Under the Tuscan Sun in Cortona

  Cortona, Tuscany, Italy
Sunday, October 5, 2008

On Sunday the roomates and I went to explore the town of Cortona in Tuscany.  We had a bit of a rough start because we got up early to take a 9 oclock train and missed it literally by a second.  The ticket machines were broken so it took us longer and we ran to the train and the door closed just as we reached it!  The train usually leaves every hour but of course 10 o clock is the only hour it did not leave so we had to wait for the 11 o clock train.  But we made the best of it.  We went back to the apartment and watched some of the move Under the Tuscan Sun.  This movie was set in the town of Cortona and is the reason we knew we should go there!
At 11 o clock we were finally on our way and we arrived around 12:30.  From there we found out that we had to take a bus to get up to Cortona which is a city upon a hill.  The bus only cost a euro and skillfully brought us up to the town.

Town of Cortona

From Cortona you get a beautiful view of the Tuscan countryside which is so nice to see when you are always in the city, it was beautiful!  Everything about Cortona seemed unreal including the view of the countryside below.  Since it was about 1 by the time we got up there we were ready for lunch.  We stopped at the first Enoteca (wine bar) that we saw and got a table right by the window.

Lunch at the Enoteca

We all got a glass of white wine from Cortona that was really good.  I liked it because it was not as bitter as some of the other wines.  We sipped our wine and looked at the window at the beautiful countryside and were in heaven! They had really good food at the Enoteca too.  I got a crepe that had lettuce (which they call rocket here) and Pecorino cheese (I think it is goat cheese and I really like it).
After our lovely meal at the Enoteca which lasted a couple hours, partly because of the service here but partly because we were enjoying the experience, we were ready to explore the town.  We decided just to start walking and see what we found.  We found a square that we recognized from the movie that had a huge set of steps that we later came back to and relaxed on.

Roomies on the Steps

We continued up up the hill and found a beautiful view of the countryside from higher up in Cortona.  

View of Tuscany

We also got to go inside one of the churches.  Like most of Italy, Cortona is a very catholic town and you can see evidence of that everywhere.  The church was very old and you could see some paintings on the wall that had survived through time.  The church was a beautiful thing to see.  We found another church along the way as well.  These were only two of many in the town.  

Continuing Our Journey

Conveniently we made a circle with our journey and ended up in the main part of town.
We also walked a different direction and saw a beautiful park.  Cortona also has lots of antique shops and we loved to look at all of the old jewlery.  I found a store with flavored balsamics and jumped at the chance to buy one since balsamic is the only dressing they use in Italy.  Upon the store owners sugguestion I bought a cherry flavored balsamic and tried it with potatoes per her instructions that night, it was belissimo!  The last thing we did in Cortona was try there gelato, of course! I got a really good cookie flavored gelato paired with a cream flavor and we sat and enjoyed it on the steps.  Then we went back in time to catch the 6 o clock bus and continued our journey via the train back to florence! Cortona was a beautiful town and it has inspired me to explore more Tuscan towns whenever I can get the chance.  It is very easy to get there and a lot less touristy than other places in Italy.  Plus I love the unique charcter and history of the town and am sure I could find more that had their own unique flavor.  My roomates and I also hope to go back in the Winter because in the movie and in some photos of the town we saw that it snows!