Cronoscalata at Camucia-Cortona

I am behind on blog posts AGAIN! This past week has been very busy--lots of projects and lots of socializing. Here is what we did on Saturday, April 20.

Dom found notice of a cronoscalata--a hill climb--for vintage cars in one of his magazines devoted to historic cars. The start was in the town of Camucia and the finish up in Cortona at the top of the hill. If Cortona sounds familiar it is because it is where Frances Mayes of Under the Tuscan Sun has her villa.

There was not a lot of sun in evidence last Saturday but it never did rain on us. The drive from Capannori to Camucia takes about two hours. The race was actually on Sunday but the Saturday practice time trials started at 3:30 pm. So we left at about 11 am and arrived with plenty of time to inspect the cars in the pits (paddock), grab some lunch and then walk a ways up the hill to watch the cars go by.

 This photo was taken near the start and shows the town of Cortona on top of the hill. The road switchbacked up the hill providing a challenging run.

 We started out in the pits looking at all the cars. The nice thing about this type of small event is there are no tickets and you can get really close to the vehicles. As you can see from the above photo, this type of racing is favored by a more mature set of drivers.

 There was a wide variety of vehicles. Some of them were stock cars that were modified for hill climbs but the above looked like it had been made from flattened tin cans. It was definitely not stock.

 Thee were small budget operations...

 ...and big budget operations. There were even "rent-a-racer" trucks. Very tempting!

  I believe Dom said all the vehicles had to be pre-197?. There were some very sleek cars...

 ...and some that were on the boxy side.

 There were definite contrasts in the pits.

 Fiat 500s are a favorite race car here in Italy. These were waiting to line up for the start.

 The pits were a lot like a poor man's Concorso d'Eleganza.

 Dom and I liked this obviously homemade trailer.

 This was the oldest vehicle in the bunch--an Alfa Romeo 6C2300 according to the program (also free!)

 We had porchetta panini from the always present food wagon. The porchetta was pretty good but nowhere near as good as the porchetta I bought from one of the market stalls here in Capannori on Friday. We might have a standard Friday lunch from now on.

 Dom eating and looking.

 After we ate we found the start line. There were quite a few people waiting for the cars to begin running.

 There were all sorts of emergency personnel including these firemen standing ready with their extinguishers.

 Here is the actual starting line with the timing equipment. 

 You can see another big fire extinguisher here. Dom said if there are going to be problems they are usually occur at the start. The course corner workers all had fire extinguishers too.

 We climbed up on a bank near one of the early turns to watch the cars go by. There were a number of other people nearby.

 It is tough to tell from the previous picture but we could actually see all the way to the starting line.

 The view of the countryside was great. The golden fields are canola (rapeseed).

 Then the cars started running. There were over 300 listed in the program but a few did not run.

 There were all sorts of cars including some that looked like they should be doing LeMans type racing.

 I always like the red cars. :-)

 This is the tin can car.

This is the old Alfa.

 In the distance we could see Lake Trasimeno...

...and Monte Amiato (I think) in the far distance. Obviously I kept getting distracted by the view.

We watched all of the first run and then walked back down to the car. It was only about 5 pm so we drove up the hill to Cortona (by another route obviously) and strolled around for a while. You can probably guess that we had a little gelato. Finally we headed back to Capannori and arrived at about 8 pm. In spite of little sunshine it was a great day out.

Palazzo Blu in Pisa

Last Friday we spent the morning working and then went to Pisa after lunch. An article about an exhibit sent us in search of Palazzo Blu, a museum that currently has an exhibit of works by Artimisia Gentileschi, the premier female painter of the Renaissance.

It is difficult to see in this picture but Palazzo Blu really is blue! It is located in the middle of Pisa along the Arno river (on the right side in the above picture).

Admission to the museum is free. We found that there were two exhibits and the more interesting one proved to be works by costume designer Anna Anni. She created the costumes for many of operas and plays directed by Franco Zeffirelli.

These are ballet costumes. Unfortunately the pictures do not do them justice. They are incredibly ornate creations with rich materials and intricate needlework.

These are costumes created for the opera Mephistopheles. The Palazzo Blu building was as interesting as the exhibits. The base of this staircase is solid green marble.

 This is the ceiling in the first room we visited.

 On the wall you can see a couple of Gentileschi's works. 

 Again, the exhibit room was just gorgeous and beautifully maintained.

This was my favorite room with a lot of faux painting on the walls. It had the allusion of draped fabric. 

 This is a closer view of the elaborate pattern in the fabric painted on the wall.

