I seem to have a thing for lamps seen against the sky

Ninth day of travel, first day of the walking tour

Sunday, the first day of June, and we’re eager to start some serious walking. We had breakfast fairly early and then had a lot of time to kill, even after sitting for a while in the breakfast room writing up our journal descriptions of the preceding day.

So we settled our debts and sat in a little solarium, and met our fellow walkers, one by one. There would be eleven of us in all, plus our two guides, Angelica Turi and Gianni Stanghellini.

Once we were all gathered, Gianni and Angelica gave us some background, giving us some idea of what we would be seeing today and what we could expect during the whole tour. Then we walked out of our hotel, up a gentle slope, getting a number of fine views of Florence behind us. The walk was almost all along narrow roads, as in the picture to the right (small image only), taken as usual from the very rear of the marching column. When I have pictures showing faces, I’ll identify the members of the group—but this picture shows backs only…

One nice feature of the walk today was that we came to the building in Arcetri where, after his second trial, Galileo stayed under house arrest until his death. Set into the wall is a nice bust, with an inscription below. The upper inscription in Italian simply says that Antonfilippo Marchionni had this bust of the Divine Galileo placed in 1843, in other words two centuries after his death. The lower inscription starts in Greek, “Συν Θεω”—“Together with God”, continuing in Latin that I can translate only sloppily and partially, since among other problems, I can’t find the right translation to convey the scorn that I presume that the word “pseudosophus” carries: “Traveler, you look on the tiny rooms where the Divine Galileo, greatest observer of heaven, and restorer of natural philosophy, or rather its originator, dwelt from 1631 to 1642, compelled by the evil artifices of false wise men.”

Two views from our luncheon restaurant

We walked on, and stopped at a nice restaurant for a light, but I thought rather long, lunch, enlivened by perhaps a bit too much wine. From there we walked to the church of San Miniato, a very pleasing place that allowed photographs without flash. The façade is to the left (big image, small), and to the right you see the wonderful inlaid floor, protected from being walked on (big image, small), and a fresco of Saint Catherine that I was rather taken with (big image, small).

Next it was onto our bus for the first time, and a drive of forty minutes or so to the amazing picturesque town of San Gimignano. Vehicles like our bus are not permitted inside the walls of the town: too big and too heavy for the streets, which are paved in stone or brick.

The town of San Gimignano is incredibly crowded with tourists, or at least was this day. We learned later from Angelica and Gianni that it’s a big destination for Italian tourists, who come here on day trips, and that after dinner the town clears out, and is empty till midmorning. I certainly did get the feeling that there were very few Americans here. Great!

Here’s what’s going on in the block of pictures to the right: The upper left shot (big image, small) was taken down below the gate, near where the bus left us out. I liked the view, which I took to be a typical Tuscan landscape. The upper right shot, by contrast, was the view out our hotel window (big image, small). You may be sure that we had no complaints about our room!

In the second row, leftmost (big image, small), we’ve come in through the gate, and are walking up, ’mongst loads of other tourists, to the main square called Piazza della Cisterna; middle, (big image, small), we’re about halfway to our destination; and rightmost (big image, small) is a view in the square itself.

Third row, on the left (big image, small), you see our guide Angelica right in front, behind her Glenn Lesses, and in the lower right corner, Claire Fund. Behind them is one of the many towers that distinguish San Gimignano. The story seems to be that they were built by families or factions that wanted to show their power. Partly it was conspicuous consumption, or whatever you call it when you build a showy building, partly the towers were for defensive purposes. On the right in the bottom row is another shot of the square, with another tower. (Big image, small.)

Our hotel was the La Cisterna Hotel, which faces right out onto the square, and it’s rather elegant. We showered, and went downstairs to write journal for a while before we met the others for a walk around to a restaurant where we had hors d’œuvres and the local white wine, Vernaccia. After all those rich little goodies, it was hard to do justice to the meal at our hotel. I had risotto with artichokes—nice but salty enough to keep me up all night for drinks of water. And for second course, I got a huge thick slice of pork, which I managed to get through at most half of. I did have dessert, a Tortone di Mele, apple cakelet, but not tasting of apples at all. Real nice sauce on it, though, slightly spicy.

And then to bed.

A view we got soon after leaving Florence