Italy

To abandon my wife my dog and my van to travel for twelve hours by plane across the northern hemisphere there must have been a good reason.

I last visited my sisters in Umbria in 2017, then Covid intervened and then retirement and here I am six years later catching up.

My great niece is two years old and lives next door to her doting grandparents, my brother in law above and my sister below. 

Their two boys have taken over the farm and have turned the farmhouse into a bed and breakfast and restaurant open to the public. 

From being an agricultural backwater in the mountains halfway between Rome and Florence these tiny villages are now hosting thousands of tourists on tour who follow a 55 mile itinerary of trails through the mountains stopping at places like this. 

My sisters sons cultivate the fields in time honored tradition while her daughter in law manages the hotel with eight employees. Into this hive of activity floated yours truly for a couple of weeks to catch up. Layne had to stay in California to look after Rusty and do some chores do when I get back we can take off touring aboard GANNET2 again  

I rented a Fiat 500 for the two weeks so I have my freedom in this hills and great fun it is to buzz the curvy roads burning $7 a gallon gas. 

I get to sleep in a newly converted farmhouse out in the fields and mealtimes involved some form of home cured meat. 

I was never cut out to be a farmer hence my departure for California in 1982 but I can enjoy the fruits (salads) of my brother in law’s vegetable garden as well as anyone. 

Umbria has been largely overlooked in the rush to turn Italy into a tourist destination but it is catching up. 

The slogan is “the green heart of Italy” as this small oval shaped region in the middle of the peninsula is full of forests and small medieval towns. 

I grew up here when I was going to school in England so my early life was split between British formality and Italian make-do informality. It was never easy to reconcile the two halves so a third country to settle in made sense. Luckily for me I got into the USA. 

“Vaccinations Kill” just in case you like to get your medical advice from a garage door:

I find it slightly ironic that I moved away from a place that has become fashionable and desirable among foreigners. The tendency to romanticize village life by outsiders is a difficult romance for me to swallow as I know the back stories. 

I enjoy cruising around taking in the scenery and listening to the chatter of family members discussing long held disagreements with neighbors and the enduring grudges of people who have fallen out. But I want no part of it. 

Life in Italy like all of Europe is heavily regulated with government oversight of every aspect of life, such that no American could stand it. Below you see a stationary orange box that photographs speeding offenders. The Autovelox photographs your tag and you get the fine in the mail. No appeals allowed. Get too many and you lose your license. 

“No Hunting” Yoy may be surprised to know that licensed hunting rifles and shotguns are widespread in Italian homes. Hand guns and “weapons of war” (whatever they are) get you an automatic jail term. But it is true you get a choice of red or white wine with your meals in jail. 

Beautiful it may be but it is no longer home. 

The food is always excellent and I enjoy the privilege of dropping in for a visit but I have no regrets about emigrating. 

There are fresh generations to take over for me after my flight west. They will do fine without me. 

I cane across a book that was written by a woman who came to live in this area. They remembered her here when when I mentioned the story to them, though they were surprised their lives were recorded in a book. So I guess this is accurate as it gets:

The Legion Of Honor

One of the great mysteries of living in Santa Cruz California must be the gas station at Costco. The price of a gallon of regular around town amounts to something between $4:70 and $5:00 depending where you fill up. They sell regular at Costco for $4:16 so if you drive a 17 mpg van you gravitate toward the Costco pump. To our amazement most trips we make to the pumps with GANNET2 involve little or no wait.  Perhaps we’ve been lucky or perhaps we scare everyone away but we almost never find more than a car or two in line and often there is no wait at all. 

Sunday morning we took off with a full tank of the cheapest gas we could find for the 75 mile drive to The City, as Francisco is known to northern Californians. Call it Frisco and you will be despised forever; don’t ask me why but “Frisco” for The City and “Cali” for the state are two terms that should never pass your lips.

We stopped at Layne’s favorite pie shop for breakfast pastry alongside California Highway One, the coast road. Rusty wanted to linger but we pressed on to Half Moon Bay where we discovered heavy coastal traffic, eager beach goers looking for fog and sand for the day. We turned inland and drove past a traffic jam more than seven miles long right over the coastal mountains into Silicon Valley. 

We turned north and followed I-280 toward the city away from the coastal traffic jam which stretched to the freeway intersection overhead as we drove north. It looked like a hellish way to spend a Sunday to me. 

Our route to the Palace of the Legion of Honor: 

The rest of the drive was uneventful and happily Google Maps sent us back out to the coast of San Francisco, the Sunset neighborhood away from downtown which is a mess of traffic and unsightly homelessness. You’ve probably heard about The City’s problems and I had no desire to revisit them. 

We drove the foggy streets past miles of multi million dollar town houses facing the Pacific Ocean, blocks away but driving cold damp fog uphill into the city streets. 

Layne made sandwiches, part of her economy drive when we pulled over to walk Rusty in Golden Gate Park. After six months in Latin America the cost of meals out in California came as a shock to the quartermaster so we eat groceries aboard. 

