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We walked up to the church built in 813 in Santa Ana in Caprena that was featured in the movie the English Patient and enjoyed the sights and views. The next day the four of us hiked the 12k between Montefellonico and Montepulciano where we had lunch and explored the cute town.  Janet and I hiked much of the way back while  Rob and Jay preferred a cab ride back to the car in th e almost 100 degree heat,  picking us up toward the end. That night we drove into Chuisi to pick up Rob’s charming daughter Alethia, aka Leafy, a premed student who was studying German at the Goethe Institute in Freiberg this summer.

The next morning the five us headed off to Monte Argentario, an island connected by three land bridges, stopping for lunch along the way in Pitigliano where we met a great artist painting in her studio to loud Pink Floyd “The Wall” to great effect. 

We stayed two nights at Porto Ercole where we ran, hiked, swam, read, lazed and snorkeled in Mediterranean waters of the Tyrrhenian Sea. 

Jay and I almost became permanent residents when we got locked into a fortress we were exploring when we crossed the drawbridge to find the iron gate locked and had to escape through the moat. Happily the moat was dry and there were no alligators to wrestle on the way out.

We returned to Castlemuzio by way of Orvieto where we explored this cool village and its outrageous Duomo, cute hilly streets, picturesque views, leather sandals and unique glass earrings. We met up with Rob and Janet’s German friends Gitta and Fritz–coincidentally Gitta and I share the same birth date.  Gitta is a recently retired teacher and Fritz is a college professor.  We met up in Bagno Vignoni for dinner and a moonlit soak in the hot mineral Roman baths.  This was a place with a continuously running hot spring into ancient baths reminiscent of Calistoga that Roman soldiers used to relax and clean off the blood between battles.

The next day Jay and I headed off on our own to Siena, and yes, crayola users, the overall color of the city is accurate to the burnt Siena crayon.  We learned of the Palio horse racing competition through  town for bragging rights between neighborhoods held each summer on July 2 and August 16. Our travel dates required us to we miss the famous Sienna Palio (but we were treated to the much smaller and more  local event in Montisi the very next day—more on that below).  

We wandered Siena returning by way Montelcino for another taste of Brunella paring it against the competing Vino Nobile from Montepulciano–the Brunella won but we have had excellent Vino Nobiles throughout Tuscany.  I also wanted to pick up a painting I had admired earlier and had a great broken conversation with the artist with John Hiatt tunes playing in the background.

That night we met up with Fritz and Gitta in their town Montisi about 4k away for the neighborhood pre-Giostra (joust) dinner. Fritz is an important member of the neighborhood and fits the costume so he gets suited up in medieval fare for the parade which takes place just before Montisi’s version of the Palio, called Giostra di Simone, the following day.  

There were four neighborhood dinners lining the streets made by small neighborhood groups of the local women. Our dinner began with melon and prosciutto followed by pasta with chinghiali (wild boar) and salad and meat with all the wine you could drink. Soon the unlabeled bottles of the local wine became everybody’s favorite vintage with singing and merriment that included gullet pouring of wine down new-comers throats–thankfully, we bought the neighborhood tee-shirts and were able to avoid that part of the ritual.   The dinner started at 8 and dessert mercifully concluded around midnight.

The next day I did a fast waddle to work off the meal, finally leaving for my 9 AM run at a warm 10:40  while the rest of the household continued to sleep off the night before.    We spent a lazy Sunday reading, taking pictures, etc until the event.  The night before, Fritz and Gitta had invited us over for a fortifying cocktail offering the needed motivation for Fritz to don his costume in the 95 degree heat.  But when we arrived he was already clad in the robes of the nobility of medieval times and really looked the part.

The event was not the horse race through town of Siena’s Palio. It was a jousting competition like “A Knight’s Tale” but without the blood.  The four neighborhoods compete for a banner, but primarily for the much more coveted bragging rights.   Each neighborhood team has a flag team that performs and a jousting team with a  hired jouster who, on horseback, rides toward a statue in the middle of a field.  The top half of a suit of armor tops the statue. There is a ring with a diameter just larger than the lance on the shoulder,  and a target on the chest.  The rider gains points for getting the lance through the ring (12 points) or up to 9 points for hitting the target properly.  Each team got four tries.  Our rider, for Gitta and Fritz’s neighborhood team, ringed at first attempt and was the only one to score points on all four turns.  Another team almost caught up but we prevailed in the final round.   It was really fun and exciting!  After the jubilance of the night before, we didn’t stay for the drunken celebration to follow but picture the toga party in “Animal House” and you might come close.

Our last day in Italy took us to a rainy Cortona where “Under the Tuscan Sun” was filmed.  Cortona was a great town busily preparing for their festival which included a lecture by Anthony Hopkins on a classical piece he had written.

We returned home be way of Castigliano di Lago, an interesting hillside town overlooking a large lake in the truffle area of Italy.  They offered us cheese with truffles, salami with truffles, white truffles with black truffles…

Our final dinner was fantastic in Trequanda near Castelmuzio. 

August 4 was spent in transit with an extra long layover in Toronto due to the Thor alert because of the lightning.

All good things…