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Published: August 3rd 2009
Despite the beauty of the natural thermal waters at our doorstop, we did feel the need to venture out around Tuscany.
On the verge of losing our newly acquired skills, Sunday took us on a search of the Lamborghini Golf Course, which was the closest one to our hotel. The hotel said it was 30 minutes away (and it could be if you know where you’re going and drive like an Italian) but for us it took us about an hour. We went searching for food on our way but it was past 3pm by the time we got to Panicale, a tiny town, nothing was open.
We hit some balls, although I was pretty bad that day and was cursing quite a bit. Must have been the hunger.
Shane’s turn to curse came later, on our way home (after we found a local bar with the tastiest €1 pizza) when I followed the signs back to San Casciano dei Bagni from Citta della Pieve, a gorgeous hill-top town. The road I took was a dirt road that took us ALL the way down to the bottom of the hill and then it had us driving alongside the
rail tracks. Shane does not like to be lost, period. I think it’s kind of fun when there’s lots of petrol in the tank; Shane does not. After a few wrong turns, we ended up on a paved road that eventually led us to where we wanted to be. The trip home was more like 1.5 hours. Next time we’ll do it in 30mins for sure.
On Tuesday we felt like visiting Montepulciano as it was so close. On our way there we stopped in Chiusi, a small town by the highway, to pick up our train tickets to Budapest. The ticket agent didn't really speak English but we managed to sort it out. My theory that using the French/Spanish word and adding an 'o' on the end sometimes works!
The drive to Montepulciano was gorgeous and we stopped lots along the way to take pictures, particularly of all the random fields of sunflowers. Seriously, what says Tuscany more than fields of sunflowers? Montepulciano was a cute town, we wandered around and bought a bottle of wine but still haven't drank it yet. We learnt what 'Nobile' wines of Tuscany were: more than 80% sangiovese grapes used and
they can only come from one of 70 vineyards nearby. The town itself was very hilly, quite touristy and hot. We were happy to have spent an afternoon there but not much more.
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