The overriding theme of this week has been the heat. I can't remember the last time I needed to put a cardigan or long sleeved top on, daytime temperatures haven't gone below 30C for a good couple of weeks, and with the night-time temperature in the bedroom staying a pretty constant 27-28C, this wasn't a good time for our electric fan to break! Thankfully we did have a spare in reserve, although the spare one seemed to make more noise than create a breeze and after two nights we gave up and went and bought a new one. So sleeping has been a challenge, and getting any work done outside is pretty difficult. I'm not complaining though - this is a true Tuscan summer, and as draining as the heat can be at times, I for one enjoy it.
Anyway, re-winding back to last weekend, after we'd said our farewells to Paul and Marie at Pisa airport, we fuelled up on some much-needed coffee before wending our way back home. It was still early by the time we got home, so we took Reggie out for a walk, stopped off at David & Sarah's orto to water their vegetables, then headed home for lunch.
Coming straight on the back of a week of sight-seeing and merry-making, having had an early start, and knowing that the days to come would be busy, we didn't quite feel like knuckling down to work on Saturday, so instead we decided to do some more exploring of the local area.
We followed the road to Collodi, then just after the Pinocchio-themed town, we turned off the main road to take us to the pretty town of Villa Basilica. The town was still all-but deserted in the post-lunch lull, so we wandered around its pretty streets before getting back into the car and heading off on a magical mystery tour.
We ended up on a tiny, narrow road that gradually wound its way up the hill. It kept going up and up, and I kept wondering if we were going to find anywhere at the end of it. There was barely any traffic on the road (which was a good thing as it was pretty narrow in places) and still we went on upwards. Eventually, we started seeing the odd vehicle, and I imagined we were about to arrive in a tiny hamlet. The road then started passing through a heavily wooded area, and we started to see evidence of life in the form of people wandering along the road. Suddenly, much to our surprise, we arrived in a place that was teeming with life. There were bars, people. bikes, tracks through the woods, camping areas... It dawned on us that this was the place we'd been told about a while ago by our friends David & Sarah - a place high up in the mountains that is favoured by Italians as a change from going to the beach for the day: they head up to the higher altitude for a degree or two's drop in temperature, and there they sunbathe, play ball, go cycling in the woods and do all the things they might do at the beach (perhaps apart from swimming). The place was called Altopiano delle Pizzorne, and we marvelled at the fact that there was so much life up there when we had barely seen a soul on the long, long way up.
Once we'd reached the top, there were fabulous views down to the plains, and we chose to carry on driving in the same direction, heading now for Lucca.
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| Views from the other side of the hill. |
When the road eventually got to the bottom of the hill, we found ourselves in villa country - an area just outside Lucca that is dotted with several large and elegant villas, some of which are open to the public (if you can work out the opening hours, that is), some of which are privately owned and run as conference/event venues (a wedding party was just arriving at one as we passed), and some of which appear to be closed up semi-permanently. We decided that the 'villa tour' was something we should investigate further on another occasion.
We eventually reached familiar territory on the Lucca road and headed home for a quiet evening and a much earlier night than we'd been used to for the preceding 7 days - we needed to get back into our usual routine that would allow us to actually get work done in the following days!
Of course it was still Sunday the next day, so we had a brief lie-in before heading out with Reggie for his morning walk in the woods before the temperature got too hot for him to handle in his thick fur coat. Then, after watering the vegetables in David & Sarah's orto, we headed home for a quick lunch followed by the week's pilgrimage to Esselunga. We had apartment guests due the following day who had ordered our 'welcome pack upgrade' (a selection of shopping covering essential groceries to cover them for the first few days of their stay), so once we'd been round the supermarket once with our own shopping list, we went straight back in again for round two.
Shopping done and unpacked, it was time for me to do a bit of strimming on the veg beds below the house while Stuart tinkered with his latest ingenious upcycling project: converting the old, rusted barbeque into a 'tool station' for bee hive inspections. The smart-looking contraption has shelves either side for putting smokers, bottles of syrup and other tools, while the gap in the middle is the most important part, acting as a frame holder - when taking the frames out of the hive to inspect them, they can temporarily be hung in the holder before putting them back into the hive again.
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| Bee hive inspection tool station. |
It was while we were at our respective jobs on Sunday afternoon, Stuart had a call from our friend Mara, inviting us to go with her and Franco for a pizza that evening at a new place they hadn't been to before. How could we turn down such an offer? So, after finishing our jobs, showering and making ourselves respectable, we headed down the hill in the car where we met Mara and Franco at the turning by the river Torbola. We then all got into their car and headed for Margine Coperta.
On arriving at the place - the Circolo in Margine Coperta - we realised that we'd heard about it from Donatella. The circolo (or club) serves antipasti, pizzas and aperitivi and makes a point of using organic produce, as well as offering vegetarian, vegan and gluten-free options. The aperitivi (pre-dinner drinks) were quite something to behold, combining San Pellegrino chinotto (a lightly fizzy soft drink made from the sour chinotto oranges), campari and vermouth. Strong, but delicious!
As well a delicious antipasti and pizzas, we were excited to find a small range of craft beers on offer - the first time we've found IPA in a long time:
Monday was straight back down to work. Stuart spent the morning cleaning the apartment in preparation for our next guests before heading to Pisa to go and collect them from the airport. Meanwhile I had a solid day of conference paper editing.
