Volterra

After my bike recon, we all went to Volterra.  I had the best sandwich ever.  

from this place

and saw this interesting bike jersey

then back to the villa

I found another cool ride with some nice graded gravel

A longish bike ride to Volterra

It was a pretty hot day, but some nice riding.  Large sections were on major roads though, which was not quite as nice.  Volterra is a touristy but nice town

Here is chloe's new running outfit.  

We made pizzas on the grill

San Miniato

We drove to San Miniato for lunch.  This time it was pappardelle with wild boar ragu.

 One pasta shape you see a lot of in this area is "Pici", which I really like.  Definitely one of my favorites.  We also climbed the tower (which we can see from the villa, many miles away)



and visited a truffle-emporium.


 The area as a whole is known for truffles.  There is even a statue of a guy holding what looks like a rock with which he is about to club his dog with, but is actually a gigantic truffle:

And found the local slow food outpost, which is ALWAYS CLOSED

Hanging out in the villa salon

Playing chess, as one does.

WINE

We went to a wine tasting with Stephanie.  I had found the winery on tripadvisor:  Agricole, SSA.  The people were very nice, and the wine was really good.  Stephanie bought us some wine!

Tuscany

The basement

This was in the basement of the villa:

Meanwhile, above:

A bike ride to San Gimignano

I went for a lovely bike ride to San Gimignano and Certaldo.  Rolling hills, wineries, Ferrari:  Molto Belissimo!

A trip to Tuscany

Stephanie had been wanting to rent a villa in Italy for a family vacation for a long time, and she found what looked like a very nice place on TripAdvisor.  She planned everything almost a year in advance, and invited everyone to come, including my mom.  Unfortunately, the great hip fracture of 2014 made it impossible for her to get there, but we still had Stephanie, us, Christa, Tom and Sophia there. Because of the logistics involved, two cars were necessary, so I drove down with Zoe.  We stopped at a restaurant near Susa for some delicious mountain fare (I found this place in the Yellow Book)

And after a few more hours of driving, made it to a nondescript dirt road, which we followed almost to the end to find an incredible villa.  It was, as the cliché goes, out of the movies.  High ceilings, fantastic kitchen, private pool.  I felt like we should have been arriving by private plane or helicopter.