Italy 2014 Day Eight

 

Oh Day 8, the last one in Orvieto. Sunny. Bird calls echoing past the ancient stones worked into building blocks, through open windows and shutters. Real shutters. Working shutters. Not like here...

 

The beauty, the great beauty of being from Oklahoma is that we are one of the last settled places with moderate temperature on the earth. Certainly one of the last in America. Statehood established in 1907, we really have few buildings older than 125 years. No mountains. No ocean view.

People are our landscape and we have honed a lovely smiling populace.

But...when you travel, everything has texture and age. It is a most fortunate perspective...

Last day in the studio, we took it outside to the convent garden for sketching.

I tried. Of course I took on way too much. 

Next time I will just focus on a single urn.

Its just fine, photography is my sketchbook...

 

Alisa and I were determined to take in the last quarter of Orvieto.

We walked again to the east end near the train station and veered north.

 

At the Fortezza Albornoz, looking northward. Pozza Di San Patrizio is a well dug as part of the rebuild of the fortress in 1527. Oh how I wish we had attempted to go in to see the spiral staircase that descends its 173 foot depth. This is one of the things you want to 'go back' for. But I know how rarely I travel, 23 years since I had been to Europe, so will I pass this way again?

One must assume not.

One must get all you can while you are there.

I wish I had gone in a few more buildings...

Walking back toward city center we passed this lovely church, Chiesa Di S. Domenico, a 13th century church built by Dominican friars, later made into a female academy by Mussolini.

Italy makes historical dead guys come alive...

Just another lovely residence in Orvieto...

A pastry shop. Meringues.  Meringues....

And then, then we decided we had to watch the last Orvietan sunset from a terrace at the convent.

We sneak our bottle of wine from the refrigerator

narrowly escaping the sensible shoe steps of Sister Giovanna.

A destroyed cork does still access wine...

We take chairs from my room up the hallway and staircase,

though a door and find ourselves on the terrace. 

 

The sunset,

the Grek wine,

the smell of burning olive branches remaining from harvest.

Divinity...

Photo courtesy of Kristi and Beel Steiner...

 

Then we are caught, that terrace was on full display of the hallway.

 

A best moment, stolen, giggling, wobbly wine and dusk...

 

to be continued...

Italy 2014 Day Four

The intense immersion into Italy that was Day Four cannot be made concise.

I shall try...

We awaken in the Convent bed and breakfast, the Insituto San Ludovico.

Built as a palace in the Middle Ages, it still bears frescoes of that time all with the loving image of Mary and the Christ.

 It has lived life as a school and convent and now is a B&B run by two nuns,

although one is down with a broken leg.

 Poor over-worked Sister Giovanna was at times a surly mother pointing out the curfew, at other times beckoning me with a hand to show me a treasure within the walls of her home.

The convent also functions as a pre-school. Children wearing little tunics with Peter Pan collars could be heard laughing and calling out their sing-song Italian through open windows.

 

Our first day in the studio with Pam and Amy. We started to assemble signatures for our book, the main project for the week.

Also began to know the other students, and we were most fortunate with the assemblage of personalities and strengths, all with something to offer.

After lunch in the convent dining hall we were off to a tour of the Duomo.

Our tour guide was Kristi Steiner of our Adventures in Italy hosts. It was the highlight of my week in Orvieto as Kristi's love and reverence for the Cathedral was as deep as her knowledge.

http://youtu.be/5YsgRhQDGVg

It is all based on an event deemed as a miracle by the Pope when a Father broke open the host which then bled onto the altar cloth. The Pope commissioned the erection of a Duomo to house and glorify the Miracle of Bolsena. The building was begun in 1290, it took 300 years to complete. The plans on parchment still exist and are the oldest plans remaining today in Italy.

This nearby clock would ring the beginning of the work day, its bells still heard today.

Although photography of the interior of most cathedrals is prohibited,

I took this picture before I realized.

 

The Bloody altar cloth reliquary is housed in the Capella del Corporale to the left of the altar.

 For me the highlight of the Duomo is the the Capella Nuova. The ceiling is the masterpiece of Luca Signorelli, the Last Judgment, 1499-1504. It is rich with suffering and hope and inspired Michelangelo as he took on the work of the Sistine Chapel in Rome.

Bas Reliefs on the exterior tell the history of the Bible to the pilgrims who could not read and had no access to the bible itself, a change that has only come less than 200 years ago...

Following the tour, Alisa and I walked to the edge of the city. Orvieto sits on a rocky plateau in the Umbrian countryside, surrounded by vineyards and olive tree groves.

We took in this vista from the East end of the 'Rock.'

 

That evening was a wine tastings and parings education at Bartolomei L'olio. I learned more in the first 5 minutes about wine than I had in all prior wine tastings combined. I also found white wine preferable to red, which I never before had.

You can find Orvieto Classico in the US

and I know for a fact Alisa has already opened a bottle Stateside...

 

to be continued...

January 2014 So Far

Started this needlepoint project, it is enormous and I expect it to take about ten years. Really.

Watched my Sooners beat Alabama in the Sugar Bowl.

Allie went.

She is with her adorable cousin, Lee, from New Orleans here.

Visited my parents.

Experimenting with Italian wines.

Participating in Root, a 30 day journaling project.

Obsessing with this girl and her abundant doggy ears.

Figured this out...