In the evening, as well as welcoming Sue and Kevin, our apartment guests, we had a lovely visit from Tracy and Grant: the parents of our kiwi HelpX-er Tess. Tess had messaged us the day before to say that her parents were staying in Pietrabuona (in fact, in one of the holiday rental properties on the hillside opposite our house) and that she'd like to ask them to call in and say hello. We were delighted to be able to meet them and, just like their daughter, they were great company. Sadly we could only manage a couple of hours with them (sitting under the pergola with a glass of wine), as they were heading down to Siena a couple of days later for a wedding, but it was lovely to meet them.
Tuesday saw Stuart doing 6 hours of strimming - throughout the heat of the day. The owners of the house in Lanciole that he helps out with were due to come over for their annual holiday, so the grass needed cutting before their arrival. Thankfully, Chris had agreed to come up and help with the work, so the pair of them headed up there at about 8.30am and strimmed all day long. I think I've only ever done a maximum of three hours' strimming in one go (or in one day), so I can only imagine how much six hours of it takes out of you. They both looked drained by the time they came back, and I think it took Stuart a good three days to recover fully.
Of course we had our weekly Italian lesson with Johnny on Wednesday morning - this week we opted to stay indoors as even under the pergola the morning sunshine was too intense to be outside. This week we continued our discussion of Brexit as well as a range of other more diverse topics.
Our second Italian lesson of the week is with Samantha, of course - while it's officially 'my' lesson, she is increasingly teaching bits and pieces to Stuart as well, which is great, although I think the heat had got to both of our brains this week and poor Samantha had to cope with us stumbling over the even basics.
After our lesson, Stuart took a run into town with my road bike - after two years on the turbo trainer, the gear cable decided it had had enough and snapped. Despite a valiant attempt to fix it himself, Stuart eventually threw the towel in and took it to a bike shop in Pescia.
Other jobs that Stuart has managed to get done this week - even in the stifling heat - include fitting a down pipe from the guttering so that we can finally start to collect rain water in our collection tanks (with no rain in sight for at least the next fortnight!). He built into the pipe an ingenious first-flush system: the water from the guttering runs down the pipe to the bottom, then when enough water has accumulated at the bottom the water is forced back up through the bottle, which traps debris, meaning that debris doesn't make it into the tanks and can't block the pipes in our irrigation system:
Stuart has also had some lovely, nature-filled walks with Reggie in the woods this week:
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| Nature's firelighters - we went back the next day and filled a large IKEA bag full of them! |
On Saturday we had a small victory - after Reggie's early morning walk, we came home and piled on our clothes to go and do our first solo bee inspection since 'sting-gate'. I have to admit to having been a little nervous about it, knowing that even Mara had been stung on the last couple of occasions, but with two pairs of trousers, wellie boots, our bee jackets, elbow-length gloves and the all-important bee-keeping hats on, we braced ourselves and went for it. It was also our first chance to try out Stuart's upcycled BBQ tool station - which worked a treat! We were quietly thrilled (and more loudly thrilled once we'd vacated the area) that we managed the entire inspection without any casualties. We took all the frames out to try and find the queen. Once again, we failed to find the elusive lady, but there was clear evidence of her having been in there since there were new larvae in the frames that we'd added to the hive on our last inspection. After inspecting all the frames, adding in a blank end frame and giving them a tub full of sugar syrup to feast on (to help them make new wax cells), we slowly retreated and gave ourselves a big pat on the back! Of all the occasions we've inspected the bees they seemed by far the calmest this time around - perhaps because the weather is so hot and calm and sunny and there's plenty for them to eat, perhaps because they love their new hive, perhaps because they are getting used to us, or perhaps the most likely because we kept our interference to a minimum on this occasion!
Other jobs we did on Saturday were limited to moving some large concrete blocks from the office down to the polytunnel so that Stuart can start building a small wall around the septic tank, and bringing one of the cold frames up from the polytunnel to the terrace behind the house so that we can sow lettuce and rocket in it.
All that heavy lifting in 36C heat nearly killed us though, and with our clothes soaked enough with sweat to be wrung out, and sweat dripping off our faces (sorry, not an attractive picture, but it's the reality!) we had to call it a day in terms of physical labour, and finished the day with a trip into town to collect my fixed bike, a stop off at the water fountain to fill 30 litres of water to take up to David Sarah's orto, where we used all the water to give their veg a good soaking. Just the day after leaving for the UK, the water supply to their orto dried up completely, so instead of checking up on the irrigation pipes (which can be prone to blockages), it's been a matter of watering the veg by hand each day, a job we've shared between us and Donatella. Poor David and Sarah will have a job on their hands when they return this week trying to restore the water supply, but they should at least have a few zucchini for their efforts!
After the ill-advised working in the heat of the day on Saturday, we decided to try a new strategy on Sunday: TRY to get up as early as possible (bearing in mind it's also Sunday, the traditional day for a lie-in!), walk Reggie and then get some work done before lunch. We managed to get up at 7.40am, and by 8.20am we were walking Reggie up along the cava track. Even at that time of the morning it was hot in the sun.
After our walk, and a quick stop for a cappuccino and cornetto breakfast at Da Sandrino's, we headed home and out onto our own veg beds, this time to try and lay some more ground fabric in an attempt to cut down the amount we have to strim around the veg beds. While Stuart has already covered two thirds of the veg terraces with fabric, the rest of it still needs doing, so we worked until we ran out of fabric and pins - and energy!
The forecast for next week is more of the same, ranging from a sweltering 37C on Monday to a positively cool 29C on Friday, but then straight back up to the mid 30s. That's what a Tuscan summer is all about!
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