October 25 & 26, 2009

Bob’s Sabbatical

October 25 & 26, 2009

 

Sunday, October 25 - 
We wake to a glorious sunrise.  We
decide to lie low today, read, pick flowers, etc.

            About 4:30
pm I decide to go check email – have to go outside to get wireless.  After that, I remember seeing something about
Daylight Saving time ending soon, so I google it.  Sure enough, TODAY the time changed in the
European Union.  We didn’t get to take
advantage of our extra hour of sleep this morning!  And now, the sun is already going down.  Until next week, Franklin will only be 6
hours behind us, since you do not change until this coming week.

 

Monday, October 26 – We decide to head to Volterra and a
little town named Mazzolla today.  As we
head down our hill, I get a picture of an old farmhouse, with a satellite dish
on the roof and solar panels in the yard.

            After we
pass Siena, we turn onto winding roads with some gorgeous scenery.  Some leaves are starting to turn as fall
approaches.  Fields have been plowed,
some have been disked.  There are few
straight lines anywhere.  I think God
likes things this way.

            We park
in an underground garage and walk into the town of Volterra, known for its
alabaster.  It was established by the
Etruscans and later settled by the Romans. 
The Piazza is the site of the Palazzo di Priori, the medieval seat of
government.  This one is the oldest of
its kind in Tuscany.

            Next we
head for the tiny town of Mazzolla (Franklin’s Historic Overlay district is
twice as big).  We’ve been told that a
couple of Australians have a wonderful Herb nursery here.  As we wind along a narrow (what else is new?)
road, we spot a heard of sheep.  It looks
like a great view beyond them, so I stop to take a picture, leaving the car
running and Susan in it.  As I get away
from the car, I hear the sheep bleating, but also the sound of many bells.   Each one of those sheep has a bell on its
collar, and since they are all walking along, the bells are making a wonderful
pastoral sound.  I go back to the car,
tell Susan to “listen,” (She cannot actually see the sheep now), and turn off
the engine. We sit and listen to the music of the sheep-bells and the quiet as
we take in the view across the valleys and mountains.

            We drive
into Mazzolla, not seeing any Herb Nursery, much less Trattoria Albana one of
Tuscany’s originals that is still intact (which is the real reason we made this
little side trip).  After a quick circuit
of about two blocks – the whole town, we are back where we started.   We
decide to park and walk back to see how we managed to miss what we came for.  Susan asks some people in the piazza, and
they tell us that the trattoria is closed. 
We walk to where they point, and there is a paper sign on the door, “Chusia-
ferie,” [Closed – vacation].  On the way
out of town, we look for the Herb Nursery, but never see it.

            We
finally find another place to eat.  By
the time we drive back in to Montestigliano at 5:15pm, the sun is going down, no
Daylight Saving Time anymore.  Maybe we’ll
get that extra hour by going to bed early tonight.

  Peace,  Bob