Villa Sandi & Tommasi to Florence

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David & Valerie Dobson
Mon 23 Sep 2013 01:17

 

Monday 23rd September 2013

The excitement continued the next day as the bus drove us deep into the heart of the Trevisian hills in the beautiful Prosecco wine country to  visit  Villa Sandi.    At the heart of the estate is the palatial Palladian villa itself, a 17th century columned neoclassical building surrounded by a lush green landscape and decorated with antique furniture.

 

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Our group in front of the Villa Santi

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A huge warren  of underground cellars – built over the course of the three generations of the Moretti Polegato family.   During the 1st World War they were used by the Italian army.  Now they are used as the resting place for about a million bottles of aging wine.

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Lunch in their restaurant in the shade of the vine covered pergola gave us the opportunity to enjoy their Proseccos and Pinot Grigios.

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A little under a couple of hours drive by bus later, we visited the second vineyard of the day, Tommasi in Valpolicella.  It was founded in 1902, and is situated in Piedemonte, in the heart of the historic Valpolicella Classico region, extending to the northwest of Verona.    Here we watched the luscious red grapes coming in from the vineyard to be stored on air dried shelving to concentrate the grape juice for making their Amarone Classico.

 

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Staying at their Villa Quadrante that night, we were able to sample this excellent wine, and tumble into bed without having too far to wander off track…

Tuesday 24th September

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Fog next morning – my goodness it’s getting chilly up in Northern Italy already, we bundled into a bus, which was half an hour late arriving to take us to the station in Verona.  No porters and no lifts meant trundling our own luggage up the stairs to the train – and then heave onto the first class carriage we had booked for the group.  We were not the only ones there though … An Australian amateur cyclist was aboard with 3 of his precious cycles, having just competed in the amateur time trials which had taken place near Lake Garda.  His bike took up most of the space our luggage needed (for 17 of us), but he reciprocated by helping a few of the men in our party (including David of course)  haul the luggage off the train when we arrived in Florence!

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The sculpted ‘parasol’ pine trees, so much a part of this landscape

 

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Separate taxis took us to the Hotel Lucchesi right on the River Arno, (the cream building in centre of this photo)  cordoned off for the time trial racing which had begun two days before hand!

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Thankfully we were able to enter via their back-entrance garage, and get a lift up to the reception with our luggage.  Arriving before our normal check-in time allowed a small group of us time to walk around the corner to the huge Santa Croce square, get a table in a trattoria right on the edge of the square and enjoy an impromptu lunch at Ristorante Boccadama

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Florence’s skyline, Ponte Vecchio over the River Arno to the left

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Always more room for small cars in cities like Florence!

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Where were the crowds of tourists?  Ahhh – that’s a good time to be there – during the Cycling time trials – nobody could drive around the city very easily  due to the most important areas being cordoned off– so it was nearly empty of cars

and tourists – magic!  Two of us took a walk down the empty streets to take a look at the Duomo and other highlights of the city, totally un encumbered by people.  Even the odd sports cyclists were able to use the cordoned off roads free of cars whilst the Time Trial had stopped during the lunch-time break.

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