Ah, Italy! Late formed in Europe, but so extraordinary by its tourist, cultural, natural potential.
Puglia visited in October 2018, Florence and its region in September 2019. And even before that, Venice and Rome in 2012...
Historical heritage, diversity, richness of the sites to discover, the landscapes to contemplate are exceptional, this is not a scoop.
So much pleasure in the discovery ; but some up there can't tolerate. Jealous!!
In this papal country, however, we would have well avoid to be punished for this sin of extreme tourist enjoyment.
The punishment - perfectly atheist - came from elsewhere, from small ancestral Italian know-how.
A marvel of... well-oiled deceit and some other inconveniences, when we are neither careful enough, nor attentive enough, and a little gullible.
Trouble in the land of the imbroglio, which is not specific to the boot.
1- Destination Lecce, in the heel of the boot, October 2018, an extended week-end.
Remarkable Baroque remains ; the possibilities of visits in this part of Puglia radiating around this regional metropolis are... legion, far from Rome.
Arrival day : from Paris, the one-way ticket with Alitalia is to Brindisi with transfer in Rome airport.
No problem, everything is synchronous. The Brindisi airport is uncrowded in this period.
On the conveyor belt of luggages, our suitcase (only one for a long week-end) is long to come.
Nothing when the noria stops. Worry. We are informéd the unloading has been completed.
At the desk of Alitalia company, we therefore file a plaint.
Rented vehicle : the office and park of rented cars is outside the airport grounds, a few kilometers. To go there, you have first to wait for a shuttle, which is slow to come ; but then finally comes.
The vehicle is got in a parking lot that is a little loose. Only one person processes reservations, for a long time. Another person seems to be immersed in another activity, impervious to the impatience of customers.
Vehicle recovered, the low ears, now destination Lecce.
There, for lack of suitcase and its contents, we have to buy a minimum of spare clothes ; the hotel, barely surprised, very friendly gives us rudimentary toiletry kits.
And reassures us, undertaking to inform us about what seems so far to be only an unfortunate delay in delivery.
We get in touch with Lecce, baroque queen of Puglia.
Second day, still nothing.
Luckily, we always keep with us funds, reservations, cameras, of course phones...
The wait remains long, and disturbing above all.
Visits are a distraction, and even a diversion despite a persistent background of worry, almost anxiety.
Third day. Whew! Finally here is the suitcase.
Dark surprise, it was opened without destroying the lock, then kept summarily closed by a soft link.
The small and quiet mafia company of thieves at Rome airport had plagued : camcorder, clothes, various chargers, the suitcase has been largely looted.
A theft report is required.
An opportunity to visit the police station of Lecce, a large building of high ceiling where some male policemen prance "in Italian way", spontaneous emulators and natural heirs of Vittorio Gassman.
But a woamn, very efficient police officer "Superintendent of Police", with whom we exchange in English, draws up the declaration. A whole morning lost.
The Italian language where all the letters are pronounced is lyrical like a parade race of the feathered bersaglieri.
The mind finally freed (nox we know), but angry, disappointed, we can continue the discovery of the many assets and attractions of the country.
Santa Maria di Leuca, seaside resort in the extreme south of the heel of the boot with its extravagant "practitioner" villas built in the 19th century, amuses and captivates, where the sea also becomes a very conventional setting for wedding photos,
We enjoy the real spectacle of Alberobello (40 km as the crow flies north of Taranto) where its amazing houses spread out as in a tale with white walls capped with conical roof of lauses assembled without mortar, the "trulli".
If this unique picturesque attracts too many crowds in the streets, a bit like a Disneyland, it is nevertheless with a total and very precious authenticity.
We appreciate as much as it deserves the surprising limestone valley of Matera, one of the 3 first cities in the world the oldest inhabited by man (about 10,000 years).
A vast troglodyte city whose caves had multiple uses, after having been dug on the tuff flanks of the canyon of Gravina. They are named "sassi", superimposed and entangled with superb.
Matera became the following year (2019) European Capital of Culture.
A beautiful revenge for the disinherited, so miserable that it almost disappeared after being declared a "national disgrace" by the President of the Italian Council in 1950.
Magnificent renaissance that we owe to its "biblical" setting that attracted some important directors, and the pugnacity of its inhabitants aware of its cultural assets and potential.
We also blend with delight in the alleys of the small ancestral island of Gallipolli (not to be confused with its namesake of Turkey, place of the Battle of Dardanelles), very rich in a long history, just west of the heel of the boot, where it tickles.
Its stone access bridge, wide and robust with 7 or 8 low arches suggests that it is a peninsula (which it's not).
In the 18th century, the surrounding olive groves made Gallipoli the 1st olive oil export center (for lighting) in the entire Mediterranean region.
It was produced in its cellars, an economy to which it owes its baroque wealth.
Its older inhabitants have kept their lives quiet, full of truth.
