Art, History, and Wow! –  A Picture Storybook of Our Breathtaking Exploration of Three European Cities.

Chapter 3

Fiesole and Florence

Nervous. 

One can never be sure with the air B&B sort of arrangement.  So boarding the train from Venice to Florence carried a mix of excitement and uncertainty.  The place in Venice had been luxurious.  Splendid.  Our flat in Paris was cozy and clean.  Would the place I reserved in Fiesole be good too?  Forever a realist, I feared the odds were against us.

However, the excitement of going to Florence, a city of incredible art and history, the epicenter of western civilization, the one time home of Etruscans and Romans,  the virile incubator of creative thinking that wrested humankind from the brutal constraints of Church dogma and propelled the western world to the enlightenment of the renaissance, far outweighed the apprehension over whether our digs were going to be subpar.  How bad could they be?

The train ride was beautiful and we were accompanied by Steve and Linda from Australia who were continuing on down to Rome. The countryside flew by as we chatted about art, home, and travel.  We passed through the mountains.  And by that, please don’t picture breathtaking views.  I mean we went through the mountains via a series of  long,                           View From the Train As it Passed Through The Mountains

dark tunnels before entering the

valley where     Florence lay.                        

As per the plan, once we disembarked the train we  found our way to the taxi stand and instructed the driver to take us to Fiesole.  The driver understood “Fiesole”.  I attempted to give him the address of “3 Via di Monte Ceceri, Fiesole.”  It seems to me that, even with only rudimentary control of one’s lips and tongue, a simple address should be easy enough in Italian.   He looked puzzled and asked “English?”  Rather than struggle to pronounce the address again, I showed him the address printed in my travel book.  He punched it into his computer as he started his cab heading north and east through the city and toward the mountains.  As the cab cut its way through the afternoon traffic, he informed us, one hand on the wheel, one gesticulating, one eye on us, one eye on the GPS, that the address did not show up on his GPS.                                   

                                                                                          

What to do?  I had the brilliant idea of calling Roberto, our host, followed by the substantially more brilliant idea of having our driver call Roberto where they could both speak Italian.  I suggested as much.  The driver agreed.

“Uh oh” I thought. ‘Two suitcases, a back-pack, my computer bag, Ellen’s handbag and we had to climb a mountain!”

Climbing,  the car switched back and forth a couple of times then made a sharp, steep right and we found ourselves in the charming piazza of Fiesole.  The cab continued, however, veering to the right into what I thought for sure was a large, ancient stone wall.  But we veered a bit more to the right and started up a very narrow street squeezed in between people’s living rooms with only stone walls between us and them.   

Straight ahead, the road narrowed still more.  He took a sharp left and stopped. No doubt he could have gone straight if the door handles on the cab were of no concern.  This was the end if the line. 

Roberto was waiting for us.  It was  warm and sunny.  I looked at the steep incline up which we were soon going to be dragging our luggage.  I adjusted my sunglasses and smiled.  It was beautiful.

As another car came up the narrow street behind us and patiently waited, we got out and started to unload. Roberto greeted us in Italian, mostly.  He was, I would think, in his seventies.  He had white hair and a huge, friendly, grin that revealed a gap in his front teeth.  He grabbed two suitcases, the large ones, and proceeded to run up the steep narrow, street, straight up the mountain.  The street was so narrow that the white lines on the side of the street were painted on the door stoops of the houses that so picturesquely lined it.

Brunellesci’s Dome proudly jutted up from the hazy blue-green valley beneath us. We took endless photos of that view, as the light altered it almost every minute. Another twenty five feet up on the left was the gate to                Kathy Graham’s Photo of Us and The View

our apartment.  Things  were looking up! 

The gate opened to reveal a narrow tunnel leading up and culminating in a small, quaint, private courtyard. It was stunning, filled with the textures of brick, stone, stucco, ancient wood and wrought iron.  Roberto told us that the apartment was in what was  once part of an old monastery.    

                                                  

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To the right  is the Bell Tower of Fiesole’s  11th Century Basilica as seen through Roman arches.

From the ruins of an archeological site that dates back to 4th century Estruscan occupation, one can view the tower of the 11th Century town Basilica through stone arches erected by the Romans around the year dot. Like looking through the lens of a stone time machine.  I was awed. Completely overcome with an acute awareness of my place in the nature of things.

That basilica is breathtaking. It’s as old as San Marco in Venice.  Though no photos were allowed. The builders appropriated the Corinthian column capitals from the Roman sites for the fifty foot interior columns of the church. 

The Ruins and oh! The Light!

Ravioli with kale and nepitella

Florence, a short 25 minute bus ride away, was mobbed with tourists.  And with good reason. On the awe-mometer of things – it’s off the charts.  So much art and architectural history!  I am so glad we had ample time to see these amazing creations as well as chill out in the hills! The highlight for me was discovering a Pontormo tucked away where no one would look for it. Or so it seemed.   But Brunelleschi’s Dome (La Duomo), has haunted me since I studied a bit of the history of art and architecture at Penn.  It is an icon in the annuls of history.  It is a wonder.  It is the major motivation for my trip to Florence.  And, oh my, what an incredible work of art it is.  We visited the Uffizi, too, where I gained refreshed insight into the greatness of Botticelli and Raphael. I was looking forward to seeing Jacapo Pontormo there too. He was a mannerist and painted, in my opinion, some of the most amazing paintings of the 16th Century.  When I was in school, I drew a great deal of inspiration from reproductions of his drawings and paintings.  But I was disappointed by the Pontormo in the Uffizi.

                                Brunelleschi’s Dome as seen from Giotto’s Campanile. Where else in the world can one view an icon of architectural history that is 5                               550 years old from the tower of another icon that is 650 years old?  Seriously.  That is Florence!

The day before we left we experienced another coincidence in the realm of the smallness of the world. Our dear friend Kathy Graham, frequenter of blues events at the St. Georges Cafe in St. Georges, Delaware was able to meet us in Fiesole for dinner!  As it turned out, she was on a fabric/weaving tour of Italy!  We had another home-cooked meal and I snuck back into the ruins to pick some more nepitella for the occasion!  I am sorry we did not take a photo of the occasion. 

Pontormo’s “Deposition” (Decent From The Cross) 1528

           

Sketch near our apartment                                                                  The Crest of the hill in Fiesole

     Our Last Day - one foot out the door!