For such a heavily regulated state Golden Gate Park is an oasis of freedom. Walk where you like and enjoy a touch of wilderness in the City. There are activities like horse riding tours, and any bush may be home to a filthy neglected lunatic homeless person but the tranquility is amazing.  

Finding an open spot in the park for our tank was no problem and we also found an open space later for GANNET2 right in front of the museum entrance. Some people think a 21foot van is a problem to drive on the streets but we very rarely have difficulties owing to its size. GANNET2 in the ubiquitous fog:

They had a special exhibit on at the Legion of Honor, a building in Lincoln Park in the former city cemetery. I hadn’t been there for decades so a visit was on my list this visit. I also want to try to get to the DeYoung Museum in Golden Gate Park where they have an Ansel Adams photography exhibit on display. The Legion of Hobor is undergoing “much needed” renovation: 

They had a special exhibit on the Tudors, the Kings and Queens who ruled Britain the dramatic years after  the fratricidal wars of succession between the houses of Lancaster and York. 

If you know nothing about them you’ve heard of Henry the Eighth: 

And Elizabeth the First, the Virgin Queen:

Alma de Bretteville Spreckels it a been in her bonnet to build a museum in Lincoln Park but her husband Adolph Spreckels wanted to spend his fortune on horse racing. She convinced him to back her plan and off she went to Europe to drum up support and inspiration during World War One, an odd time to tour France. 

It turns out the French had a building she quite liked housing the national exhibition of the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exhibition. The French agreed to have her copy the building which was itself a replica of the Palais de La Légion d’Honneur built in 1782. So there you have it. 

The audio guides are always useful in these places. The entry ticket was twenty bucks each, add the ticket for the Tudor exhibition and the headphone rental and we spent about $70 at the Legion of Honor. 

Thanks to the Spreckels sugar barons the museum has a huge collection of Auguste Rodin sculptures. They took over the Hawaii sugar trade and invested in San Diego practically buying the city up. In those days billionaires covered their sins with culture offering public spaces their art collections and so forth. Their name is prominent at the Legion of Honor. Giving in private is not part of the schtick. 

Outside in the fog there are assorted exhibits and plaques which I wandered around to see after I got Rusty out of his sleep in the van. Joan of Arc in classic style: 

Tourists admiring the golfers. 

Holocaust Memorial: 

I need to remember to look this up: 

The end of the Cold War has produced endless surprises:

I seem to remember this as a representation of a sextant:

Rusty is freaking me out by growing gray hairs and slowing down. 

No visible parking skills. In Mexico it’s not a problem as everyone parks higgledy piggledy but here you’re supposed to fit between the lines not on them: 

And if the mood takes you remove your hoody and fling it into the fountain as a piece of art, or a statement, or a protest or something. 

And before we go a few pieces by Rodin, the famous ones that were supposed to adorn his monumental gate of hell sculpture. He died before he could put it together: 

Abandon hope all you who enter:

A nekkid dude whom I artfully dressed in a skirt! 

All very classical and earthquake proofed in 1995. 

Art does not delight everyone: 

A portrait by Joshua Reynolds’s depicting a classical scene where Paris in the sculpture is awarding the golden apple of beauty to the viscountess in his portrait and not the Graces as Greek myth told the story.  

Sir Joshua Reynolds’ 1779–1780 Work: Anne, Viscountess Townshend, later Marchioness Townshend In the Permanent Collection of the Legion of Honor

“Anne Montgomery (1752?–1819) was the second of three beautiful daughters of an Irish peer. Celebrated as the “Irish Graces,” the sisters were immortalized in 1773 by Sir Joshua Reynolds in a grand-manner portrait entitled Three Ladies Adorning a Term of Hymen (London, The Tate Gallery).

That same year, Anne became the second wife of George, fourth Viscount Townshend, later Marquess Townshend. In 1779–1780, she sat for Reynolds for this elegant, full-length portrait.

Treating portraiture as a branch of history painting, Reynolds used classical themes, poses and statuary as references to the past. Here, the carved relief at the lower left depicts the Judgment of Paris, a popular mythological theme, with one two goddesses. Paris appears to ignore them as he offers Anne the golden apple, a witty and flattering conceit implying that Anne herself is Venus, the third and fairest.”

And back to Rodin here is his long time mistress and eventual wife pouting we are told. He was not easy to live with they say especially if you prefer fidelity in a relationship: 

And Victor Hugo (Les Miserables) looking grumpy as he posed under protest. 

And then the ride home going through the city (NOT FRISCO) in the golden glow of evening.

I-280 passing Palo Alto: 

Highway 17 through the Santa Cruz mountains jammed with traffic leaving the beach on a Sunday evening: 

And I am off to Italy for two weeks to see my sisters for the first time since 2017.  What a different world that was. Layne Rusty and GANNET2 stay behind. After this pause we will head east hopefully spending a month wild camping Utah and Colorado.