FROM AZ BEEMER MEMBER BRIAN BOLES:
Sunday - Viaggio di Bagagio Smarriti: Which means "Trip of Lost Luggage".
So far, Melanie's and Don's luggage were lost and fortunately recovered. The Christensen's luggage has yet to arrive. So, Melanie and I spent the first 2 days in Firenze emergency clothes shopping. We did get to see a lot of the city doing that and I guess as a bonus, Melanie has a new Italian wardrobe.
But aside from lost luggage, we are all here in Tuscany.
A quick word about the scooters. You may remember that when Don suggested this trip, I posted a picture of an elephant on a scooter. Don replied "No problem, we can fit 2 up on a Vespa scooter, no problem." What the big goof didn't mention is that he had upgraded himself and Donna to a super-scooter Aprilia Scarabeo 500cc.
Now since neither Melanie and I are Italian underwear models, and the Vespa seats are clearly designed for at most 2 Italian underwear models, we are a bit jammed on the seat. A lot of the couples are complaining about the seating accommodations of the Vespa.
Monday: So, now that I've finished my Italian Whine -
Today was the first riding day. The riding is spectacular. Awesome scenery. Small twisty roads up and down the hills of Tuscany. Historic architecture abounds.
The scooters perform quite well. They are great for slicing through the Italian traffic in the city of Firenze, but only about 1/2 of the group has the Italian riding style down yet. You got to view the cars as markers and weave your way through the stacked traffic at the lights and get up to the front. It's call "Filtering" here. Outside of the city, the scooters aren't super fast, but for the curvy roads they have plenty of speed and actually pick up out of a corner quite well.
So, today after getting out of Firenze traffic, our first stop was an overlook of the city on the side of a mountain to the south of town. After getting some nice city shots, we got out in the country roads amongst the olive, apple, grape, sunflowers and other crops. The grapes looked delicious but we didn't get to stop to steal some off of the vine.
We stopped in the town square of Greve in Chianti. This town has a famous butchery and wine/cheeze store that we visited. I love italian salame and ham, so we bought some samples along with Brunello wine. Myself and our friends Mark and Linda maxed out the storage with wine, cheese and ham.
The next leg was about a 60 mile ride through the Tuscan countryside. This was the most enjoyable riding. We did lose half of the group when they got too far back and took the wrong exit of a roundabout.
Our guide, Dominic, isn't the best at keeping the group together. He tends to run too far out front and not slow down at critical turn points. But all of the ladies on the tour are hot for him since he's a Italian stud boy.
The next town we got to is San Gimignanao and is called the Manhattan of the Middle Ages because the residents got into tower building contests as a way to show the family wealth. So on top of a hill, there's this ancient town with 14 towers of various heights. This was our lunch break. Mark, Linda, Melanie and I found a truly excellent resturant. Off the beaten path. Mark and I had pizza, Linda had pasta and Melanie got a beef filet in a mushroom puree sauce that was spectacular.
This town is a bit of a tourist trap, and it has 2 gelato shops, one that claims to have the "world champion gelato" and the other "the best gelato in the world". We chose the world champion. Yep, tastes like gelato !
On the way back to Firenze, we passed a winery that was pressing grapes. You could smell the grapes from a long distance and outside the factory, trucks were lined up to pick up the squashed grapes and stems which I assume become fertilizer or grappa.
We got back to Firenze about 5PM which made traffic really sucky. I wasn't about to let Dominic out of my sight, plus with my Mexico experience, I'm used to dodging traffic that is "unorganized". Some of the folks really need to work on those "filtering" skills and we wouldn't have to stop so often to re-group. We refilled the scooters before getting back to the hotel. I think I used the most gas since ours is 2-up and I was cranking that puppy for all it was worth.
Just had a dinner with exceptional anti-pasti (including a liver pate) and pasta that was OK but not great. Dessert (panna cotta for us), +++.
Tomorrow, we head north for higher mountains and Mugello.
Ciao.
