Finally got my netbook to connect to the home wifi, so I can actually start writing and posting.  It’s been small steps forward.  First, the Italian cellphone trying to spellcheck me into Italian, then using my cellphone refusing to work with this website, now an actual functioning keyboard!  Also, I got my phones to sync with dropbox, so now it will be much easier to post pictures.   I want to transition to making this more about drawing and less of a travelogue.

Everywhere you look, there's an overlook

I don’t think I could have chosen a better city to start off my time in Italy.

1. Montepulciano is a small town, but not so small as to be boring for a month

2. People prefer to speak Italian first, even if they speak some English.  This is so much better for practicing.

3. It’s probably the most pretty Tuscan town ever.

I’ve got a whole bunch of drawings stored up now.  So how I think this will go is that I’ll post a drawing, then talk about how drawing it went, and anything interesting that happened in the process.  We’ll see.  Ci vediamo.

Muscles hurt not only going uphill, but also downhill.  I’m going to be really in shape by the end of the month.

I had a conversation in Italian with two women about a bee hive that had appeared in an alley.  Today,the beehive was gone, but the angry bees were still there.

Today was the first day I haven’t been caught outside in the rain.

It feels like my Italian conversational skills are improving dramatically.

Tuscany is actually really pretty.

So, it’s been very cold and rainy.  But also hot and sunny.  Hot and rainy in the early afternoon, then cold and rainy until dark.  This has messed up some of my drawing plans, as I’ve only had a few hours after class before rainy and cold.  Today I was drawing an alley, sitting outside the music school, listening to an orchestra practicing.  Pretty nice,  but then rain started within half an hour.  I’ll come back later to finish the drawing.  Weather is supposed to improve soon.

Wrt Italian, even after just three days of class I feel like I can speak more confidently.  The class is constant speaking and discussion.  When I was walking downhill from the Piazza Grande, I had a brief actual conversation about a bees nest and its various dangers.

Also discovered a shortcut up to the summit.  It’s an alley which is almost straight up, but seems very direct.

(Pictures to be uploaded soon )Well, I’m done with the traveling portion of this summer. I went from the very southest shore of Sicily to within 40 miles of the northern border. The last stop was to see the Byzantine mosaics at Ravenna. They’re overall the best in the category of art made of tiny glass pieces. These were all done between 300-700 ad. You can tell the earlier ones because they include beardless Jesus. Later mosaics all have bearded Jesus.

Then arrived at my home for the next 4 weeks, Montepulciano. I’m staying in a really nice house with a really nice family, and another student at the school. The house is about a 15 minute walk to school. All uphill there, all downhill back. Right after I arrived, we went to a hotspring nearby. The spring starts at the top of a hill, with a small waterfall which is the temperature of the most perfect hot shower. And so much water pressure! The spring flows down the hill, cooling as it goes. At the bottom is a milky blue pool, which is much cooler and the temperature of pool water at the shallow end on a sunny day. We sunbathed awhile on the rocks. These rocks sound like thin plaster when you knocks on them, but they’re apparently solid and sound like that because of air bubbles. It’s still disconcerting.

For the first day of school, I started with a placement test and interview. Got sorted into advanced 1. It’s a class of 5, with 2 teachers, that meets from 9 to 1:30 with several breaks. After school, I walked around the city. I chose a random street and went up it. It’s impossible to get lost if you keep walking uphill, since you’ll eventually just reach the highest point, which is the main square. The Piazza Grande includes city hall and the largest church. I stayed here a few hours and drew a bit. Then it started to look stormy, so I went downhill to a coffee shop, then sat under an arch until the rain lessened a little. I then hopped between shops down the street towards the house. I met the barista at a coffee bar on the way, and the lady who runs a vegetable shop. All the locals swear it’s not supposed to be this cold in June. It’s like 50 degrees.

Montepulciano is an extremely pretty, not too big, not too touristy town. Around every corner is something scenic or pretty in some way. I’ll post more on the city later.

I was in Riva del Garda 6 years ago with my chorus trip.  Now, I’ve got the chance to come back and stay for a few days.  Renting a small apartment on the edge of the historic center.   A seemingly random religious procession complete with marching band passed under the window one night.

Riva del Garda is a town at the end of a the very long and skinny Lake Garda, which is surrounded on all sides by the Alps.  It’s impossibly pretty.  You can walk by the lake, or around town, and it’s all pretty. Took a hike up to a castle on a hill which did not help protect the city from French invaders, but does have a nice view.

