A Flying Visit to Florence

After three weeks in Italy, I’m able to report that Boak has indeed steeped himself in its culture and customs.
In true Italian style, his day is punctuated by frequent stops, wherever we happen to be, for a potent shot of the half inch deep, bitter, gritty, brown heart-starter they call caffe (consequently followed by those other frequent stops…).

More than once he has been complimented on his excellent Italian accent (just like a Tuscan, he’s been told) and I must agree. Words like “Pronto” and “Bongiorno” roll off his tongue with the mellifluousness of a native. However also he fearlessly launches into longer phrases of Italian with not a care in the world for verb endings or the gender of nouns. His delivery, complete with hand gestures, is a triumph of style over substance, and usually raises a friendly, if not bemused, smile. I just wonder what our waiters think when, after serving us, they come back a few minutes later to check if our meal is “tutte bene” (all well) and Boak beamingly replies “va bene” - which I take to mean “off you go, now, and have a nice day”!

And now he even drives like an Italian, which is how, in just three days and two nights this week, we were able to accomplish a sizeable round trip taking in Montepulciano (again), The Mall, Fiesole, Florence and Pisa. It’s amazing the kilometers you can cover hurtling along an Italian Autostrada at speeds never experienced at home, and I’ve almost straightened my fingers out!

Fiesole, on the hill above Florence, again proved the quietest and most convenient base for our visit. Previously we’d stayed (twice) at the Villa San Girolamo, a gracious and elegant Medici villa run as a guest house by Irish nuns and overlooking the city. It was here, by the way, that Michael Ondaatje spent some time writing “The English Patient”. On our last visit, I 1997, they told us that fire regulations were forcing them out of the hospitality business, and certainly when we drove up to the Villa this time all was quiet behind the high, solid gates. I made many inquiries around town, too, but nobody (including a priest at the church just 300 metres from the Villa!) could enlighten me on the fate of this lovely house and its inhabitants.

We stayed, instead, in a very comfortable hotel (the Hotel Villa Aurora) in the Piazza Mino, the main square of Fiesole, in a room with the same view we had at the Villa – the whole of wonderful Florence stretched out before us! A plaque proclaimed that Queen Victoria slept here, and another in our room told us that Margaret of Savoy slept here too! We had a little balcony where we sat drinking champagne as we watched the sun set (and I kept pinching myself!).

As we had previously, we hopped on the No. 7 bus the next morning for the 30 minute ride down the hill to Florence, on the way visiting the convent of San Marco (magnificent frescoes, painted by Fra Angelico on the walls of the monks’ cells). With floor tiles worn to a sheen by the sandals of monks over centuries, these cells, some as small as 3 metres square, reflected the asceticisism of the monastic life. All the cells were built looking inwards, so the outside world did not impinge on one’s vision, and all but one, which had no window at all (the “naughty room”??), had a tiny window, no larger than 45cm wide 60cm tall, overlooking the cloister, through which very little light shone.

The most striking feature of each cell, however, is a fresco, painted on one wall, relating to Jesus’ life. If you were lucky (had money, were favoured, knew someone in power?) yours was one featuring the annunciation of Mary, or the transfiguration of Christ, or the Last Supper, or somesuch, painted in glorious lapis lazuli blues, and bright siennas and reds. But then there was a whole corridor (or so it seemed to me) of cells with variations on excruciatingly detailed crucifixion scenes – even as a Christian, I can only wonder at the crippling effect of waking up to that every morning.

We moved on, on foot, observing the looooooooong queue of those eager to see Michaelangelo’s David in the Galleria dell’Accademia. It was the same story at the Duomo, the Baptistry and the Uffizzi (all of which we’d seen before, but which would have been worth a second look). So we consoled ourselves with a little shopping and pizza, and a stroll across the Arno and then found the new Museum of Leonardo da Vinci filled with life-sized models of many of his sketched inventions.

Boak skillfully negotiated our way through Florence and its traffic the next day - mostly because I kept quiet – and we beetled across to Pisa via another autostrada. Once there, though, the Leaning Tower proved surprisingly difficult to find until we turned a corner and were almost on top of it, so to speak. The Duomo, the Baptistry and the Tower are splendidly situated surrounded by a large expanse of lawn, however the sight of around 20 market stalls selling souvenir junk right in the Cathedral Close was hard to take.

I always look for interesting design elements in famous buildings like these and was excited to see lots of “quilt designs” executed in coloured marbles on the side of the Duomo. I’ll try to upload some photos to the Blog one day soon. You can climb the Tower (for 15 Euros - Au$25) but we chose to be on our way, and after a couple of coffee stops along the Superstrada for the ‘rally car driver’ we made it back to Manciano by sundown.

Today is Saturday, and we leave to drive back to Rome to return the car on Monday morning. Then on Tuesday morning we board a train for Venice. I’ll be sad to leave the peace and quiet and comfort of Angela and Franco’s little villa, but what lies ahead is exciting too!

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Postscript… If you’re wondering about The Mall… It’s an Outlet for Burberry, Gucci, Ferragamo, Pucci, Zegna and many more designers at 30%-50% off!
Address is Europa 8, Leccio-Regello (Tel. 0558657775) but if you turn off the Autosdrada at the Incisa exit, turn towards the Leccio and Regello signs and keep driving you’ll soon come to signs directing you to The Mall.

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