Rowley Gallery Blog
From Saturnia it’s a short drive to Sovana, a small village with just a single street, beautifully paved in herringbone brickwork. There’s a ruined castle at one end and a cathedral at the other, and a piazza in the middle where we ate delicious lemon pizza for lunch. Continue reading “Sovana & Pitigliano”
Heading south on the road from Siena to Grosseto last year, Sue snapped this photograph from our car as we sat in traffic, waiting to join the cypress avenue queuing in line above us on the horizon. The trees were lying in wait, ready to ambush us at the next junction. A crest of spikes. But with a gentle zigzagging we joined together like the interlocking teeth of a zip fastener and cruised in harmony down to the ancient site of Roselle. Continue reading “Roselle & Saturnia”
We’d just walked to Montepulciano in the blistering midday sun, feeling a bit like ‘mad dogs & Englishmen’ as we climbed the last few kilometres, quivering from heat exhaustion, thirsty and hungry and pretty sure we’d be returning to Montefollonico in a taxi. But after a surprising lunch at L’Altro Cantuccio we were rejuvenated and given new legs to walk us back home. Continue reading “Walking Back To Montefollonico”
We visited Montepulciano a few times last summer. The first visit was brief, having walked there and knowing we had to walk back, we stayed just for lunch and a quick look around. Through the gate, we followed the Corso winding steeply up through the town, feeling hungry and exhausted, sightseeing long enough for somewhere to rest awhile before heading back. We climbed all the way to the church of Santa Maria at the top of the town, only to return back down again, eventually finding a table near the Porta al Prato where we first came in. Continue reading “Montepulciano”
A couple of days later we discovered another ancient abbey, a counterbalance to the beauty and elegance of Sant’Antimo, the Abbazia di San Galgano stands open to the sky, with all the breathtaking grandeur of a canyon carved out of the rock, its great hulk like a ship run aground. Continue reading “San Galgano”
After visiting San Quirico d’Orcia and Montalcino we headed south looking for Bagno Vignoni, a spa since Roman times, but we got distracted along the way by the Abbazia di Sant’Antimo, a beautiful Benedictine monastery set in a lovely landscape of wooded hills and olive groves. Continue reading “Bagno Vignoni”
We floated westwards, down the highroad from Pienza to San Quirico, overlooking the Val d’Orcia, stopping whenever we could to take in the view and to breathe in the endless sky. Continue reading “San Quirico d’Orcia”
On the first Sunday of each month the streets of Arezzo are lined with stalls filled with antiques and bric-a-brac for the Fiera Antiquaria, one of the best known antiques markets in Italy. Continue reading “In Arezzo”
One evening we came down the hill from Pienza to see the original parish church, which dates from the time when the town was still known as Corsignano. Luckily we found the caretaker sweeping up rose petals after a wedding and he invited us to look inside. Continue reading “Pieve Di Corsignano”
Pienza was the creation of Pope Pius II. He was born here in 1405 when it was known as Corsignano, and in 1458 he commissioned the architect Bernardo Rossellino to replace it with a Utopian new town, intended to be the rival of Siena. The buildings around the main piazza were built within three years, but the rest was never completed. The ideal city remained little more than a village. Continue reading “In Pienza”