Y2W46 - Toscana

After nearly two years in Europe, we finally made our maiden voyage to Italy. This is a bit interesting as it was at the top of Ellyn’s pre-foreign assignment vacation spot list. Perhaps this is the result of an unresponsive spouse or just a bit of bad luck and unique circumstance. I’ll go with the later.

This trip, like the Ireland weekend before it, was not without adventure. We had carefully choreographed a delicate plan that involved the precise pickup and delivery of not only ourselves but both of our mothers to Tuscany. Work and vacation villa availability schedules combined to yield a plan that involved precise airline arrivals in multiple countries. The original plan had Ellyn’s mom landing Friday morning and accompanying our family part way down to Italy that same day. After an overnight rest in Basel, Switzerland, we would pick up my mom at around noon on Saturday in Milan, Italy. From there, we would drive together in our two cars to San Gimignano, Italy. The total driving time is about 12 hours with each stop approximately 4 hours apart.

Everything went immediately south when Sharon’s (El’s mom) flight to Europe was delayed one day (missed connection) due to bad weather in Atlanta. This threw our whole plan into disarray as she didn’t arrive in Düsseldorf until Saturday morning – the same time as my mom was landing in Milan. On top of that, after 24 hours of delay, the airline couldn’t manage to get her bag on the flight. El and I stayed up until 4am talking on the phone with Delta and Northwest (sweet merger transition) having plans to enable Sharon to fly into alternative locations accepted and then taken away due to differences in policy between the two companies. I was starting to think that this was a reincarnation of the DaimlerChrysler merger.

In the end, Ellyn hung back with Avery and Lleyton, picked up her mom on Saturday morning while I travelled ahead with Bailey and Bryn to pick up my mom. I wasn’t enamored with the idea of Ellyn driving such a long distance without me, but it turned out to be easier than trying to stay together on the roads surrounding Milan on the return trip.

We had booked a fantastic villa in Tuscany south of Florence near the small Italian hill town of San Gimignano. It was a 17th century church that had been renovated by the owners, an Italian architect and his English wife who live in London. What a lucky find.

On our first day, with Ellyn driving in from Milan, my mom (Linda) and I along with Bay and Bryn went into San Gimignano. There we had what would be the first of many Italian Gelatos. This place is noted by many as one of the best. It was fantastic. Here is a bit about Italian Gelato.

From there we met up with Ellyn, Sharon, Avery, and Lleyton at the U.S. Military Cemetery south of Florence. As always, it was immaculately kept and served as a good meeting point outside the city. We then visited Piazzale Michaelanglo which offered great views of Florence. With the day only beginning, we ventured back to the villa where we enjoyed the pool. Later that evening, we took the full team into San Gimignano to experience the Italian Gelato together. One might think that a couple Gelatos a day might result in significant weight gains, but when one walks and often pushes/carries kids about 5+ miles per day weight gains are of no concern.

The following day, we ventured off to Siena. It is a classic Italian hill town that was once a fierce rival to Florence. Ultimately, Florence became the dominate city of Tuscany as evidenced by its current population slightly north of 400,000 people while Siena has about 60,000 permanent residents. However, in some ways, it is the traveler who wins. Highlights of Siena include its amazing Duomo (Cathedral) and grand Piazza del Campo. Avery, desiring to go to the top of the Palazzo Pubblico (City Hall) tower, climbed with me and was rewarded with a fantastic view. One off the wall tip… when in Siena, stop by a local Chinese Restaurant. We picked up this idea from some online research, thought it a bit odd, but tried it, and were rewarded.

After Siena, we visited a small walled city named Monteriggioni. The girls walked around with the moms while Ellyn and I strolled the city streets separately.

The highlight of the day for Sharon was an evening trip with her brillant son-in-law (me) to the Florence airport to pick up here long lost luggage.

The next day, it was another drive through the Tuscan hills to a small monastery named Mount Oliveto. Much of the drive was on a route known as the Crete Senesi offering some of the most classic Tuscan scenery to be found any in the region.

After lunch, we abandoned plans to go into Florence and decided instead to visit Volterra. It is a city known for its Etruscan roots and location high, high in the hills of western Tuscany. Once in town, we visited an Etruscan museum and strolled the streets in search of alabaster carvings and biscotti. Check out this picture of a hot trixie I snapped in Volterra. I also got her to pose with my mom.

We also got these pictures of the girls that I like. I’m enjoying my new Digital SLR Camera. A must have to properly document these trips.

The following two days were spent in Florence braving some of the best museums in all of Europe and frequenting some of the most impressive Cathedrals. The travel to Florence by train gave us a nice break from driving. The slide show below indentifies some of the highlights.

With restrictions on picture taking, classics such as Michaelanglo’s David and Botticelli’s ‘Birth of Venus’ and ‘Primavera’ have to be seen in person. A couple of our other favorites were the ceilings of the Florence Cathedral’s Baptistery depicting the Final Judgement, and the original bronze North Doors of the Baptistery which took Lorenzo Ghiberti twenty-one years to produce. He then spent another 20 years doing the East Doors which Michaelanglo named the ‘Gate of Paradise’. Some of the original panels are on display at the Duomo Museum. The Florence Cathedral Dome designed by Brunelleschi was the largest of its time, and is brilliantly observed from Giotto’s Tower. The Santa Croce church houses the tombs of Galileo, Michaelanglo and Machiavelli while the Bargello museum’s most famous sculpture is Donatello’s bronze portrayal of David.

It was a Humanities majors dream, and I enjoyed it as well. The kids did great as we tugged them along to church after church and museum after museum. All of this history is rubbing off as we continue to have to explain to Bailey that we often have to limit ourselves to the highlights as time is limited. It’s much better than the opposite of constantly trying to keep them enthusiastic about what to them (and even us at times) feels like more of the same.

Our last full day in Tuscany had to include Pisa. Bailey was terribly persistent about her desires to visit the leaning tower. We were pleasantly surprised as the Cathedral and Baptistery were also very impressive.

We spent only a couple hours there and enjoyed a bit of shopping in our favorite little town of San Gimignano.

We ended our stay in Tuscany and headed for Lake Lugano. It is a picturesque lake nestled between Lake Como to the east and Lake Maggiore to the west. While the city is located in Switzerland, we stayed in a resort, Parco San Marco Hotel, located on the north side of the lake in Italy. It was a challenging ride as staying together through Milan and other areas was not without its issues, but we arrived in time to visit Melide Swissminiatur. It is a fun little park with replicas of all the classic sites of Switzerland, reconstructed at 1/25 their actual size. The girls had fun running through the park, riding on the miniature train, and driving the bumper boats. A quick dinner in Lugano was followed by a coastline drive to the hotel. We were all hammered and glad to go to bed.

Easter Sunday included a small Easter egg hunt in one of our rooms and a series of musical performances by the girls.

I drove my mom back down to Milan so she could catch her plane back to the U.S. We spent the day hiking in the San Grato park overlooking the lake and mountains, touring Lugano, and climbing Mount Bré.

Our final stop was to the Castagnola Cemetery to get a few pictures of Rudolf Caracciola final resting place. For those of you who have been catching the blog for the last year or so, know that one of our oldest and best friends, J.R., has been researching and writing about the ‘Ringmeister’ for some time. Not a bad final resting place. Check out the view.

The next day, we made the trek back to Bad Godesberg. This was one of the best visits we have embarked upon since the start of our ‘Christensen’s Adventures in Deutschland’ experience.