The last day, took a road trip to see Otzi, the iceman found frozen in the alps in full copper age fashion.  From like 5000 years ago.  There is a museum in Bolzano dedicated to him and his possessions.  It starts with the discovery, then moves to the actual man and items, then to the death circumstances, then Otzi’s medical analysis.  Otzi was wounded, and walking across a mountain  when he was shot in the back with an arrow.  He then fell, got frozen, and stayed there until 1992.  It turns out he had Lyme disease and badly clogged arteries from a fat filled diet.  At the end is a full body reconstruction of what he looked like.  He’s a little short for a modern person, but overall looks pretty normal.

Then a drive a little north to see an old German castle.  In Bolzano, the language I heard most was German.  At the castle, it was all German.  The main text was German, with Italian definitely as the subtitles.  It’s like we moved into a different country.  Everything suddenly looks like Switzerland.

Back to the north of Italy!  Took the Frecciarossa fast train.  It’s fast, clean, comfortable, and has wifi.  It’s miles away from the only train that goes to Sicily, which is slow, poorly bathroomed, and forces you to sit with the same six people for 8 hours.

Florence and Bologna feel like they’re in a different country from the south. It’s like everything is more upkept, cleaner, and I can understand more of what people say.  Spent an afternoon in Florence to see Santa Croce, which is where anyone who is famous and also Italian is probably buried.  Like Galileo, Leonardo, Macchiavelli, etc.  Everyone.  Then a quick trip by the language school I’m starting in July, pretty much just to make sure it actually exists.  It does.

Then a quick, easy train to Bologna.  Bologna is a beautiful city.  

Went to see the city library, the original University of Bologna main building, and the old operating theater.

Operating theater, with muscle only guys.

The library has great chair desk things. We need these at Rice

Finally, walked through the actual campus, which seems like maybe NYU or some similar city campus.  Posters, and protesters everywhere.  It seemed a lot more politically active than Rice especially.  Communism is very popular here, as well as being anti-fascist.  We stopped at a nice restaurant to have spaghetti bolognese. Or as the menu called it: Meat spaghetti with meat ragout.

Then left Bologna for a drive to my favorite little city on a lake, Riva del Garda!

Very old things today.  First, took the circumvesuviana train way towards Naples to see Herculaneum.  Herculaneum is just like Pompeii, but with much better buildings and not body casts.  Herculaneum was a smaller city than Pompeii, and most people were able to evacuate, except for about 300 by the seashore, who were apparently died of instant vaporization by a heat wall.  The lava was very deep here, covering houses above roof level.  This left some houses almost completely standing, with wooden balconies, mosaics, and frescoes.   Then a few stops down the metro to Villa Oplantis, which is a very fancy, huge Roman villa.  It’s basically intact, with the wall frescoes mostly preserved by the lava.  The Villa was mostly empty, which is a shame.  It was at least as worthwhile as Herculaneum, to see the frescoes.  You can be right next to the brushstrokes making a flower that some guy painted 2000 years ago, which were then covered by lava.  The amazing thing is that nothing is behind glass, you’re just walking through this house with wall paintings.

Then the fastest stop at Pompeii ever, since I had a free ticket that was expiring that day.  Spent 15 max, then back to Sorrento to catch a bus to Positano.

This bus was very scary.  It takes the Amalfi drive, which is very tall cliff with a road on top of it.  One sight was a glimpse of the wall of a valley full of bathtubs.  Strange.  The bus was a strange mix of tourists going to Amalfi and Positano, and locals using it as normal transportation.  We walked down the hill to the pedestrian town center, then ate by the ocean.  Another very, very scenic town.  Then, a wait by a random wall for the bus back to Sorrento.  Sat with a bunch of people speaking mostly Spanish, with some Italian mixed in.  Not sure where they were from.  There were also three Chinese girls who kept standing in the middle of the dark mountain road, scaring some drivers coming around the bend.  Then a limoncello at the square in Sorrento to end the day.

A trial trying to leave Capri.

People looking at the high waves

The only ferry working is the big boat, which is much more industrial than the hydrofoil we took over.  I met a very angry pregnant British woman in line.  I taught her how to say “I’m pregnant and angry” in Italian.  Then everyone crowded around the dock.   The ferry comes in, while lowering a big ramp, and very tired dock workers trying to push back a large crowd.  It was not a glamorous Capri experience.  The ramp lowers to show a large crowd waiting sadly on the car deck.  Several are supported by friends to get off and looked very green.  We a crowd on and get seated.  Then on the sea we learned first why the small boats were cancelled and second why the previous passengers looked so sad and sick.  Pregnant angry British lady becomes pregnant sick angry British lady.  Longest 70ish minutes ever.  Then we’re at Naples. Even more terrifying taxi ride to the train station.  A metro ride to the Convent of St. Chiara.  Which is humongous, and covered in painted tiles and paintings. 

