April 17
Perugia, doh!, Arezzo

Arezzo was an excellent place to stroll around. Most of the narrow medieval alleys you see in other towns were blasted away in WWII and then replaced with wide, pedestrian-friendly avenues. Okay, that made it sound like Disneyland Italia, which it isn't.

We walked through the Church of San Francesco to see a 13th century fresco called the Legend of the True Cross, which tells an interesting story, although for a skeptic like me, a difficult one to really take seriously. It goes basically like this: When Adam got old and died (very interesting depiction of Adam and Eve as old folks, with all the wrong parts sagging), his kids planted a twig on his grave from the original Tree of Knowledge - you know, the forbidden fruit, the snake, Inna Gadda Da Vida and all that. When it came time for the Crucifixion of Christ, the Romans fashioned the cross from wood taken from that very tree. After the Resurrection, the cross was buried, then rediscovered, then stolen, then recovered in a bloody war, and finally returned to Israel.

There wasn't a lot of time to study all this because, as our luck would have it, just as we were getting to the good part about Solomon thinking he was the greatest king of the world who would be crucified with wood from a bridge made from the tree grown from the twig (it's a long story), a bell started to ring and a priest began to chant in Latin. Kathy was standing in the middle of Sunday mass, and I'm trying to decipher a sign in Italian that says something about visitors being forbidden to do something on Sundays after 11 am. We quietly left and I wouldn't let Kathy have the camera until we were safely outside. We walked on and toured the ruins of a 16th century Medici fortezza (fort) and another domed church (duomo) with some very cool stained glass that's five centuries old.

The highlight of the day in Arezzo naturally involved food. We ate lunch at a fancy trattoria called La Lancia Soro on the Piazza Grande. We chose it because, 1) it had inside seating, 2) it was starting to rain again, 3) we recognized spaghetti on the menu outside, and 4) they accepted MasterCard. The food and the service were outstanding. As soon as we were seated, the waiter poured a glass of champagne for each of us and explained they only do that on Sundays. This was followed by a basket of assorted breads dipped in rich, green, locally-pressed olive oil. Then came a tiny bowl of cold soup, Kathy got tomato and I got pea, both of which were surprisingly tasty. Kathy's main course was a lasagna baked fresh with homemade pasta, mozzarella, and shaved truffles on top - by far the best dish we'd had so far. I got farfalle pasta with a cream sauce and bits of spicy beef. And then came dessert! We shared a truly heavenly Tiramisu. I drank espresso and Kathy had a cappuccino. Oh yes! I forgot to mention the palate-cleansing pre-dessert of mini-cream puffs filled with a cheesy, creamy mixture. Yummy!

After that two-hour Italian lunch, we waddled back to the station wagon and took a short catnap before driving back toward Chiusi and La Boncia. We took a more scenic route back home, avoiding the autostrada, and happened across another medieval castle, Castle il Castiglione Montecchio. We parked the car and trekked up a giant hill on foot, but when we arrived at the castle door, no one was home. The return trip also took us along the shore of Italy's fourth largest lake, Lago Trasimeno, where Hannibal, of elephant fame, kicked butt and killed 16,000 Roman Legionnaires back a couple hundred years before Rome really took over.