 There were a number of smaller works displayed that had nothing to do with either of the major exhibits. This was my favorite--a small picture of a young woman gazing along the coast with the ducks waddling behind. I would love to have it in my home.

 There were also some lovely pieces of furniture of which the above is just one example. Of particular interest in this cabinet is a collection of pottery--probably Etruscan.

We only spent about an hour in the museum but it was well worth the visit. Afterwards we strolled back to our car which was across the river and found a gelateria. Somehow all our excursions involve gelato at some point. :-) 

Next post: To Cortona for a Cronoscalata

Lunch at Marina di Pietrasanta

Last Wednesday we drove out to the beach for lunch. Our usual spot (Oscar's in Marina di Massa) is closed Wednesdays so we drove south along the coast until we got to Marina di Pietrasanta. There is a nice area there for a pre-prandial passagiata so we strolled along and checked out the restaurants. I really like dining with a view of the water but the majority of places actually face the street. We found one that looked good--Bagno Venezia.

The food was very good. I had a scrumptious plate of smoked salmon, tuna and swordfish. It came with lettuce and tomatoes. If I had know it had all that I would not have order the large salad I also ate. Dom raved about his spaghetti all'amatriciana. We also had a nice fizzy white wine. 

The above picture is a view of Bagno Venezia looking at it from the beach. On the left you can see a row of white posts. They are just setting up the umbrellas and chairs for the season. We watched them work hard to create a perfectly straight line with the posts evenly spaced. Umbrellas will go on top of the posts.

Behind the flags you can see the upper deck where we ate lunch. It was a marvelous view of the water with just enough breeze to keep it from getting too hot.

 We walked out towards the shore to take a look at things. There were actually people in the water but they were teenagers (!). I was tempted to go stick my toe in the water but I didn't have anything to wipe off my feet afterwards.

 This is looking north up the coast. During the height of the season this will be chock a block full of beach umbrellas and chairs, all of them for rent by the day, week, or season.

And, this is looking south along the beach. It is still awfully quiet. Things start to pick up in May with the Northern Europeans coming for vacation. Most Italians don't go near the beach or pool until at least June 1 regardless of the weather.

We finished up our beach excursion with a stop in Viareggio. After indulging in gelato we walked over the the marine supply stores and found some cleats. Our latest pigeon prevention scheme involves rigging screens that can be raised and lowered like sails. Progress should be made on this project in the next few days.

Next post: A visit to a Pisa musuem

Fortezza di Verrucole

We had beautiful warm weather all of last week which encouraged us to strike a better balance between getting work done and playing. Interesting excursions were the order of the day on Monday, Wednesday and Friday.

On Monday we drove up the Serchio Valley, something we had not done in a long time. At the north end of the valley, not long before the road drops over the top and winds its way down to Aulla in the Lunigiana, the fortress of Verrucole is perched high above the pass.

We had visited it before but as we drove towards it we could see that further work had been done on the old tower. It had been repaired and roofed. So, we drove up to the tiny village that sits just below the castle and hiked up the path up to check it out.

 It was a gorgeous day but you can tell by bare trees and the snow on the Alpi Apuane that it is a late spring this year in Tuscany. On the right in this picture you can see the nice cobbled path that leads up to the fort and its crowning tower.

 Across the valley from the fortress is an old village. If you enlarge this picture (click on it) you will see a whole field of solar panels in the middle of it. I like the juxtaposition of the old and new.

 The hike up the hill is about a quarter of  a mile. We were pretty warm by the time we got to the gate.

 The castle is long and narrow. It follows the contours of the ridge it is perched on. Concerts are held there in the summer, hence the stage that can be seen behind the tree. There is also a small building for selling tickets and a concession stand/bar at the far end.

 The main entrance gate is on the right and you can see how the tower rises above it.

 Over the years we have visited the castle a number of times. Restoration work has been steady with the rebuilding of the tower the latest phase. Below the roof are the excavated remains of the old chapel. The large object under cover is an old fresco-ed wall and alter.

 This is a view to the south down the Serchio Valley. It was a beautiful clear day.

 This photo was taken from the top of the steps leading to the tower which was unfortunately locked up. (Even more disappointing was the fact that the bathrooms were locked!)

Hiking back down the hill the view was to the west of the Appenini, the spine of Italy. By late this week a lot of the snow was gone. The temperatures have been in the mid 70s every day up until yesterday when it turned cooler. The sun is supposed to return for part of this coming week. 

Next post: Lunch at the Beach