Sunday, October 28, 2007

Cortona and Perugia - Thursday cont.

It was a double header today, Cortona and Perugia, both to the southeast of Radda. Two hilltop towns, though Cortona was the hillier and Perugia offered the more intriguing edibles.

First to Cortona. There was quite a long approach to the center of town. We passed one open market that looked interesting but kept on going because we weren’t sure how far it would be to the real center of town and we didn’t have too much time available. Karin spotted a man sitting there chatting with his friends who sure looked a lot like Bruce’s Dad, so we said a quiet hello to Dad as we drove by. He certainly would have been among our most avid blog readers. And if he had been in Cortona that day, he’d probably have been out there chatting with his friends.

The center of town was indeed quite a ways away, both horizontally and vertically. Great views off the edge as we drove upwards. We finally got a slot in a parking lot just outside the city walls (which date back to pre-Roman Etruscan times) and started walking, again very much upwards. After a few rest stops along the way we found ourselves out of the built-up part of town and in the parking lot of a large church. GPS said that we had gained 400 feet in elevation from the parking lot. The hill continued a bit higher, but we were content where we were.

We didn’t get a look inside the church as the noon Mass was going on, but we surveyed the view, watched salamanders scampering in and out of a stone wall, and treated ourselves to some chocolate covered ice cream bars from a little shop next to the church. The chocolate tasted great—not at all waxy as one frequently encounters on ice cream bars back home.

Then we started down toward town by a different path. There were Stations of the Cross along side of it, wonderfully done in glass mosaic in the style we were to see more of in Ravenna. When seen at normal viewing distance the rather basic squares of color blended together so wonderfully. The detail was marvelous. Backgrounds were all full of action, and there was even a gold rim around Pontius Pilate’s hand basin. We learned later that these were done in the mid-1900s by Gino Severini, who had been a colleague of Picasso, Matisse, and other artists of the period. Sadly we failed to take any pictures, but we did get a good shot of the path. We’ll take better pictures of mosaics in Ravenna.

The bottom of the path took us onto the city streets, continuing steeply downhill. We were quickly surrounded by a mass of high school age kids with suitcases, clearly a tour group departing from the place where they had spent the night. We couldn’t pick up what language they were speaking. The road was so steep that they couldn’t decide whether to pull their suitcases behind them at an almost horizontal angle, or to let them assume a more normal angle out in front. Either way, the wheels sure made a great clattering sound on the cobblestone pavement.

Cortona appears to be quite a destination for students. We learned later that the Universities of Alberta and of Georgia both offer art-oriented programs there.

There were quite a number of nice art shops, food shops, and the like on the way in toward the center of town. Lunch for each of us was a slice of pizza, eaten while sitting on the steps overlooking the square.




GPS aimed us in the right direction toward the parking lot, though it did get a bit confused with one way streets that of course weren’t relevant to us as pedestrians. There were also times here and in many city locations where the signal just couldn’t penetrate down into the urban canyons. Our advice to anybody planning to navigate a city with GPS is to have alternate forms of directions available, keep an understanding of the big picture, and find a large open space to allow it to first gain sync before moving into areas of lesser reception.

On the way to the car we all stopped at a hole-in-the-wall loo. Literally. It was built into the city wall. It did feature real plumbing. We can recall a David Macaulay video which described earlier versions that hung over the edge and simply relied on gravity.

Then it was on to Perugia, the site of the Eurochocolate 2007 exposition! Again a hilltop city, with ever-growing modern outskirts. We don’t know too much about Eurochocolate. From what we can gather on the Web, it takes place in Perugia in the fall, in Modica in Sicily in the spring, and has also occurred in other cities in the past. It appears to be a mix of activities aimed at those in the chocolate profession and at those who just like to eat it. A lot of the latter took place in booths and tents along the main square and side streets. It was clear to all that Perugia is a landmark location in the chocolate industry; indeed, it was the source of the ice cream bars we had so enjoyed a few hours earlier in Cortona.

Our first hint that we had arrived at the scene of the action was the gigantic fussball table on our right as we neared the top of our climb up the hill. Then looking to the left were tents and booths, all selling various forms of chocolate: chocolate candy, chocolate drink, cooking chocolate, chocolate liqueur, everything chocolate! And wonderful street performers. Many of the booths were from what appeared to be established and well known manufacturers from all around Europe, while others were clearly local. Too few were offering free samples! We bought cups of what was called “hot chocolate,” which was just that. Warm, thick with the consistency of not-quite-cooked chocolate pudding, rich in taste, delicious! A cup of cocoa will never be the same again. B & SA also bought a small bottle of chocolate liqueur, which we are saving for a celebration when we sell our house.



Pinocchio puppet street performer




Mime street performer

Other than chocolate (and the amazing self-cleaning public loo, with room for two!), we can’t really say too much about Perugia. Chocolate was the reason we went there, and chocolate we got. We expect that there were many other nice things about the town, but we just didn’t go looking for them. Like the other hilltop towns we had visited, the views were spectacular.

Back to Radda on the winding roads through the hills. Quick stop at the supermarket. Dinner at our villa. Pack for the journey that begins tomorrow.

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