Archive for the ‘Capalbio’ Category
Cruising down to Rome
“The time has come,” the Walrus said, “to talk of many things: of shoes — and shops — and saling wax — of cabbages — and kings — and why the sea is boiling hot and whether pigs have wings.”
Ok, so really, it was just time to say good bye to the family and make our own way through Italy.
Since moving here, Josh and I have had a more relaxed attitude toward our travels around Europe. Our two European adventures that we had before moving here were carefully planned out, booked months in advance. Now we throw darts at the Google map.
Where our dart landed this time. Before we went to the big city, we wanted a quiet weekend getaway. Josh wanted to roadtrip, I wanted seaside. Somewhere in there, a trip to Pisa was thrown in. So we scoured the map and hit the jackpot in this little nubbin of land on the west coast. More on that later.
Our chariot. We trained to Florence, picking up our little Alfa Romeo for our journey: first stop Pisa. I’m so glad we did this as a stop along the way. Besides the big park where the famous tower leans, the city didn’t seem that great. I’m sure it has its gems, but not enough stood out to make us wish for more time there.
The cathedral in Pisa, with the tower in the background. 
The very-much leaning Tower of Pisa. We wrinkled our noses at all the hawkers selling fake watches and Bart Simpson underwear while laughing at all the tourists holding up the tower on their digital cameras. I even got suckered into taking one for a couple that didn’t speak English — that was interesting. But after an overpriced lunch, we were back on the road.
Two hours down, we hit our little jackpot. After what Rick Steves has done to the Cinque Terra, we hope he stays away from this place. We arrived at Porto Ercole on Monte Argentario in the late afternoon and were blown away.
The town of Porto Ercole. 
A little hike up the hill.
A tree we saw at the top of the hill. Does anyone know what it is (besides awesome)?Our hotel, the Bihotel, was just 12 rooms right on the water. Its a tiny little fishing village precariously built into the mountainside. We hiked around the mountain, with forts on every vantage point. It smelled just like the seaside should: brined fish. There wasn’t a word of English to be heard, not even our hotellier spoke anything useful. Dinner was pointing at the menu and hoping for the best. It was delicious.
The hill we hiked up. The next morning, we took it slow, eating breakfast as late as possible and heading to the beach. All the little pieces of land that creat the lagoon between the mainland and Monte Argentario are lined with beaches. So we bought a cheap beach mat and got our last bits of relaxing in. As the clouds started to roll in, we packed up our strawmat and said goodbye to the beach.
Leaving the beach — you can see why in the background.
But we weren’t ready to head to Rome yet, so we asked the lady at the hotel to point us in the way of a must-see town. She recommended Capalbio, and we had no reason not to trust her. As we rounded a turn on our way there, we see a hill town with castle towers sticking up. It was Capalbio.
Josh on Capalbio’s medieval walls.
I snapped him snapping! Ha ha! The town was quiet — nothing like the crowds of the other hill towns we visited while we were in Chianti. We snapped photos as we walked along the medieval castle walls, taking in our last views of vinyards and olive groves. Lunch was again pointing at the menu with a “per favore”, but we were twice lucky with the food. We were, after all, in Italy.
Streets of Capalbio.
I don’t think there was too much we had to worry about gastronimically.
More goofing.
Finally, the sun got to us and it was time to make the rest of the journey.
We were en route to Rome.
