Pt2 - 17:

FLORENCE, SIENA

 

Rail is hands down the smartest mode of transport in this country. The seven and a half hour journey from Sorrento to Florence could so easily have been a biblical ordeal, but it wasn’t. The changes at Naples and Rome went remarkably smoothly and, apart from Tess almost having her arm amputated in the automatic ticket barrier in Roma Termini and the unedifying spectacle of a middle-aged couple sucking face like a pair of desperate juveniles for several hours on the run to Florence, the trip passed pleasantly enough. The further north we travelled the more picturesque the countryside became, verdant green farmland studded with palatial villas and impossibly romantic medieval walled towns.

As always, Tess stayed with the gear at the station while I went off to hustle up the accommodation. Call me sensitive, but I swear the first dozen or so establishments quoted me outrageous prices just to get rid of me. It was such a trend that by the time I took the lift up to the unprepossessing Embassy House Hotel I’d begun to take it personally. Maybe it was the hair, which had regrown enough since Ali barbered it in Aqaba to be officially wild; maybe it was the unshaven face or the smelly socks, or all of the above, but I approached the old gentleman behind the desk with an air of resignation. I think he took pity on me because he offered me a very nice room with very nice towels at a very nice price. The catch was we could only have two nights before a bunch of conference delegates took the place over. I thanked him through my tears and hurried back to bring Tess in from the station.

Later we entirely failed to find any of the eateries recommended in our Let’s Go (and Get Lost) and in desperation allowed ourselves to be shamelessly fleeced al fresco in the Piazza Santa Maria Novella. We dined, and I use the term loosely, on lasagne so economy sized I needed the binoculars to find it on the plate and a bottle of coke so small its mummy is probably still waiting up for it.

We emptied our wallets, went home and slept.

*

I’d forgotten what an impact the first sighting of the Duomo has but it came back to me this morning as we rounded the last corner and there it was in all its splendour. I remembered 20 years ago approaching along Via Cerretani from the station with Ilene and stopping in my tracks as the sumptuous marble façade loomed through the chasm of ordinary buildings, like the Treasury at Petra framed in the Siq. It had the same effect on Tess now, an involuntary gasp as she stopped to take it in, to gaze at the gothic arches, the ornate decoration, the green and white Baptistry, Giotto’s famous bell tower and Brunelleschi’s beautiful dome. The weathered marble was clean and appeared to glow even under the overcast skies. We circumnavigated it slowly, drinking in the detail while we waited for the line into the gloomy cathedral to evaporate. Inside, the embellishments continued but my personal favourite is the quirky 24hr clock which runs backwards.

We tore ourselves away and wandered up the V Ricasoli to the Academy. There was no avoiding the wait here, the line stretched hundreds of meters around the block. It took 30 minutes but finally we stood before the work everyone, and I mean everyone who comes to Florence, lines up to see – Michelangelo’s David. The 507cm statue stands in its own purpose-built apse under a cupola of frosted glass. The floor was crowded but you could have heard the proverbial pin drop in the reverent hush. Take as long as you like to admire the masterpiece because there’s nothing much else in the Academy worth seeing, at least nothing you’ll remember afterwards like you’ll remember David.

*

The line to Siena tracks through Tuscany at its postcard best. On this luminous morning we rolled lazily past charming villages like Certaldo in the shadow of meticulously maintained hilltop fortress towns. Orange tissue paper poppies dusted the blindingly green fields until eventually the ancient terracotta rooftops of Siena hove into view. Despite it raining back then, the Siena of my first visit lives comfortably in my memory, although with the peerless weather I expected it to be more crowded today.

We caught the local bus into town and strolled through the cobbled streets to the Campo, the large central square dominated by the Palazzo Pubblico. There were plenty of people taking the sun, although they were vastly outnumbered by the pigeons. The famous Palio is held here every year, a medieval festival culminating in a race in which ten riders on ten horses in colourful regalia representing different wards, or suburbs, race each other around the Campo for nothing more than bragging rights. Everything was calm and peaceful on the Campo now while we ate lunch, watched the passing parade and scanned the map to plan our route around this gorgeous town. As we prepared to set off we were approached by a group of primary school children with workbooks in hand to practice their English. They were very polite and asked us a few questions about our travels in Italy. Finally, one kid said, “Have you got time?” and they all raced off giggling to the other side of the Campo where I could see them checking in with their teacher; I’m guessing he meant: “Thank you for your time”. What fun – imagine that happening in Oz!

The Duomo here is smaller than Florence but older and more flamboyant and intricate in its design. Inside, the striking black and white striped marble makes you feel like you’ve stepped inside a Geelong jersey and the ceiling is crowned with a spectacular gold cupola and oculus which seduces the eye. The elaborate pulpit, mosaic floor, frescoes, stained glass and works by Michelangelo and Donatello make the place seem more art gallery than cathedral. The Gothic exterior, with its density of gargoyles and saints and bronze doors complete a coherent, if busy, intersection of art and architecture.

