Wine Country

Sunday 19^th September

Getting out of Arezzo was almost as difficult as finding our hotel last night, but we were having fun despite our predicament.  Fortunately Angie is a good sport and was able to inject humor into our frustration at (what seemed like continually) taking the wrong roads. I don’t think either of us was that impressed with Arezzo, although having said that we really loved our hotel.

We had planned on taking the autostrada to Montevarchi, but once again I took the wrong turning and ended up on the SR69, another secondary road.  However, despite my inability to follow the signposts once again luck was with us, as the road appeared to be running parallel to the autostrada, and in the right direction.  There was very little traffic on the road and as we were making good time we decided to stay on the SR69.

At Montevarchi we turned off onto another side road the SR408, and then eventually on to the SR429 into “wine country” Chianti.  The beautiful windy roads took us past countless vineyards, through rows and rows of Cyprus trees, Olive groves and breathtaking scenery.  I was stopping the car every few minutes to take photographs.  As we drove through Radda in Chianti there were wine tasting tents all through the village, which was teeming with people, but there was nowhere to park, after driving around for a while we finally came across a parking space but we were so far out of town and at the foot of a very steep hill so we decided to move on. A couple of miles outside of Radda we came across another vineyard offering wine tasting, WE parked the car and ventured inside, Both of us tried a couple of different Chianti’s but we were not impressed enough to buy, The vineyard also produced and sold olive oil, and balsamic vinegar of various vintages.  I tried some of the 30 year old balsamic, it was like nectar, I had to have it, besides we couldn’t really leave without buying something, after having had a few tastings, so I bought the smallest little bottle of the 30 year old balsamic, it cost about $50, but was so delicious, and I will use it sparingly, I just hope customs don’t take it off me when I fly back, I think its OK.  There was a lovely little restaurant at the vineyard, but having enjoyed a very extravagant day (culinary speaking) yesterday, we both decided to find something a little less expensive for our meals today.

We left the vineyard and continued on through the picturesque town of Greve in Chianti.  It was getting late and we were both beginning to feel a little peckish.  Since Radda we hadn’t come across any restaurants in the small villages we had driven through. We eventually came across a signpost for a Castle that Angie had spotted on the map, she thought it might be interesting, and possibly somewhere we could get lunch.  We turned onto a small side road and followed it up a narrow steep hillside towards “Castello di Verrazzano”, a local tourist attraction. The road wound steeply around the hillside climbing higher and higher, eventually we reached the top, where there were large parking lots, but they were empty!  The castle built around the eleventh century still produces wine today, and is well known for its Verrazzano Rosso.  The name Verrazzano means “land of boars”  Had I researched it I could have booked us into one of their fabulous wine tours and dinners.  OH yet just another reason I’ll have to come back to this incredible country…