Autostrada del Sole (ITC Week 19)

Indie Travel Challenge Week 19: Road Trips

 For week 19, we’d like you to design the perfect road trip. Who’s with you in the car? What kind of car are you driving? What snacks are in the cooler? What music is playing? And, most importantly, where are you?

When I read this prompt, the first thing that popped into my head was  sunlight pouring in the windows, catching a glimpse of Orvieto, an ancient town built on top of a cliff, out the window as I head south towards Rome on the Autostrada del Sole.  Giorgia’s Girasole (Sunflower) is next on the playlist, and I’ve brought along a bottle of A.C.E. fruit juice. It’s hot outside, but the air conditioner is thankfully working at the minute. 

 Even the name Autostrada del Sole, the Highway of the Sun, Interstate 1, seems an invitation to find out where it goes.  It’s the backbone of Italy’s interstate system, running like a spine from Milan to Naples.  In between, it passes through most of the major cities of central Italy, including Bologna, Florence, and Rome. 

When I lived in Italy, I traveled every mile of it at some time or another, most of those in a large and crowded van (the rickety old gray Bible School van on our way to a convegno in Velletri, just outside of Rome; crammed in the back of the di Marco’s van with the Naples crowd as I bummed a ride down to explore Naples after another trip to Velletri) or else riding along with the Shorts to Florence, or again Velletri.  I guess those trips to the women’s retreat and family retreats held at Velletri really added up the highway miles. 

However, the thing all of these trips had in common was that I was in route somewhere, and I had a time I needed to be there.  And while the sights along the way are nice even in passing, it would make a beautiful road trip if I had the time to wander: a side trip to the independent country of  San Marino, parking and taking the tram up into Orvieto to see the famous old church,  fields of sunflowers with the Tower of Pisa floating on the horizon behind them, eating the original ragu (meat sauce) in Bologna, meandering off side roads to explore the small towns perched on top of hills in rural Tuscany, parking at Piazza Michelangelo for the postcard-picture view of Florence, passing miles of empire-era aqueduct just south of Rome, and finally taking my life in my hands driving into the chaos of Naples, with Vesuvius looming over the city.  Dozens of other side trips would be possible, if the time and money held out. 

Sadly, it’s been three years since I left Italy; nearly as long as I lived there.  I still feel homesick sometimes to walk across Piazza del Duomo in Milan.  I thought when I left that I’d find a way to visit frequently, but as always, life hasn’t worked out that way.  Life instead took me even further the opposite direction, to China.  My Italian is getting rusty as there’s rarely anyone to talk to around here. You would think that after living for three years in Italy, I’d have seen it all, but I only scratched the surface.  I could spend three more years and still not make it everywhere I’d like to go: I’ve never seen Juliet’s balcony or the ancient amphitheater in Verona, taken a cable car up over the Alps into France from the mountains near Aosta, visited the Borghese Gallery in Rome (I could spend three years just in Rome), or gone to the little republic of San Marino, and the whole mainland of Italy south of Naples is unknown territory for me.  I’ve been to Catania and Mt. Etna in Sicily, but making the loop around Sicily would be another road trip of a lifetime in itself. 

First Week at the University

Today is an amazingly beautiful day--one of those fall days when the sky is such an exuberant blue that the green trees--barely tinged with orange--and the yellow and white buildings stand out sharply against it.   it's the first really "cool" day, when a jacket is actually needed.  After the humid haze of summer, this time of year always seems so clear and bright. 

I have finished the first week of class at the University of Florence.  I think I will like it. We are learning very practical, useful sorts of words in class.  Not being the slowest, like in the last school, is really helping; I think I am speaking better already because I am not so afraid of being wrong. 

It's fun to meet such a wide variety of people, too.  I've spent quite a lot of time talking with Cheryl, who is from Oregon, and her French husband, Matthieu.  Yesterday, Cheryl and I walked around Centro together while we waited for the bookstore to reopen after lunch so we could buy our workbooks for class. 

Today, I talked with a group of Japanese girls and a Nigerian woman during our break from class.  Tomako, one of the Japanese girls, taught me that in Japan, holding up the thumb is a gesture meaning "man", and the pinkie finger means "woman."  I don't really know where that came from, or why she wanted me to know that, but there we are. 

Now, I think I will take a bus back to San Marco or somewhere, and do some picture-taking.  It's the perfect day for it, and I figure I ought to get my looking-like-a-dorky-tourist in before I've been here long enough that I want to try to blend in as a local. 

Stopping to Write in the Piazza

The sun is at just the position to filter through the red brick and stucco buildings on the east side of the piazza.  in the afternoon light, the white facade of the opposite building (a church) shines against the cloudless blue sky.  A light breeze is blowing, and at least there is the shade.  It seems a little cooler than it has been.