The church was mostly destroyed in WWII, but had been reconstructed.  Then lunch of extremely cheap street food.  I got a mini pizza, and a breaded rice ball fill with cheese, sausage, and tomato, called Arancini, because they’re the size and shape of an orange.   Then the Archaeologic museum to see the treasures of Pompei.  Amazingly detailed mosaics, and everyday objects, but I was really to tired at this point after the stressful boat ride to spend too much time here.  Naples is a very active, exciting city, but I don’t know how long I could take it.  Very loud, crazy traffic, hard to cross the street, and graffiti on every single surface.  But it definitely has a distinct character and is very alive as a city.

Then the express circumvesuviana metro to Sorrento.  I’m stuck by the doors with my luggage with a bunch of loud people from Chicago.   Then Sorrento, which is a shopping town for sure.  Gnocchi, onion, and prosciutto for dinner.

The next day:

Took the Circumvesuviana train into Naples to Hertz rent a car.  Lots of things to see today which are difficult to access on public transport.  First, a visit to Solfatara

. 

Which is amazing.  It’s a smoking big flat caldera of a Volcano, which you can walk around almost unrestricted.  Only a single fence to protect a bubbling mud pit “The gates of Hades”.

Hades

The soil is white ash and sulfur, hot to the touch, and smells like bad eggs.  There are unprotected huge steam vents, which you can get as close as you want to to.  It’s an alien landscape for sure.  They seem to be confident it won’t explode, as there’s a campground right in it.  Then lunch by the harbor of the best pizza ever in Pozzuoli. Apparently, Pozzuoli invented pizza, but Naples had the idea to use tomato sauce.  Saw a submerged market ruin, and old theater, then drove around a large lake.  Tried to see our old family house, but the neighborhood was locked.  Then drove out to a point of the bay.  Stopped at an overlook and had a long conversation with an old Italian man.  He liked to sit on the overlook, and even suggested an Italian boy I could marry right then if I wanted to stay.  I declined. He had a very sad story, his daughter had left with a sailor from the US Navy and never returned.

Then we got lost several times on a mountain.  Then got lost at the bottom of the mountain looking for the Arch of Happiness (Arco di Felice).  Gave up looking, but accidentally found it on the way to see the Sybil of Cuma.  In terms of Oracles, she was right up there with the one at Delphi.  The entrance is a long gallery.  Extremely spooky.  The sun illuminates the path only in the late afternoon, when it comes through the windows.  At the end are three larger dark chambers, with rocks where the Sybil’s throne was.  Apparently, toxic gases from the.volcano would keep the Oracle constantly hallucinating (the toxic gas is gone now).  At some point the whole gallery was filled with rubble and bricked over, only being accidentally discovered in the 1930’s.  Then an easy drive to the Naples airport to return the car, and another bus back to Sorrento.  The city really fills up on the weekend.

Leaving Taormina today on the train.  The station at Taormina is very pretty, Mediterranean, and romantic. 

Sat on the train with a very chatty Canadian, then pretended to sleep for a while to get some quiet.   Then actually slept for a while.  Left train at Naples, then took a very scary taxi to make a ferry to Capri.  Apparently red lights are only suggestions for Neapolitan taxi drivers.  There was a great red light running left turn across three lanes of traffic, but it did help to make the ferry.  At the ramp to what was definitely the correct boat, three sailors indicated that the boat was going to Sorrento.   Joking because I was running to the boat. Then on the boat, another sailor said the boat as going to Ischia.  Joking also.  They were in cahoots and thought this all was very funny.  On Capri it was very pretty.  The town is on a mountain leading down to the marina.  You have to take a cable car to get to the main town from the harbor. Then a main square and streets full of designer clothes.  Capri is very touristy, but somehow still a lot more likeable than other tourist cities.  Probably because it’s extremely pretty.   Unreasonably pretty.  I stayed at a family hotel, with views of the Mediterranean.  It started to rain and we ran to the nearest restaurant, Isodoro, which was full.  I had actually the best ever spaghetti and clams.  As in both the spaghetti and the clams were the best I had ever had of all spaghettis and clams respectively.  Then white wine, espresso, and a gratis limoncello at the end. I have to see if they sell limoncello at Spec’s.

