| A Trip To Tuscany - Day Four |
On this day, Leslie and I were scheduled to go
to Pisa on a bike tour. We would visit one little
town and then Pisa, famous for its leaning
tower. I was pretty excited about seeing this
architectural marvel, however, there was a mix
up with regards to what time the tour was
leaving and we got left behind. We had planned
on keeping Saturday to ourselves instead of
going to Sienna with the group, but since we
missed Pisa and would have Friday to
ourselves, we signed up to go to Siena on
Saturday. This whole chaotic transaction
turned out to be quite a blessing. The ones that
came back from the trip to Pisa said that it was
not that great and that they barely even got to
see the leaning tower and certainly didn’t get to
go up in it.
When we were selecting our itinerary for the
week, we thought we would be able to skip on
down to Montalcino to visit one of the wineries
on Saturday, which was technically our last full
day in Italy. I learned a harsh lesson though.
No wineries stay open on the weekends in
Italy. Boy, that wouldn’t work in Napa now
would it?
Since we missed the tour, we decided to just
take a leisurely stroll around Florence and stop
in a local restaurant for lunch. It would be one
of the only times we had to pay for a meal all
week. Our first stop was at a local café not too
far from the hotel. Leslie, who does not do
caffeine very well ordered a cappuccino and
was bouncing off the walls the rest of the day. I
asked for espresso only half knowing what I
was getting into. They passed me over this tiny
little cup that scantly looked bigger than a
thimble. I knew that the perpetually black
liquid in this cup would be strong, but holy
crap! I think I finally fell asleep that night at
4am! It stained my teeth brown and
everything. I believe I could have ironed and
starched my shirt with this stuff! And to think I
felt cheated by the size of my portion!
Then we started shopping, Leslie for gifts for
the kids and me for wines to put in my
collection. How shocking I know! Lunch time
found us in the square with the Uffizi museum
and there was a little half indoor/half outdoor
pizzeria that looked interesting. We were one
of the first ones to come to the restaurant for
lunch that day. A waiter ushered us inside to sit
at one of his indoor tables, but we asked
politely if we could sit outside in the courtyard.
In Italy, a lot times the waiters will seat their
own customers.
Our table belonged to an older gentleman who
had way more energy than I did and he was a
hoot! He made fast friends with us, especially
Leslie…hmmm, I guess it was a good thing I
was about half his age! I tried to speak Italian
with him, even though he could understand
English enough to get us what we wanted. This
was a theme throughout the week that drove
Leslie crazy, but hey, when in Rome,… er…
Florence do as the Floridians do! Somehow I
think I just made reference to people living in
Tampa, FL. He was a good coach and helped
me with the words I was technically butchering.
Leslie and I both ordered Pizza’s because that
is what this restaurant specialized in and they
were great of course! We also ordered a bottle
of Castello di Brolio 2004 Chianti, which made
our waiter very happy. In fact, it was his
recommendation. As it turned out, despite
drinking a vast ocean of different Chianti wines
on this trip, this bottle turned out to be by far
the best Chianti we had the entire trip. I see it
here in Dallas Stores all the time, but avoid the
2002 vintage. That was not a good year for
Tuscan wines across the board. In fact, no’ one
in Tuscany would even serve you a 2002
Chianti from any winery. I guess they wanted
you to have the absolute best opinion of Tuscan
wines possible.
I took a picture of our waiter with Leslie and as
you can see from the picture, he really hammed
it up! Then he brought us some complementary
Vin Santo dessert wine with some biscotti
cookies to dip in the wine. Fantastic! I will be
replicating this experience at home soon!
After lunch it was time to resume shopping and
sight-seeing. On the way out of the square we
passed this home with a tour group in front of
it. Upon careful inspection, it turned out that
this was the home of Dante’, you know the guy
that wrote Dante’s Inferno and many other
things. I’m so cultured! I took a few pictures
of it and the museum dedicated to him and then
we moved on.
I finally found an Enoteca (Wine store) that was
loaded with goodies! I thought I was so clever
because I had printed out a hit list of some of
the best Italian wines from the Wine Spectator.
