While I love our Garmin GPS device, when you don’t have a precise address for a destination, it makes things quite a bit more difficult than you ever imagined. Add to that the stress of the rental car and navigating crazy switchbacks and narrow alleyways through tiny villages. What should have taken us about 3 hours to drive from Rome to the Fattoria Poggio Alloro, took us about 5 hours. Five hours of frightful uphill stalls, stopping to ask directions from Italians in tiny villages that really don’t speak English, and Cathy quietly praying for us all from the back seat.
I will spare you the 5 hour play-by-play, but I do want to mention the one stop we made in a tiny village somewhere between the interstate from Rome and San Gimignano. We stopped at a tiny café in hopes of finding a single soul that spoke enough English to either give us directions or draw us a map. Out of the three Italians in the café, they all tried to explain the directions to us in…you guessed it – rapid-fire Italian. We finally asked, through a delightful series of charades, if they could draw us a map. The four of us huddled around the bar while we watched the man draw a line north, then east, then south, then west. He then wrote “San Gimignano” inside. He’d drawn us a box around the words San Gimignano. Then he wrote “10k” below the boxed San Gimignano, spoke some more rapid-fire Italian and tapped the words a bunch of times with his pen. Huh. For all of you who may at some time in the future be called upon to draw a map for someone, please hear this lesson and actually draw a real map, not just words. J
Anyway, with the help of an English-speaking girl at a hotel in another tiny village, we were able to finally locate Fattoria Poggio Alloro Agriturismo, the working farm and vineyard where we would spend the next few days with my parents. My, what a beautiful site the farm was when we arrived! I’m not positive, by I may have seen my husband kiss the dirt of the farm, for allowing him to get out of the dreaded Dodge and not have to drive anymore that evening. Of course, that could have just been my imagination, too. J The Agriturismo is situated on the top of a hill, where you have an incredible view of the surrounding fields and village of San Gimignano rising out of the top of a hill in the distance. The view was so amazing, we all commented it looked like a backdrop to a movie (such as The Princess Bride) instead of real life. www.fattoriapoggioalloro.com
We all shared a meal made from 95% organic from their farm that evening, complete with course after course of melt-in-your-mouth cheese puff pastries, three kinds of beef salami, spaghetti, salad, roast beef, ice cream and fruit, and of course, their own wines. A deliciously stuffing outdoor meal, with the amazing view all around! It was so wonderful to be together with my parents, Mel, and Cathy!
During our last evening at the Agriturismo, we took a long walk along some of their 200 acres. It was so nice to enjoy the Tuscan countryside…until the sky abruptly turned dark as a large storm approached. We all hightailed it back to the Agriturismo in time to miss the rain, but catch the power outage. After the storm had passed, the resulting clouds and sunset made it appear as if the sky were on fire! Absolutely gorgeous and a wonderful way to end our time together!
---Arielle
