After our two days in Cinque Terre, we were to take the train to Lucca for a stay of 11 nights. The best laid plans ... We caught the train from La Spezia Centrale as planned, with a change of trains in Viareggio. Or so we thought. Our connection was cancelled, so Trenitalia brought in a bus, which picked us up and took us directly to Lucca's station.
We walked to the walled city, navigated the fortifications, and found our way to our apartment, near the Guinigi Tower (the one you see in photos with trees on top of the tower).
In its infancy, Lucca was a Roman settlement, with a forum, amphitheater, and streets laid out in a grid. The forum is replaced by the busy Piazza San Michele, and the amphitheater is reflected in Piazza dell'Anfiteatro, another of the busiest squares in Lucca.
The thin medieval walls of the city were replaced, in Renaissance times, with very thick walls, due to the advent of cannon. Ironically, after that time the town was never attacked, so the walls now have a park and walkway around the city, so you can stroll or bicycle around the city atop the walls.
We enjoyed walking the walls, and did that on more than one occasion, and also rented a four-person bicycle and cycled the walls as well. We also walked through the city almost daily, enjoying the interesting shops (the ladies found bargains on clothes -- who would have thought it?), discovering restaurants, piazzas, and gelato!
We found our way to Palazzo Pfanner, a great house built within the walls of the old town of Lucca.
It was a bit rainy when we visited Palazzo Pfanner, so we were glad to duck into the house for a visit, just as it started to rain.
One afternoon, we took a stroll outside the walls, to find the Roman aquaduct.
Several days into our time at Lucca we decided to take the train to Florence (Firenze) to see somethings we had not seen when there some years ago. You can read about that visit here.
Our apartment in Lucca (which was wonderful!) was on Via Guinigi, only a few steps from Torre Guinigi, one of the historic towers in Lucca. This, as mentioned above, is the tower with trees growing at the top. Of course, we had to go up!
At the top the wind was howling, and rain was threatening, but we enjoyed the magnificent views of Lucca just the same.
Later in our time at Lucca we decided to rent a car for three days, to visit some areas that are not as easily reached by train or bus. The first day we drove to Populonia and the Etruscan Coast. This was an entirely new area for us. Having seen some great photos, our hope was, among other things, to see a magnificent sunset along the coast. It rained as evening came on, so we gave up on the sunset for that day.
The second day was a drive to the Chianti region, another area which we had not visted previously. We drove to Strada in Chianti, where we stopped to explore the town.
I had a number of specific photos I wanted to take while in Chianti, and so expected to have a separate page to link to with that day's travels. Leaving Strada, we went to Greve in Chianti, where we had an absolutely magnificent meal at La Cantina.
From Greve we stopped at a vineyard to explore, and the owner graciously allowed us to roam the vineyards, which were just ready for picking. She mentioned that certain grapes had already been picked, and others were ready to be picked in the next few days. We happily clambered up into the vineyards, and captured all the shots I had hoped for, or so it seemed.
From the vineyard we followed the recommendation of the vineyard owner, and went to Badia di Passignano, and abbey overlooking a vineyard, where we could see the grapes being harvested by hand, and trucks filled with grapes would rush by below us. I snapped pictures of all of this, of course, and even showed them to everyone on the back of my camera.
It wasn't until later, when I went to transfer the photos to the computer, that I realized something very unfortunate had happened. While the camera's internal memory had allowed me to review a few of the photos, not a single picture from the time we got to the vineyard through the rest of the day had been recorded to the memory card in the camera. It appears to have been a failure of the "write" mechanism of the card - almost as if the switch to protect the card had been flipped -- except it hadn't. There was nothing to be done about it. All those pictures are lost forever.
The third day's car rental was so we could easily visit two places - first, Villa Reale, not far from Lucca. Another grand estate. Sadly, photographs were prohibited inside the house.
After Villa Reale, we drove to Borgo a Mozzano, to see the Ponte di Diavolo (Devil's Bridge), a steep (when you walk it, you realize just how steep!) bridge dating from the 1100's, and reportedly used by medieval pilgrims.
For our final day or so in Lucca we treated ourselves to a lovely meal at a very nice restaurant (we kept remarking on how fortunate we had been in the quality of the meals we had experienced without much knowledge of the places selected) and, of course, gelato. We had one last walk on the walls, hoping for a sunset. We weren't disappointed!
Finally, I mentioned earlier the small skylight in our bedroom. Now it returns to the tale. The Torre Guinigi is lighted at night, and with the trees on top it is quite a spectacular sight. Naturally, I wanted to get a photo of it. I had tried, by opening the skylight and standing on the bed (since the bed is directly under the skylight), but it is so dark that the shutter has to be open for an unusually long time, and it is very difficult to the the shot without blurring from the camera moving. This last night I tried once more, using a small tripod on the tile roof (holding on to the camera, for fear it would clatter to the ground, four stories below). I was finally able to get one shot that was steady enough to work. The result is below.
Now off to Venice!
Credits:
Copyright © 2022 Scott Thomas, Scott Thomas Images. All rights reserved.