the plan after that was to do some wine-tasting. A had called earlier to book a wine tour and was quoted €16 a person. soon realized we should be asking about wine-tasting instead, which was free and did not require booking in advance.
headed to greve for lunch. turned out to be much further than it appeared on the map. which led to a series of principles/theorems. (1) the hunger distortion effect. distances and traveling times are directly proportional to the state of hunger. (2) visual verification of physical landmark before vehicular separation. (owing to a longer-than-expected walk in pisa.) (3) travel is about losing our way and finding ourselves. if getting lost was going to be a common occurrence, we might as well make it sound good.
finally reached greve’s triangular piazza g matteoti after a long and winding road. got to g da verrazzano as it started to rain. had the vegetable soup (lots of beans, yummy) and grilled pork chops, tasty though a little too dry. E’s osso bucco was good. 140 total.
afternoon of wine-tasting followed, at vignamaggio (where kenneth branagh filmed ‘much ado about nothing’) and then castello di verrazzano, where the british lady fed us 12 year old balsamic vinegar. the gorgeous honeyed taste was the highlight of the tastings (for E as well) and went for the princely sum of 46 for a 100ml bottle.
the vineyards here did not offer sweeping spectacles a la napa valley, or apparently, south Africa. but it’s lush and verdant everywhere, the fields dotted with white or yellow or red flowers, with a burst of violet (wisterias?) here and there. if only it were sunny.
the buildings ran the gamut from pale yellow to ochre to burnt siena to the occasional grapefruit pink or blood orange red or stone.
took the highway route back which turned out to be so much quicker that giddy with excitement over the extra time, we stopped in grassina to walk about and then wondered what attracted our attention in the first place. and still, we were early enough to make it to the cooperative (or coop) supermercato to pick up more stuff.
dinner by E: lovely chicken soup and salad of rucola, tomatoes, mozzarella tossed in a sauce of wholegrain mustard, mirin, olive oil etc.