Italy Road Trip: Tuscany & Florence
We were on our way to Florence, a historic city steeped in culture, famed for its art collections, a place often touted as the birthplace of the Italian renaissance.
I had a lovely warm welcome from Italy. I’m not telling you that Mr. Berlusconi was waiting at the end of a red carpet with an invitation for some ‘bunga bunga’ with ‘Ruby the heart stealer’. I should be so lucky. I meant that literally it was sunny and warm, which obviously was an improvement on the weather in England.
From now on, I would be in control of our navigation. In a somewhat bizarre role reversal, it was the passenger who knew exactly where to go and how to get there and the driver who had absolutely no clue where he was or where he was going. Andre clearly fancied himself to be some kind of ‘free spirit’. He would do all the driving, but he simply wanted to follow commands. He seemed to take pride in ignorance of where he was. He was thinking, ‘’I’ve gone well off the beaten track and I’ve gone and got myself bloody lost, isn’t it fantastic!’’. He was Indiana Jones the great explorer. I was R2-D2, pre-occupied with the details and happy to be involved. However, in this moment we were Perugia, which was nowhere to boast about. Unless you are boasting that you just flew into the cheapest airport in Italy.
Perugia airport is cheap because the location isn’t very good. Of course, if you hiring a car, you can alleviate that problem very quickly. The great thing about Perugia airport is that it is about as big as a kindergarten and as quiet as a library under the auspices of a very strict librarian. I was surprised to read that it had been extended in 2011, tempting me to assume that before it was about as big as my house. It currently serves 5 airlines, offering flights to 10 destinations. To put this into perspective, London Heathrow serves over 90 airlines, offering flights to over 170 destinations. I was outside in 5 minutes. What a delightful escape it had been. We bundled in to our Fiat 500. This is by far the most popular hire car in Italy. It’s a small car, perfectly designed to negotiate the tight cobbled streets of Italy’s old towns. It’s also an agile car, designed to slalom its way up and down snaking roads that straddle the mountains. I imagined how comical it would be if an American was dropped into Italy with one of their notorious muscle cars, something like a Ford Mustang or a Shelby GT 500. They would not be suited to Italy’s roads at all. Imagine a salmon trying to swim on the moon. It would look kind of like that.
Our trusty Fiat was to perform admirably throughout the week. We had absolutely no complaints, especially as the price had been very reasonable, the car costing less than €100 to rent for the week (excluding fuel costs and those pesky toll charges on every motorway). It would have been so cool to hire a vintage Fiat 500, a few of which we did see on our travels, however they cost over €100 per day and we couldn’t afford that!
The route I had curated for day one was to reach Florence, passing along the shoreline of Lake Trasimeno on route. Trasimeno is the fourth largest of Italy’s great lakes. I was disappointed not to find a place to have a dip, as I had somewhat optimistically packed swimming shorts. It would certainly have been a little chilly by October, but not too cold for a brave soul like me. We made a brief stop at Passignano, a small town by the shore, as we had spied some enticing castle ruins above the town. We spent an enjoyable hour walking up the steep and narrow alleyways of the town, enjoying the ambiance of a quiet, old town which seemed to have changed very little over the years. Unfortunately the castle ruins were closed, as we were visiting during the week in off-season. Nonetheless, I felt accomplished, as we were exploring the type of areas we had hoped to find. Passignano was a local area and represented an authentic portrait of Italian life. We were charmed by the old architecture, the scenery and the calm, slow, pace of life that existed there. If you do have some time to explore Lake Trasimeno, then consider ferry trips across the lake, to other towns or to its small islands, consider tours of any of the many hilltop castles in the region or enjoy a cycle ride on the 50km of cycle path surrounding the lake.
Moving onwards, we soon exclaimed in excitement as we passed from the region of Umbria into the region of Tuscany! Tuscany is world famous for its picturesque scenery, usually depicted amidst steep rolling hills, with vineyards and cypress trees leading up to quaint old estates. We had high hopes that just driving through Tuscany would prove to be a delight in itself. However, the main attraction of the day was ahead of us. We were on our way to Florence, a historic city steeped in culture, famed for its art collections, a place often touted as the birthplace of the Italian renaissance.
Would you like a very brief history lesson on Florence? Excellent, settle down then. I’ll put the kettle on. Unsurprisingly, Florence was established by an ancient Roman named Sulla, as a land reward for his veteran legionaries. Fast forward to January 1st, 1449, and a baby named Lorenzo de’ Medici is born. The Medici family established a ruling dynasty in Florence that lasted throughout the 15th and 16th centuries and their influence extended far beyond their city. Prominent bankers, their money flowed into the hands of monarchs and traders across Europe. They supported English Kings fighting in France whilst they supported the struggles of the Papacy in Rome. It was during this time that the Italian Renaissance movement burst into life. Michelangelo and Leonardo di Vinci both spent considerable time in Florence, working as artists. Machiavelli, a political theorist, most notorious for his work The Prince, which endorsed unscrupulous but effective exercise of power, was another prominent Florentine. That should suffice to give you a flavour of the historical significance of the city.