I am sitting on the steps of the Istituto degli Innocenti in the Piazza S.S. Annunziata, listening to the water splash in the small fountain just out into the piazza.  The stone is stained with rust on the sides where the water has bounced off for so long.  An identical fountain is situated on the opposite side. 

Th focal point, however, of the piazza is a large statue of a man on horseback. A sign posted at the base reads:

"Equestrian monument to Ferdinand I, Bronze Giambologna--1608. The sculptor was eighty years old when he created this statue that was cast by his pupil, Pietro Tacca, using bronze from the cannons captured from the Barbareschi during the North Africa expedition led by the Knights of the Order of St. Stephen in 1607.  


To commemorate this event, the following words, dictated by Giovanni Villafranchi, were engraved in the girth of the saddle: De metalli rapiti al fiero Trace [from the metals taken from the proud Thracian].  The device of the sixty bees swarming around their queen on the bronze plaque (added to the base in 1640) on the side facing the church, was suggested to Ferdinando by Scipione Borghese (who found it in Book XI of Naturalis Historia by Pliny) to extol the generosity of the grand ducal government." 

Anna told me another story about the statue: instead of looking forward down the center street, which has a magnificent view of the Duomo two blocks away, the statue's head is turned so that he gazes searchingly into the corner.  Supposedly, there was a woman he fell in love with, but couldn't have as she had already married.  He never forgot her, and when his statue was erected he requested that it look towards the corner--where her window opened onto the piazza.  In this way, he would always be near her. 

I like this piazza because it is open, uncrowded, and quiet except for the buses that drive across the west end, by the church.  I especially like the view framed by an archway over the road when I look to the right from the Ospedale degli Innocenti: through the gateway, there is a succession of golden-stuccoed, red-roofed buildings so typical of the city, and beyond them, a hill dotted with villas.

I suppose I should have begun this journal on the plane or in the airport, the mark the beginning of this fresh part of my life; however, I am glad to start it now, and spare myself the recounting of the jet lag, caffeine headaches, and the adjustments and frustrations of the first few days.  I have been here for three and a half weeks, and I know I have plenty of adjustments and frustrations to go, but I am beginning to feel comfortable.  I bought this little book yesterday at the San Lorenzo market.  I know it's touristy, but after only three weeks the touristy things and places have not yet lost their appeal.  Besides, I love the smell of leather; that is something you certainly can't find in one of the chain bookstores.

[Note while typing this up, years later: I have never before nor since been bothered by jet lag much at all; I just stay up one night and get myself right on schedule without too many problems.  However, that time I had terrible headaches and fatigue; probably was a combo of the jet lag and the sudden and complete deprivation of Mello Yello, which I had drunk massive amounts of for years up until the day I flew to Italy.]

Today was my last day at the Istituto d'Italiano in Via Martelli.  Since the first I have planned--well, with the recommendation and request of the other workers-- to attend a semester of the 'corsi per stranieri' at the Universitá di Firenze.  However, the course does not begin until the second of October, so I did three weeks of language school at the Istituto.  I certainly did not want to sit around at the bible school being of little use to anyone for over a month. 

After three weeks, I am making progress in Italian, although it seems frustratingly slow right now.  I did well enough on the entrance exam to be placed in the second-level class--which was a good placement during the two-hour grammar half of the lesson.  However, the conversation class in the second two hours was over my head.  There are some disadvantages to studying alone. 

The sun has now lowered enough to be shining into my eyes from the direction of the duomo, and the steps are no longer shady.  I think I will go through the arched road and look at the gardens that should be a block in that direction, and then catch the 6 bus for Scandicci.

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Instead of going the way I planned, I turned to the right when I reached the corner of the piazza, through a long tunnel of sorts.  I wandered along past the Archaeological Museum, and over onto Via Laura.  Luckily, I am following the route of the 6 bus, so I will be able to wander further since I don't have to walk all the way back or find some other bus route.  I kept walking until I came to a large park, which after looking at the map, I think to be the Piazza M. D'Azeglio...In a city, I am always happy to find large trees and the smell of grass.  There are two large fenced sections: one, with a playground for young children, the other full of teenagers playing soccer.  There is a green-and-turquoise carousel on the far side, but it isn't running today.  Looking at the map, I should be very close to the Jewish temple with its sea-green dome.  I'll tell the story of our rainy Saturday spent at the temple some other time.  I feel like I'm beginning to get a feel for directions in the city.  The trick is to always know what direction the Duomo is.  Time to wander on...I wish I knew what time it is; my cell phone batteries are dead.