The next day:

Capri continues to be cold. The water is very kicked up, and no boats are going out except for the largest ferry.  So no blue grotto today.  We hiked all the way up about a mile of incline through narrow alleys and very nice houses and gardens.  The women walking down from these houses were well dressed and spoke standard Italian.  This is a big change from the people in town and in Sicily who had much heavier accents when speaking Italian, and preferred their own dialect among each other.  Dialect = incomprehensible.  The town Italian is tricky too, as several phonemes see changed.  Like “rosso” becomes “rosho”.  And a lot of word endings disappear.  Very confusing.  Anyway, at the top of the hill/mountain is the Villa Jovis and a park with great views and questionable wooden railings.  The Villa is where Emperor Tiberius liked to vacation.  There are wild goats up here which like tourists.  The villa is mostly ruined, but you can get a general feel for the scale of it, and the view of the sea.

the view

Then a short hike/climb through the woods/cliff to a modern modern villa, Villa Lysis.  In the early 1900’s, a rich Swede basically kidnapped a teenager off the streets to use as his “muse” etc.  He brought him back to this Villa, which was all white walls and gaudy gold decorations, and had statues and paintings made of him.   After a time the Swede overdosed on drugs mixed champagne in his own personal opium den in the basement. Then left nothing to the muse in his will, because he wasn’t an aristocrat.  The whole house is very eerie.   The villa is run now by an old man who has handwritten signs to it all over the city.  After, tried to go down to the Via Krupp scenic path  but it was closed for weather.  Then took a bus to Anacapri, the town above Capri to see what there was to see.  The main sight was a now closed church where the floor is one continuous scene painting on tiles. 

Then a bus to the secondary harbor to see the waves.  This is usually a beach, but the sea level was over the first floor of the beachside restaurants, and crashing up to the second level.

The buses seem at too large for the roads. On the way up from the little marina the bus scraped a wall, but this didn’t seem to be a big deal.  Capri in the storm as almost deserted because of the ferry cancellations.  We were probably the only customers of the night at Isidoro, which had been full the night before.  The bed

Day 1: This was a beautiful day.  Perfect weather, no clouds.  First, breakfast overlooking the view.

Then a walk up to the ruins of the Greek theater.  Taormina seems to have been very successful in the 3rd century BC when this year was built.  There was seating for hundreds, and it was all very big and fancy.

Greek theater

Then, a walk to the public gardens.  Which were beautiful, lots of trees and flowers all overlooking the water. Also, cages with parrots for some reason.   There were several large  elaborate fake wooden buildings that looked like they had been designed by a eccentric and/or crazy person. Then a walk through the main tourist street, which was very pretty, but also very touristy. Mostly Germans and Brits. Then lunch at a pizza restaurant of course overlooking the water. The town is so steep that everything overlooks the water.  Then a ride in a cable car down to the beach/the Isola Bella.

This beach is entirely made of baseball sized  rocks, so not too comfortable to walk on.  The island (isola bella) was unfortunately closed on Mondays.  It’s connected to land by a tiny 3 foot wide sand walk.   I saw people swiming around the rocks so I swam out too. Turns out, the only people swimming were Germans, their like the Canadians of Europe.  Then took a boat ride with a local man and spoke only Italian!  I saw a blue grotto, and swam a bit.  Very very cold in the water.  Then a dinner of pastries from “the wizard of pastries” Roberto.  His specialty is the “mafioso”, which I think is flavored  almond paste rolled in almonds, then powered sugar.  Also, cannolis.  Then, since my stomach was uneasy from the sugar, stopped at a bar for an espresso and a panini.  It’s amazing how cheap little sandwiches are here. Then bed.

Day 2: Today was a bus tour of Agrigento and the Villa Armerino.  Agrigento is all the way on the south coast of Sicily, and is a large complex of Greek Temples.  One was almost complete, one was semi complete, one was totally ruined, and one was totally ruined, but extremely large.  They were all Doric, which is the earliest and simplest temple style.  Very successful civilization, until they got conquered (by the Capodocians I think?).  Then to the interior of Sicily to see the Villa Armerino.  This is an amazingly preserved Roman villa.  Enormous.  The reason to see it is the mosaics.  Almost perfectly preserved.  I couldn’t take pictures, but the most amazing are the “bikini girls”, and a very long hallway showing a hunt in Africa, and return to Rome.  These mosaics had action scenes, and perspective drawing.  It looked was more advanced than what I would have expected from 300 A.D.    Then a ride back to Taormina.  You could say that interior Sicily is not economically very good right now.  Like 50% youth unemployment.  They landscape is very mountainous and rugged, but full of wheat, grapevines, and orchards. At Taormina,  more pizza, then pastries for the train.  Then bed