As it turns out, the guy running the store saw
me coming a mile away and asked to see the
list. The next thing you know he was running
around grabbing all the stuff that he had in the
store from that list. We left with five wines
there and it proved to be an unbelievable
bargain, even though the prices were in euros.
I am certainly glad we found the place.
We wandered around some more and got back
to the hotel in the afternoon. The entire group
would be traveling out this evening to the
Tuscan countryside to this giant villa that was a
cooking school. There were five different
classes and each person got to pick three to
attend. I chose the Pasta class, the Pesto class
and I know this is hard to believe, but also the
wine tasting class. Of course I spent most of
my time talking to the sommelier that hosted
the wine tasting class, but the other classes
were interesting too!
Then we got to eat all the lovely food that we
saw being made along with some new things.
The ravioli with the Pesto sauce that you see
pictured at the top of this page was to die for!
There was an almost endless supply of Tuscan
wines to choose from and even some more of
that Brolio Chianti that Leslie and I loved so
much from lunch.
After dinner there was a live band and dancing.
If you have never witnessed an Italian band
playing American music, well…let’s just say it
was entertaining! Leslie’s company provided a
box of chocolates for the girls, but for us boys,
it was huge assortment of Cuban cigars! I think
I wound up smoking about four on the entire
trip. Yes, the Cuban cigars are all that and a
bag of chips!
On the bus ride home, everyone was in great
spirits. Probably because they had been
drinking wine all night like me. Leslie and I
entertained the group with her country-hick
accent and my sarcastic comments. The bus
load of people were cracking up over Leslie’s
butchering of the English language. Saying’s
like “All Y’all” and other grammatical gems!
At one point I had my elbow lifted up in the air
and she turned her head around right into it.
Everyone on the bus noticed it. I just proudly
announced that it was Texas Fore Play, “Yo
Beyatch! Get in the truck!”. For this we
received a thunderous round of applause.
Afterwards a few of us hung out in our
hospitality suite for a while because apparently,
we didn’t think we had enough wine to drink for
the evening!
to Pisa on a bike tour. We would visit one little
town and then Pisa, famous for its leaning
tower. I was pretty excited about seeing this
architectural marvel, however, there was a mix
up with regards to what time the tour was
leaving and we got left behind. We had planned
on keeping Saturday to ourselves instead of
going to Sienna with the group, but since we
missed Pisa and would have Friday to
ourselves, we signed up to go to Siena on
Saturday. This whole chaotic transaction
turned out to be quite a blessing. The ones that
came back from the trip to Pisa said that it was
not that great and that they barely even got to
see the leaning tower and certainly didn’t get to
go up in it.
When we were selecting our itinerary for the
week, we thought we would be able to skip on
down to Montalcino to visit one of the wineries
on Saturday, which was technically our last full
day in Italy. I learned a harsh lesson though.
No wineries stay open on the weekends in
Italy. Boy, that wouldn’t work in Napa now
would it?
Since we missed the tour, we decided to just
take a leisurely stroll around Florence and stop
in a local restaurant for lunch. It would be one
of the only times we had to pay for a meal all
week. Our first stop was at a local café not too
far from the hotel. Leslie, who does not do
caffeine very well ordered a cappuccino and
was bouncing off the walls the rest of the day. I
asked for espresso only half knowing what I
was getting into. They passed me over this tiny
little cup that scantly looked bigger than a
thimble. I knew that the perpetually black
liquid in this cup would be strong, but holy
crap! I think I finally fell asleep that night at
4am! It stained my teeth brown and
everything. I believe I could have ironed and
starched my shirt with this stuff! And to think I
felt cheated by the size of my portion!
Then we started shopping, Leslie for gifts for
the kids and me for wines to put in my
collection. How shocking I know! Lunch time
found us in the square with the Uffizi museum
and there was a little half indoor/half outdoor
pizzeria that looked interesting. We were one
of the first ones to come to the restaurant for
lunch that day. A waiter ushered us inside to sit
at one of his indoor tables, but we asked
politely if we could sit outside in the courtyard.
