I love the Tuscan Countryside

Really.

This weekend I ventured to Cortona and Arezzo with SAI for the much anticipated Tuscan Movie Tour. Imagine watching a movie, looking out the window, then looking back at the tv and seeing the exact same scene that is outside the bus window. That's what I did this weekend in a nutshell.

We began by going to Cortona where Under the Tuscan Sun was filmed. First of all, I love that movie. Second of all, I walked on the land that it takes two oxen two days to plow. No joke - we were driving up this hill and around these really curvy curves in a giant charter bus (I was a little afraid we were going to hit either an ancient wall lining the road or a mophed parked along the side of the road; fortunately we hit neither.) and watching the scene where Paolo and Chiara are getting married. There is a shot of a church on the side of a hill. We passed that church and then moments later watched that scene.

The town was quite wonderful as well - small and quaint as all Tuscan towns should be. We toured through some churches there, ate a quick lunch, then hiked down the road to 'the villa.' 'The villa' in fact where the movie was actually filmed. I think the best part of all may have been that though we were with this tour guide from Florenc for Fun, and it was an organized outing with 70 or so students, we actually snuck onto the property. This was just the type of activity Sarah Rumsey would have loved - trespassing.

After Cortona we hopped back on the bus and began watching La Vita è Bella as we travelled to Arezzo. To get into Arezzo though, we actually had to ride a bunch of escalators up a hill and through the city wall. It felt as though we were in an underground train station or subway, and then suddenly we walked through these modern automatic doors and onto a stone road standing in front of a 12th century church. After that it didn't feel at all modern anymore, and there were no more escalators. Around a few corners from the church we walked into the piazza where some of the scenes for the movie were shot. Actually a similar thing happened when we got back on the bus in that the very next scene to appear was in that very piazza. I bought candy and foccacia bread in Arezzo.

Then I watched the sunset over the Tuscan countryside as we drove back to Florence with the end of La Vita è Bella playing on the television.

I like Italy. I enjoy travelling around, but just as much as I like Italy, I like Florence. I like that I live in Florence. I'm not a tourist in Florence or just passing through, I live here. I like waking up and going to my favorite cafè and shopping for fresh things and sweaters at the San Ambrogia Market. I like drinking caffèlatte with a dolce filled with nutella. I like eating il pollo and spinaci from a Salumeria. I like sitting in Piazza di Santa Croce and watching the day turn into evening and then into night. I like drinking wine with my dinner and getting stuffed on bread and olive oil. I like that the streets aren't smooth and not all the cars have four wheels (some have three). I like sketching statues and listening to street music from Loggia della Signoria. Italia. firenze. La dolce vita.

- io