in a single size, and everything else is boxed up and out of reach. If you are interested in buying, or even looking, you are at the mercy of the shopkeeper. He or she will tell you your size and what to try on. While this can sometimes feel humiliating it does avoid the humiliation of having a dressing room full of clothes that are too small. We find a men’s clothing store that we have walked by several times and Bill puts himself in the hands of an attractive young saleslady who is very comfortable checking everything for size. After a protracted sales dance, we purchase several items, say grazie and head back outside.

We meet Austin and Norma at the Locanda della Posta and walk a few blocks to the car park, the Mercato Coperto (covered market), a two storey structure that is built into the cliffs below the old town and which is accessed by an elevator that takes you from street level to the subterranean garage a hundred feet below. Our destination is Deruta, the spiritual center of the ceramics industry in Italy. The historic center of upper Deruta consists of studio after studio of artists painting and offering their pieces for sale to the mostly American public. While we see a few new studios it is sad to see that a number of studios that have closed down – and not just for the winter. The ceramics industry in Italy and particularly Deruta is facing hard times, mostly from cheap Chinese knock offs and other work farmed out to places such as Tunisia and eastern Europe. These new centers utilize cheap labor to paint in the Italian style. We are saddened because we strongly believe that there is something more timely and magical about the pieces we see being painted in Italy by Italian artists, many with generations of experience in their blood. Our sadness also stems from the fact that we consider many of the men and women we meet in the streets of Deruta as our friends.

Despite a house that is bursting at the seams with ceramics, Suzy finds several new pieces that we have shipped back home. Our shopping spree in upper Deruta is too short and we make plans to return at the end of the trip, or at least on our next trip.

Maybe we do eat too much in Italy. One dead giveaway is that restaurant owners always seem to recognize us and seem delighted when we return. We have planned to meet Gerardo Rigibini, the owner of Geribi ceramics at Tavola e Favola, one of the best restaurants in Deruta and one where we have dined a few times in the past. In what is becoming an all too frequent occurrence, as we enter the restaurant the waiter leaps up, runs over and shakes Bill’s hand. He doesn’t speak much English, but it is clear that he is thrilled to see him again and that he will take very good care of us. No need for menus – he knows what Bill would like to eat and proceeds to bring us lunch, announcing each course before he brings it, but not putting up his selections for discussion. We start with an antipasto platter with some sliced meats that are the specialty of central Italy – braesola, prosciutto and salami, as well as some local cheeses. Next he brings each of us plates with two pastas – a ravioli with black truffle sauce and a fettucine with tomato sauce. While these are delicious, it is the beef that the restaurant is known for and Paolo brings us tagliata, rare slices of grilled steak served with arucola and tomatoes. It is to die for. We have little time to linger today, so we have to say no to the jeraboam of grappa beckoning us, but we make a mental note to have two glasses of grappa when we return later in the week.

Austin has college applications that are due at midnight and Norma still has a shopping list of shopping a mile long, so we drop them at the Locanda della Posta in Perugia and head back down to Ponte San Giovanni to meet with Walter, the man whose house we are negotiating to rent. It is a difficult finale to our earlier negotiations and everyone seems to be unhappy, even though we seem to have come to agreement. Such is business, whether it is in America or Italy.

This has been a wearying day, from our early start to the quick visits to Deruta, Gerardo, Walter and a brief visit to Javier’s studio. We return to Perugia late and without definitive dinner plans. We decide to try a new trattoria, highly recommended by our good friend Michele Fioroni. We enter the elegant but empty entry and an engaging Italian woman greets us, immediately warning us that their credit card machine is not working. No worries, as our son Austin is flush with cash. Over the next two hours we proceed to have a wonderful meal, although it is unlike most we are used to. Instead of the traditional Umbrian pastas and meats served in a home-style environment, typically by members of the owner’s family, this is a white tablecloth affair, with nouveau Italian cuisine. But the service and friendliness of our waitress, who had greeted us earlier, bridge the gap from a sterile, formal affair to the warmth of the traditional Umbrian trattoria. The result is a comfortable, enjoyable evening with a very different cuisine. It is not something that we would choose every night, but this night it seems to work.

We start with a nouveau selection of first courses. Austin has a chocolate cannoloni stuffed with cheese, prosciutto on a potato puree. Suzy has half moon pastas made with quail eggs stuffed with duck in an amatriciana tomato sauce with cappellini with black truffle. Bill opts for the traditional stringozzi (a thick homemade spaghetti) with norcina sauce, a creamy sauce made with sausage and truffle. Austin follows with tagliata di bue grilled sliced beef with black truffle sauce, Suzy has a turkey breast stuffed with sausage on a dried fig compote and Bill has rabbit with pistachio crust. For desert we share a foot long tray of little pastries, which Austin devours and Suzy cuts in half, proclaiming, without trying them, whether they are good or not. Coffee and a tray of cookies follows, putting a cap on the day.

It has been a long day, but a good one. A cumulative fatigue seems to be settling upon the travelers and we have an early start planned for tomorrow so we can spend a day in Rome before Austin and Norma return home. So it is off to sleep, hoping to delay the hour when the alarm clock squeals its admonition to rise once again.

Bill Menard here, sitting in my hotel room, enjoying a nice helping of Siena morning.