We swerved into a gelateria for a cinque gusti each. I’ll miss these indulgent confections when we leave Italy in a couple of days. I loaded up my bucket with pistachio, chocolate, coffee, stracchiatella and something called Zuppa Inglese which tasted like custard. We sat on the campo and slowly spooned our way through them like a couple of kids on a picnic.

By five we were back in Florence. We’d decided on a night in so I grabbed some Morettis and a chianti from the local grogateria and a couple of ham and cheese pizza sandwiches – yep, they’re a thing here – left over from last year at the chew and spew next door to the hotel. Food has been a major disappointment in Italy; it’s horrendously expensive for miniscule helpings and, frankly, we get better pizzas in bloody Bridgetown. We’re both hanging out for what we hope will be a food renaissance in France.

*

Our one hundredth day on the road was an orgy of Renaissance art, with a stroll through the Boboli Gardens to break it up.

The line for the Uffizi was a mile long when we arrived at 9:30 so we sauntered across the Ponte Vecchio to the deserted Pitti Palace. Of the seven galleries we chose the Palatine which houses the Medici royal apartments. The Vatican in miniature, the galleries succeeded one another in a procession of Rubens, Sustermans and Van Dykes. Each was sumptuously decorated from ceiling to floor and the fully draped and furnished royal apartments reflected the limitless wealth and power of the Medici.

It was a glorious day for the Boboli Gardens. We wandered at large through the formal hedges, around the fountains and down to the Isolata, or retreat, at the far end. The central feature here is a tall fountain reached by footbridges spanning an artificial lake stocked with colourful fish. All is surrounded by tall hedges into which are cut shady niches with benches for repose. It was a cool sanctuary from the madness of modern Florence and we took our sweet time enjoying it before letting ourselves out via the amphitheatre behind the palace.

To lunch. Given what I’ve said above about the general food experience in Italy it might seem unfair to single out La Sagrestia for special mention, but the very fact I have indicates just how deceitful and slimy this particular place was. Our eye was taken by the menu touristica prominently displayed in the window. They offered a three course meal for L20,000 (A$16), all charges (service, taxes, cover etc) included. Reasoning that if we ate well enough now we could get away with just snacking tonight, we went in. None of the drinks on the list appealed to us much so we ordered a couple of cokes at L4000 (about A$3.50) each. Of course, they turned out to be the baby sized bottles so we’d have to ration our two sips. The minestrone was passable, but when the roast beef arrived it was sliced so thinly it was transparent. For garnish they added a dollop of buttered spinach and four fries. To entertain us for the microsecond it took to consume this feast a loud American at the next table regaled his companion with the story of how he and his friends played doctors and nurses when he was a kid, taking each other’s rectal temperatures with a stick. I kid you not. The prefabricated desserts arrived in tiny plastic cups after which, completely unsated, we called for the bill. Imagine our surprise, not, when it came to L50,000 instead of the L48,000 we’d calculated. No worries, I’d just point out the oversight and all would be hunky dory. Not so. I was smugly informed that a 12.5% service charge applied to the microscopic cokes because they weren’t on the tourist menu. The bastard was so smarmy and flagrant about it I could’ve set fire to his hair. I paid up, too angry to realise they’d rounded the bill up just for fun. The sums involved are miniscule in the scheme of things, but the brazen contempt with which we were treated really got up my nostril. To top it off, the supercilious cashier was smoking so I stubbed his cigarette out in his eye. I didn’t of course, though it took a heroic effort of will not to; we settled instead for ripping up the stale bread rolls so they couldn’t serve them to the next suckers. It goes without saying that if you’re going to complain about the service do so after you’ve eaten so they don’t fart in your glass, not that complaining matters to Florentines who treat the legions of tourists like cash cows. Enough.

The Uffizi is never mentioned in the same sentence as the Louvre, the Prado, The Guggenheim or the Tate but it exhibits some of the world’s most extraordinary art and many of its most extraordinary artists. From Botticelli to Bellini, from Caravaggio to di Credi, from Titian to Tintoretto, from Leonardo to Lorenzetti to Fra Filipo Lippi, from Raphael to Rembrandt to Renoir to Rubens, from Veronese to Verrocchio to Vermeer; Bacchus, Medusa, The Adoration of the Magi, The Annunciation, Coronation of the Virgin, Leda and the Swan, The Birth of Venus…you get the picture, lots of pictures. No matter how long you give to the Uffizi you always leave feeling as though you’ve seen hardly any of the collection. One of the world’s most underrated galleries.

It is a fitting finale to our Italian sojourn, for tomorrow we train across to the border town of Ventimiglia via Pisa and Genoa, and the the following day we rail down to Nice and an appointment we've been anticipating with increasing excitement for several weeks now. As we leave the northern Mediterranean and head away from the coast the whole complexion of the Grand Adventure is about to change radically.

Coming up: Fabulous France...