Travels to the Other Side of Nowhere

Italy 2005
Day 4 - Tuesday, March 29

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We rose early and skipped breakfast so we could get a jump on further exploring Tuscany. We hit the dirt roads again, and finally ended up an one where we had to turn around. The mud was too deep for our trusty SmartCar, which doesn't have very much clearance. We wandered southeast to San Quirico d'Orcia. Here we made our second stop in a Coop (an Italian version of a grocery store). Our first experience was in Buenconvento, where the Coop was the size of a Starbucks. One example of the differences between American and Italian grocery stores is that while they sell only one kind of toothpaste, they offer fifty kinds of spaghetti (not pasta... just spaghetti, in various sizes). It was fascinating! The Coop in San Quirico d'Orcia was substantially larger than the one in Buenconvento. Each city seems to have only one Coop, and its location is typically marked on the street signs. Slow Travel Italy has great information about shopping  at a Coop.

We stocked up a picnic supplies: sparkling Lambrusco (since we were without a corkscrew), Grana Padana, goat cheese, filoncino, oil-cured black olives, Sicilian-style green olives, salame timilano, and bresaola. We continued our drive in search of the perfect picnic spot and ended up in a deserted castle in San Quirico d'Orcia. Just the receipt from the Coop is interesting. Click here... it's worth it.

We hiked through the walls of the city, though a rose garden, and ended up inside a deserted castle in San Quirico d'Orcia. We were completely walled in and all by ourselves. Inside the castle wall, there were now trees growing in grassy area. Open to the sun, we ate lunch on a collapsed turret. Great fun! The sparkling Lambrusco was perfect.

From there, we drove towards Montepulciano, through Pienza, a scenic walled city with an adorable panoramic hotel perched on the hillside, overlooking the lush waves of mountains and valleys. We inquired about rates (€ 90 per 2 persone, including breakfast). Appealing, but we still had several hours of sunlight to tour the countryside. We opted to keep going and head towards Rome.

We drove to Montepulciano, and somehow ended up inside the walled city. It was late afternoon, so all shops were open (small shops regularly close between 1 and 4 for an afternoon siesta). The streets were now quite crowded with pedestrians, still the cars drive down these narrow cobblestone streets in and among the pedestrians. We drove through the maze of the city, certain that the single-lane road was about the abruptly end. Each turn appeared to end at a closed "garage" door, only to turn around the corner and continue on, snaking through the town. How the residents get in and out of their garages is an unexplained phenomenon... regardless of how small their cars are.

We had to fold in our mirrors to make it through several narrow passageways. The picture doesn't rightfully demonstrate just how close it was... In the photo above, the narrow downhill street took a sharp turn to the right just beyond the arch, but it is difficult to show the correct perspective. Trust us... it was a VERY tight fit! It would be a really bad feeling trying to navigate through this one-way town if you were trying to catch a flight in Rome. It was a rush... very challenging, very exciting, and very hard to describe. It was unbelievable, but you had to be there.

Once we finally made it out of Montepulciano, we took side roads through a bunch of tiny towns instead of taking the direct route on A-1, the toll road. Going nowhere, at a very leisurely pace.

We headed south through Chiusi, Citta Pieve, Piazze, and Acquapendente, then down around Lago di Bolsena, through Montefiasocse, Viterbo, and Capranica. Castles and fortresses were everywhere!

From there it was a short hop back to the beltway and into Rome. We made it back to the hotel around 10:00pm after reluctantly returning our SmartCar.

Once back at the hotel, we settled into the Executive Lounge to relax and sip a glass of wine. Our cohorts joined us there, and we adjourned to the top floor to indulge in Prosecco and room service—Italian-style. The hotel staff opened up the roof-top balcony where we rehashed recent travels and looked out over the city. Room service arrived on a linen-draped wheeled cart, complete with dome-covered plates. We ate antipasto, fresh bread, olives, and panini with our champagne until the wee hours of the morning.