Menard family lore has it that the patriarch of the family, a bit of a scallywag in his youth and one who supported the Boston Red Sox as much as the next man or boy living in Cohassett, Massachusetts, grew tired of hearing others’ names announced over the air during the game broadcasts. As the story goes, he and his brother, then both south of ten years old decided to send their own telegram to the Red Sox broadcast team, touting the joy one gets from listening to the Red Sox as well as the smooth taste of Kentucky Colonel pipe tobacco. During a break in the action the town was shocked to hear that “Lyman and Lincoln Menard are sitting on our porch, rooting for the Red Sox and enjoying a pipe full of Kentucky Colonel.” And so perhaps it is genetic that I, too, feel the urge to broadcast to the world just what is going on in my little corner of the world, here in Siena, enjoying a dose of Tuscan morning. It’s much healthier than pipe smoking.

Today’s installment is not about Siena; that will come later. This entire trip has been an exercise in catching up, as we have raced across the boot of Italy from the knee to the heel, back up to the knee, down to the shin, back to the knee and finally to some place that would, if Italy really were a boot (with a leg inside), be covered with muscle and bone. We have not exactly worked ourselves to the bone, but the constant movement and travel, packing and unpacking has left little time to chronicle and post our (fascinating) adventures in real time. So while we awake this morning in Siena, in the heart of Tuscany, we are writing about what transpired a couple of days ago less than a hundred miles away in Umbria, having in the interim spent a day in Rome, said our goodbyes to Austin and Norma at the Rome airport, made a too-brief and ill-planned stop in Viterbo and fought our way against traffic and an annoying rental car here to Siena. Stay tuned for these exciting episodes, dear reader, and why not fire up a bowl of Kentucky Colonel to keep you company along the way?

* * *

It is Sunday morning and Perugia is very quiet, a pleasant contrast to last night’s crowds. Today is perhaps the most important day of the trip; we plan to spend it with our friend and associate Javier Casuso to hammer out the details of a deal in which we will acquire a long-term rental of a charming property outside of Perugia, with the intention of establishing a business of renting to vacationers and organizing Bella Italia-led groups to Italy. After a quick coffee and pastry, we drive to Brufa to meet with Walter, the owner of the house we are hoping to rent. It is a short drive, just a few minutes outside of Perugia and although the day is hazy and gray, the house is delightful. As we walk through the airy bedrooms upstairs we begin to think of how we will furnish the house and how different types of families might use it. The downstairs kitchen is perfect, a huge rustic space with high wood beamed ceilings and a huge wooden fireplace. The room is big enough for a table for 12 and a few steps away one can walk out onto a covered portico. The garden is right outside and we envision the food we can create. Walter promises to start work on the back of the bottom floor adding two more bedrooms and bathrooms. We walk outside to look at the garden and the pool. We can imagine a few lounge chairs and some ceramic tables that will soon be sitting under the olive trees in our own little retreat.

Negotiations take time and much has changed since our initial conversation with Walter in October. We go back and forth and then agree to meet again tomorrow. We are cold and our feet are wet as we head back to the car somewhat disappointed. Javier happily tells us not to worry, that we are going to look at another property. Great! How big, where is it, does it have a pool? No worries, we will find out when we get there. The drive is beautiful and after every turn we look to see if the next farmhouse could be ours. The drive goes on and on and we get further and further from the highway. The view becomes even more amazing as we look out over the rich, fertile Umbrian landscape, spying many of the houses we had passed along the way. At last we pull up to the house we have come to visit. It is not quite what we had in mind. I am sure that in its day it was a beautiful old stone farmhouse, but in the present it looks like the shed from which Jed Clampett took his family when he discovered black gold. At least it has its original sone floors, which are slightly (okay very) uneven and its original walls. There is not a bit of plumbing or electricity to be had. It takes a great deal of imagination to see the beauty of the house and we can’t escape the dollar signs dancing in every nook and cranny. We leave without even asking the price. No doubt, ten years from now some canny investor will be sipping a glass of Montefalco Rosso, looking over these same hills, congratulating himself on his wise investment.

We drive to the town of Bevagna for lunch, one of Umbria’s most charming small towns, crowned by an extremely well preserved historic central square. The restaurant is, of course, unmarked, but we open the door and are greeted with a room warmed by a fire and the smell of rich Umbrian fare, a simple hearty cooking that highlights grilled meats and rich pastas that we have longed for despite many fine meals along the coasts. We are inspired by the fire and order bistecca alla Fiorentina for lunch. In the meantime, the pastas are house made and are great. The steak arrives perfectly grilled and for once it is not enough food – perhaps this is a blessing. We finish lunch and walk around the small town. Down every street there is a wonderful view of rooftops and arches. Bill and Austin take photo after photo.

We return to Perugia and plan to meet for dinner outside Assisi, at a restaurant that Bill visited last October. Since then the legend of this place has grown to almost epic proportions and we decide that we all must give it a try. La Stalla, which means the barn, is a simple room located next to a campground above Assisi. Nearly all of the food is prepared on a wood fired grill that is in the middle of the room, providing entertainment as well as nourishment. Over the years the whitewashed stone walls have become covered with soot from the fire, adding to the charm of the place.

We start with the grilled stuffed tartes – round bread toasted over the fire and filled with sausages, cheese or proscuitto. This is accompanied by a wooden bowl of polenta topped with tomato sauce and some grilled sausage crumbles. After a while the grilled meats start to arrive – sausages, lamb chops, pigeon, chicken. Our eyes roll back and we begin to forget what is arriving, simply trying to keep up with the onslaught of food. Finally little ramekins of melted cheeses arrive, which are smeared over more grilled bread, adding a satisfying layer on top of the animal slaughter that has preceded it. We call the evening and the day quits, forgoing a grappa in light of the long windy drive back to Perugia. And, because Italy’s restaurants have recently banned smoking (even in restaurants where the walls are covered with soot), we don’t light up a pipe full of Kentucky Colonel. That can wait until baseball season begins.

Go Bosox!