Right, past Rome… and into Tuscany

Pizza!

Recapping a bit on our last post….. driving through Salerno on the way to Pompei was nothing short of hell. Sat Nav Suzie went loco and we ended up in a warren of tiny streets with very low balconies that we were far, far too big for. Horns honking, arms waving and lots of shouting and that was just Den, the Italians on the whole saw the funny side. With Jane in front ‘walking the route’ asking the road work crew to put the manhole covers back please and pointing at the balconies, we crawled at 2mph through this rat’s nest of 90degree bends. When we finally got to the camp site - just outside the gate of Pompei -after 6 hours at the wheel we were both exhausted. We weren’t going there but to be honest by this time Suzie had re-calculated herself to death and we realized that there are actually two Pompeis within a few miles of each other. The campsite was a car park next to the rail station masquerading as a citrus grove. So with oranges banging on the roof as you parked and trains thundering by we were not expecting much but were too tired to care.

In the morning things always look better and the trains didn’t run late into the night so we were pleasantly surprised, so surprised that we ended up spending three days there. Friday night tapas with local bread, cheese and wine helped.

So a showery day in Pompei (covered in last post). As we were camped next to the train station we decided to take the train to Naples the next day as at 9 Euros for both of us it was a bargain especially considering that some old streets in Naples are even narrower than the ones we got stuck in in Pompei.

Naples

Naples is one of Italy’s most chaotic cities, think third world with a  bit of café culture and you have a lively melting pot of one million souls. We loved it, all twelve miles that we walked. The traffic has to be seen to be believed, crossing the road, even on a zebra crossing, is an act of blind faith. You can easily be forgiven for thinking that you have become an extra in a Bond movie, the atmosphere can be that exciting!! The amazing backdrop of Vesuvius’  chasing the Island of Capri across the Bay of Naples does nothing to upset the illusion.

Sorrento over looking Bay of Naples

The next day we headed to Sorrento, it looks out from it’s cliff top down the Amalfi Coast in one direction and to the Bay of Naples in the other. It was a thirty minute, eight euro train trip that gave us another drive free day to recover. Sorrento is one of Italy’s top tourist destinations and as such is full of shops (new boots for Jane) and every other conceivable way of getting the tourist euro! The place is a joy to walk, with a warren of tiny streets, packed with people, just like us. You can tell from the estate agents window that with a price tag of £500,000 for a 50 sqm one bed apartment what sort of people actually live here, not us!!

Happy campers - Sperlonga

Just like the legions returning home, we marched on to Rome. Well Sperlonga actually – an expensive holiday village thing which was more like a dying shanty town than a village, in October. Lovely beach though, complete with restored castle and surfing dudes.

Sunset at Latina

Latina, about 80 km from Rome was different from anything we had seen so far in Italy. Our campsite was in a National Park, on the coast and apart from being woken by duck hunters it was clean and green. Footpaths, cycleways, walkers, joggers and even litter pickers. Add lush vegetation, canals and a beautiful sandy beach and it was more like California than Italy. We did have a sneaky suspicion it was a dormitory for rich Romans who pay for the nicer things in life.

Civita Castallana - main piazza

Civita Castallana 30km north east of Rome, a good Latin sounding town, with a medieval old town that had seen better days but was fun to explore. Free mineral water at the campsite and the best free toilet in all Italy – at the cemetery! Maybe dead people don’t steal the toilet paper or pee on the floor?

We had no plans to stop at Rome this time but we did have to navigate the ring road, imagine the M25 with Italians all driving with their phone to their ear, coffee in one hand, cigarette in the other all desperately looking for a loo with toilet paper………..

South Tuscan hills

As soon as you enter Tuscany the Italian picture postcard and Italian restaurants back home come sharply into focus. Without ever having been to Tuscany it’s all very familiar. Rolling hills, hill top fortress towns, neat row upon row of vines and ubiquitous olive trees, creating a giant tapestry bathed in glorious sunlight. Yes, we were impressed and 500 photos later, we still are. Tuscany is clean, wealthy and upmarket, in a way that has seen rich Brits buy here big time with big money. Most hills have £1million plus properties sitting on top of them, no sign of a recession here, Chiantishire  is alive and well.

Hill top Tuscan town

The sheer beauty of virtually every vista makes it all too easy to forget what Tuscany is about. There are real Italians here and you can get reasonably priced wine in lovely little restaurants, however, the local wine, Brunello, Italy’s premier wine, retails for around 30 euros a bottle even in the supermarkets. We can’t tell you how it tasted but every year a small army of people with too much money pay homage to the grape, buying up piles of rubble and  turning them into another hill top palace. O.K. you guessed it – we admit it, we loved Tuscany but can’t afford to live here!

Montepulciano

Tuscany’s beauty and the sense of unease it brings seem strange bed fellows but look a little harder, scratch the surface and you glimpse what life ‘everyday’ must be like here. It has an almost sterile look and feel, perfect if you are on holiday and want Italian food, Italian wine, Italian everything. The often misunderstood thing about being English is not that we don’t like England or all things English, it is that we don’t like ‘everyday’! For example today we eat Italian, tomorrow burgers and then fancy an indian or Chinese meal at the weekend. This would be impossible in Tuscany. For us anyway, ‘everyday’ and ‘anywhere’ blend seamlessly to celebrate the diversity of life itself.

Translations of this blog are on sale at www.updensownarseorwhat.com for 50p a copy!

Time to look at the pretty pictures of Tuscany;

Pienza

 Montepulciano – stunningly beautiful but unfortunately not the home of the wine of the same name that we drink back in the UK – the real stuff is expensive.

Pienza – in our opinion ranks as one of the prettiest little towns on the face of the planet.

Siena Duomo

Siena – incredibly vibrant and beautiful city centre, better in many ways than Rome or Florence, especially if you like liquorice allsorts.

San Giovanni d’Asso – big name, tiny but beautifully formed, hill top town.

Lunch at Siena's 'Campo'

We still have Montalcino to visit and we’ve been told that it’s the most beautiful town in all of southern Tuscany – this we must see before heading to the coast as a cold front is coming that looks like snookering our plans for shorts until November.

Take care

Jane X and Den