Greetings from Tuscany!! Another absolutely beautiful day ~ clear blue skies with perfect temperatures, as we are so glad to be able to wear long sleeves!!
Today was another wonderful day filled with fun times and experiences and lots of laughter. I feel like we have laughed our way through Italy, which makes me so happy. I have loved traveling with Leah and am so happy she agreed to come on this trip with me. :)
Last night we ate at the Gordon Ramsay's Contrada restaurant on the grounds, which is a fine dining establishment. There had seemed to be a bit of a buzz earlier in the day that Gordon himself might be here, but we did not see him. Darn. In any case, we had a fantastic dinner last night, experiencing their tasting menu which was filled with many fantastic dishes. Our 'staff' of Guiardo, the lovely host and all-around good guy, Marco, our Sardinian sommelier, and Stephano, the food/beverage manager that checks on us multiple times per day, helped make our evening so lovely and enjoyable.
This morning we had a light, yet lovely breakfast at a table with a view of the landscape. On our table was an envelope with last night's entire menu enclosed. We had asked if they could write down for us the tasting menu, but instead we now have an entire menu to take home. So nice.
A little spa time this morning for us both, which was so lovely and great. We had decided yesterday that we wanted to rent a car for a couple of days to do a few day-trips ourselves, so our VW Golf arrived today at 1p. They offered us a Merecedes C-class, but Leah and I felt that the non-Mercedes variety of car would be better for us...just in case. After some time for set-up of the GPS (had to get it switched from Italian to English), Leah was ready to drive and I was ready to navigate.
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| Our 'Ferrari' |
Let me explain something first...the hotel has given us incredible dossiers of the locales we want to visit along with maps of said locales. The maps themselves are a bit difficult, as no roads are labeled with any distinguishing labels and the scale seems to be a bit off. So...off we went.
We decided to get our 'sea legs' by traveling not too far away from the Castel and exploring the Chianti region of Italy. We wanted to make sure we could handle the driving (Leah did spectacularly with the stick shift) and the navigating in this environment. So, we were traveling along some really windy roads up into the hills, heading toward Giarole in Chianti, which was about 23km away. Leah got the driving sorted out just fine and I was attempting to coordinate the GPS suggestions with the maps I have, which overall went well. We made it to Giarole in Chiant in about 30 minutes, but because it was Sunday, most things were closed. So, we decided to travel along to Radda in Chianti.
Again, more really wind-y roads with lots of switchbacks (see photo of GPS I took below) and about another 15km, we arrived in Radda without difficulty. The Golf's stick shift is a little unusual, as the Reverse gear is to the left of 1st gear, rather than to the right of or below 5th gear. So, we pulled into Radda and were looking for a parking space along this medieval wall and there was a Porsche Cayenne parked (it looked gi-normous compared to all of the other cars) and then there was a space open 2 cars to the right of it. Well, we stopped just past the space the 1st go-around and Leah was trying and trying to get the gear shift into reverse, but was unable to do so. So, we went around the wall again and hysterically, the same thing happened again, as we forgot the space available was just past the Porsche and again, we were unable to get it into reverse...it just would not go. So, around the wall we went again for the 3rd time (look, kids...Big Ben!!) and Leah was able to pull into the spot just fine. We then spent a few minutes trying to get the gear shift into reverse and Leah thought she had finally found it.
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| GPS en route...love the switchbacks |
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| Driving along in Tuscany |
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| View from Radda in Chianti |
The landscape here in Tuscany is totally different than we thought it would be. It is very rugged with lots of forests/pine trees and lots of hills (this part I expected). Leah and I both agreed that the landscape we saw in the Piedmont (up north) was what we expected in Tuscany and vice versa. Interesting.
We then returned to the car to travel to 1 more city ~ Castellina in Chianti. Well, Leah unfortunately had not found the reverse gear, but still was in 1st. Thankfully, when she put it in gear, we actually rolled backwards a bit and did that a few times to get out of the space, which was good, as there were other cars waiting to get around us. We then started driving in the direction the GPS recommended, which I knew was incorrect. So Leah stopped in a closed petrol station and I reprogrammed the GPS. She then finally got the gear shift into reverse (apparently one must push it down and then over to the left and up to engage it, so as to not accidentally end up in reverse when wanting to be in 1st gear)!!! Such an exciting and necessary moment!! The small victories, right?!?!
Off we went to Castellina in Chiant, about another 10km along the windy roads. We found a parking spot and they have a fantastic medieval castle that is still quite intact within it's square. We made our way in and started climbing to the top. We got to get all the way to the top and it was really cool. Lots of stairs, but totally worth the climb.
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| The Castel...let's storm it!! |
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| The view from the top |
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| At the top...it was a bit windy. |
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| Leah conquering the Castel...on the roof!! |
Had a nice simple snack for dinner tonight in the Lounge ~ some cheese, salami, olives and breadsticks with our new favorite olive oil and a little Brunello ~ with Marco and Guiardo attending us as usual.
A perfect ending to a great day.
Tomorrow we are traveling to Pisa to climb the leaning tower (we hope) and to visit some villages along the way. More fun to come, I am sure!!
Thanks for reading!!
xoxo
Stacy
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