In Italy, a lot times the waiters will seat their
own customers.
Our table belonged to an older gentleman who
had way more energy than I did and he was a
hoot! He made fast friends with us, especially
Leslie…hmmm, I guess it was a good thing I
was about half his age! I tried to speak Italian
with him, even though he could understand
English enough to get us what we wanted. This
was a theme throughout the week that drove
Leslie crazy, but hey, when in Rome,… er…
Florence do as the Floridians do! Somehow I
think I just made reference to people living in
Tampa, FL. He was a good coach and helped
me with the words I was technically butchering.
Leslie and I both ordered Pizza’s because that
is what this restaurant specialized in and they
were great of course! We also ordered a bottle
of Castello di Brolio 2004 Chianti, which made
our waiter very happy. In fact, it was his
recommendation. As it turned out, despite
drinking a vast ocean of different Chianti wines
on this trip, this bottle turned out to be by far
the best Chianti we had the entire trip. I see it
here in Dallas Stores all the time, but avoid the
2002 vintage. That was not a good year for
Tuscan wines across the board. In fact, no’ one
in Tuscany would even serve you a 2002
Chianti from any winery. I guess they wanted
you to have the absolute best opinion of Tuscan
wines possible.
I took a picture of our waiter with Leslie and as
you can see from the picture, he really hammed
it up! Then he brought us some complementary
Vin Santo dessert wine with some biscotti
cookies to dip in the wine. Fantastic! I will be
replicating this experience at home soon!
After lunch it was time to resume shopping and
sight-seeing. On the way out of the square we
passed this home with a tour group in front of
it. Upon careful inspection, it turned out that
this was the home of Dante’, you know the guy
that wrote Dante’s Inferno and many other
things. I’m so cultured! I took a few pictures
of it and the museum dedicated to him and then
we moved on.
I finally found an Enoteca (Wine store) that was
loaded with goodies! I thought I was so clever
because I had printed out a hit list of some of
the best Italian wines from the Wine Spectator.
As it turns out, the guy running the store saw
me coming a mile away and asked to see the
list. The next thing you know he was running
around grabbing all the stuff that he had in the
store from that list. We left with five wines
there and it proved to be an unbelievable
bargain, even though the prices were in euros.
I am certainly glad we found the place.
We wandered around some more and got back
to the hotel in the afternoon. The entire group
would be traveling out this evening to the
Tuscan countryside to this giant villa that was a
cooking school. There were five different
classes and each person got to pick three to
attend. I chose the Pasta class, the Pesto class
and I know this is hard to believe, but also the
wine tasting class. Of course I spent most of
my time talking to the sommelier that hosted
the wine tasting class, but the other classes
were interesting too!
Then we got to eat all the lovely food that we
saw being made along with some new things.
The ravioli with the Pesto sauce that you see
pictured at the top of this page was to die for!
There was an almost endless supply of Tuscan
wines to choose from and even some more of
that Brolio Chianti that Leslie and I loved so
much from lunch.
After dinner there was a live band and dancing.
If you have never witnessed an Italian band
playing American music, well…let’s just say it
was entertaining! Leslie’s company provided a
box of chocolates for the girls, but for us boys,
it was huge assortment of Cuban cigars! I think
I wound up smoking about four on the entire
trip. Yes, the Cuban cigars are all that and a
bag of chips!
On the bus ride home, everyone was in great
spirits. Probably because they had been
drinking wine all night like me. Leslie and I
entertained the group with her country-hick
accent and my sarcastic comments. The bus
load of people were cracking up over Leslie’s
butchering of the English language. Saying’s
like “All Y’all” and other grammatical gems!
At one point I had my elbow lifted up in the air
and she turned her head around right into it.
Everyone on the bus noticed it. I just proudly
announced that it was Texas Fore Play, “Yo
Beyatch! Get in the truck!”. For this we
received a thunderous round of applause.
Afterwards a few of us hung out in our
hospitality suite for a while because apparently,
we didn’t think we had enough wine to drink for
the evening!
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