We walk, wide open eyes in Otranto, this port most east of the boot, ancient and intense place of coveted passage, and battle (1480) between East and West in the Middle Ages. The venerable cathedral, well modified in the Renaissance, exhibits the largest mosaic in Europe created by the monk Pantaléon in the 15th century ...
... and in the picturesque mazes of Ostuni, further north, white staged city, perched on the heights above the olive groves of the Adriatic coast ...
But a persistent anger still grips us in puffs; the visits do not divert us - "do not distract us from our dark thoughts" - not enough to extinguish a biting resentment like a toothache.
But finally the blue horizon erased with mist to the east, then the serene majesty of the immense ancestral olive groves, tortured trunks capped with vigorous silver-blue hair, powerful as mythological heroes, manage to free our minds.
Return of the vehicle on the way back is done at the renting place in a vociferous chaos, in Italian, in English with the Italian accent in an even longer queue than on arrival.
Failing to immanent justice, thanks be made prosaically to our travel insurance "Mondial Assistance". Three months after having established the meticulous retrospective inventory of the stolen objects and tried to value them with some invoices found, we will be very correctly compensated.
There are even mechanisms that work. Whew!
2- Stay there also of an extended weekend in the region of Tuscany just north of Florence.
By plane, the point of arrival and departure is Pisa airport, where we pick up and return our rented vehicle.
The charms of sweet Tuscany north of Florence are savored slowly, in the harmony of curved hills planted here with silver-haired olive trees and dense groves, punctuated by the dark lines of erect yews.
The Tuscan vineyards are south of Florence where we will not go (this time).
In its wide valley, the quiet effervescence of Firenze, the former municipality of merchants of the Middle Ages, extraordinary birthplace of the Renaissance with the Medici, ephemeral capital of the Kingdom of Italy in the 19th century, keeps all its promises.
Let's walk through its streets illuminated by facades of light polychrome marbles where white dominates,
..., punctuated by the imposing Renaissance statues, familiar after having leafed through the pages of dictionnaries in the past,
let's get lost in the maze of museums of incredible wealth.
We exhaust ourselves in the surprising climb of the 463 steps for the vertiginous spectacle of the frescoes inside the Duomo and that of the city from its lantern outside,
We finally sweep at a gaze its roofs and domes from the Belvedere of Piazzale Michelangelo, under the elegant and famous languid David who contemplates the Arno.
The masterpiece city still persists and fascinates the whole world, and the whole world is there.
Even from Fiesole on the hill to the north, the mythical city can be seen there like a red drowsy cat under the autumn sun.
On the way back to Pisa, it is already an opportunity to see with what solicitude the very elegant and flamboyant marble tower leans over the shoulder of the cathedral on the countless visiting ants came from all over the world... before returning our vehicle.
It's on a Sunday ; restitution, as is the rule, must be done with a full tank. We decide to refuel in Pisa itself.
Serious mistake ; no petrol station open.
Only one, automatic, occurs, where only cash is admitted.
Let us introduce 20€. Incorrect operation? Misunderstanding of the instructions for use? Nothing. Disappointment, anger rises; attempt to share with other companions of misfortune directed to the same pump.
Another attempt by introducing two more 10€ banknotes, this time believing that we have understood how it works. Stupid stubbornness! New failure, and the rage takes us, that of having been knowingly deceived.
Fourty euros stolen for unclear reasons, perhaps also because of a deliberate ruse.
Impossible to find elsewhere an open station. It is therefore necessary to return the car without its full with the inevitable overbilling : 60 euros.
Parking in Pisa.
In the immediate perimeter of the historic site crossed a little by accident, don't think about it at all: parking is reserved for residents only.
Finally we get a place in a second wider perimeter, sufficiently far from the historic center.
Eight months later, beautiful bilingual Italian-French postal mail from the municipality of Pisa which invites us peremptorily to pay a heavy fine (almost 120 euros) for non-compliance with the interdiction of driving in the 1st zone without authorization, infringement automatically video recorded.
Fortunately, we were able to crisscross under an intermittent rain the vast historical perimeter of Piazza del Duomo (formerly Piazza del Miracoli), with its lawn as perfect as a golf green,
and its astonishing cemetery-cloister, the Camposanto, dotted and paved with tombs, whose high walls are original frescoes
There are also more recent tombs, including a surprising stele decorated with a very beautiful lascid woman half-naked in tha Art Nouveau style : the tomb of an Italian physicist and mathematician of the 19th century, O. F. Mossotti, liberal, exiled and then returned to Pisa (is the statue his inspirational muse, a beautiful provocation of a revanchist liberal or simply the allegory of astronomy or science as some say?).
There was still a supreme task to be carried out before leaving : straighten the tower, this bell tower that became much more famous than its cathedral since it tilted...
That is done. But there, you will have to pay to know the secret!!
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