Touring Tuscany

We rented a car for the weekend and plan to visit the Chianti region area south of Florence. After a quick breakfast we are out the door and hit the road around 8:30. After leaving town we get on the toll highway and hope this is not going to cost us an arm and a leg. We get off it after Florence and near where we want to start our wine country touring. We were happy to find out that the tolls was only 5.6 Euro, less than $10 CDN. The speed limit was 130km/hr which we did not really achieve as we are in a small 4 door smart car but also lots of other people were also not going 130. Also the price of gas is around 1.6 Euro per litre, ouch.

We join the SR222, called Chiantigiana, at Strata in Chianti, this is one of the first towns on this road which takes you south in the Chianti wine country and goes from Florence to Sienna and is about 100 km long. It is what people most people think of when of when they think of Chianti. Vineyards, Olive Orchards, Rolling Hills, Hilltop Homes with Cypress Trees, Winding Roads with Small Valley Towns.

The next town we drive through is Greve, which is one of the main market towns in Chianti. There was a wine museum that might have been fun to do but it was too early to stop. We drove on the SR222 until Sienna with stops once in a while to admire the scenery. Also a few roadside pullover to let the locals pass us as we are not breaking any speed records on these twisty roads. Tons of vineyards to stop and do wine tasting and buy wine if you wanted to but not sure if they are all open early in the morning or in the off season. We can't imagine doing this in peak season. Many cyclist as today is Saturday on this road as well which is not very wide in many places. We also realised that there has been salt put down on the road as we go into the mountains, this must be for the bikers.

These are the types of view we saw all week-end, gorgeous!

Not fun coming across this on these narrow roads, no it was not a bike race

Our first stop on the SR222 is Monteflorelle which is one of the oldest towns in Chianti with a well preserved medieval castle. A small walk thru the town and off to the next stop



Pick your service time

Panzano which has fantastic views and one of its butcher is famous for being in a movie. This is another walking up in elevation on main street and back down. None of these towns are level.

We had a guide book at the apartment and in it was a recommended Southern Tuscany scenic drive. We had decided to do this after doing the Chianti drive and would stay overnight in Montepulciano.

So now we are on our second part of our day drive.

Once past Sienna, we take the SS2 to Buonconvento. It is not like the other towns in Tuscany as it is not built on a hilltop but instead in a valley. Easy parking right off the main road and next to the town walls. There a small gypsy market going on today as well. We walk around town for a while admiring the old buildings and gates into the city. As it it near lunch time we decide to grab something from one of the food trucks. We choose sandwiches, Mine was prosciutto and Wendy's was roasted pork. We sat in a small square in the sun. Mine was a tad salty but Wendy's was so salty it was almost not edible. I think we will be drinking water later on. I guess the salt makes it possible to have the pork out all morning without problems.

A door for the door

We were going to visit Montalcino next but after parking on the far side of town, we only walked a couples of blocks into town and turned around. We still had a lot of road ahead of us and it all starts to look the same. Beautiful buildings, walls, squares and churches.

Next stop was to visit the Abbazia di Sant'Antimo (the abbey of Saint Antimo) which was built in the 11^th century. Beautiful church with a small crypt in it. It stands alone in a field which makes it different from many of the city churches we have seem so far.

Our next stop was to visit Rocca d'Orcia which is a hilltop small castle surrounded by a small village. When we got there we saw the cranes and it was closed to the public. Beautiful views going up and down but no visit. So back to the car and we saved going up about 1000 steps as the castle was perched on the very top of the hill.

Bagno Vignoni is a bit of an unusual village/town. Instead of having a central Piazza, it has a enormous outdoor pool of warm sulphurous water from a natural spring. No one was in it, so I am not sure if it is open anymore or you need to use one of the spas in town, but a sign did say no swimming

Next on the list of stops is Pienza, a UNESCO World Heritage site. A small medieval place with its main attractions being the beautiful Piazza Pio II bordered by palaces and the Cathedral. We toured the church and the crypt which was an extra 2 Euro each. It is a small museum with relics from the past. The church is actually built on the edge of the hill and is sagging down at the alter end. Modifications were needed almost as soon as it was completed. The town is surrounded in parts by a walkway with fantastic views. Well worth a stop here.

We finally get to our destination for the night, Montepulciano. Googles says it is a 180KM / 2 hours drive. It only took us about 8 hours and 300km. Wendy is very happy to get out of the car for the night.

We have booked an airbnb just outside of town for the night. On google it looked like about 1KM to the walled city and about 2 to the centre of town. Easy we have been doing tons of walking. Well this turned out to be all uphill, so not so easy as we first thought. This is another beautiful town, well this is more of a city. Must be absolutely crazy in the summer, you can tell it is very touristy now.

We quickly got checked into our apartment, parked the car (never fun), and we set off for town hoping to get some views before sunset and dark. It does not disappoint, really gorgeous and worth the climb. Wish we had more time here, like I'm sure we will say everywhere we visit over the next few weeks.

Lots of restaurants in these tourist towns that are not open in low season, but there are still plenty to choose from. We ended up at a restaurant not far from the gate we entered so we didn't have as far to walk home. This is the first time we've had dinner out and been charged a cover charge per person, not sure how common this is, or if it is just because we are English.

Tons of wine shops selling local wines with free sampling. We ended sampling twice and we bought 1 bottle of red wine which we were going to have a bit when we returned to the apartment but we were both too tired to open the bottle.

One of the wine shops have some underground tunnels that you could visit. The had lots of wine barrels in there plus some other relics from the past. Carpenters tools, torture instruments, wine tools.

Speaking of torture, it must be a big thing here because we must have seen at least 3 or 4 torture museums.  

The walk back to the apartment was 10 time easier going downhill but much chillier as it was now pitch black.