Cortona, made famous by Under The Tuscan Sun and many other things of course, was our first destination today. As in the past we were transported in the black pope mobile, however this time we were with the Canadians Kerry and Kathy.
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| A 'La Maesta' at the back of our accommodation titled La Maesta |
Starting at the top along side the Church of Santa Margherita, we followed a different route down this time, rather than taking the pilgrimage route we went through the steep streets of the town until we reached Piazza Garibaldi and Via Nazionale. This street Via Nazionale is also the only flat street in the town all others are on an incline of up to 40 degrees.
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| Photos never show how steep a path is. |
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| This rock is fitted in the corner to stop men urinating, if they do it will run onto there shoes. |
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| This lady was having a conversation with her neighbour, by shouting at her one floor below. |
We wandered the streets and made a few souvenir purchases for the kitchen at home.
We decided to have lunch at a place that had lovely views. Walking in we spoke to the waiter and he advised the kitchen opens in 20 minutes but we could have a drink and wait. That sounded good to us, so we took a table along the rail overlooking the Tuscan countryside.
At 12:20 he gave us the menus and as we placed our order we advised we would need to be out of the place by 1pm as our bus was coming then. He said no problem the kitchen will cook fast. To make things easy we went non Italian and both chose the hamburger.
It was around 12:50 and we started to get worried as the meals had not arrived, after gesturing to the waiter he indicated it was coming.
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| Waiting |
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| Waiting... |
Well by 1pm time was up our bus from LaMaesta had arrived, the Canadian couple were waiting and we didn't have lunch on the table! At this point we decided we weren't going to be walked over and went to the bar. We advised the waiter we would be leaving and as the meals had not arrived as promised we would like to pay for the drinks. Then with a whir and a ding the "dumb waiter" behind him opened and the hamburgers appeared. Standing our ground and knowing people were waiting on us in the piazza, we refused the hamburgers (which looked lovely) and asked for the bill of the drinks. The waiter jumped on the phone and we could tell he was giving the kitchen a blast. He returned the handset to the telephone and could not apologise enough to us, he even offered them as takeaway.
In the end we asked to just pay for the drinks, he said no need to pay as the restaurant had made a mistake and the drinks were free, no need to pay. We then said thank-you and goodbye and within moments were in Rosalinda's van being whisked to the house where the Under the Tuscan Sun story as based on.
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