Orvieto- Day 1

I don’t know whether it was yesterday’s back to back yoga sessions or the glasses of red wine, maybe both, but all of the normal air travel irritants fazed me not one bit. I would just “breathe into it, take another sip” and contemplate how mellow I was feeling as I floated across the Atlantic Ocean. Maybe I’m finally getting the hang of this traveling thing.

It took us a while to reach our hotel today and a bit longer to get into our rooms. I was definitely “runnin’ on empty” by the time I collapsed onto my bed for a one hour nap.

My room is lovely, on the first floor, which, by the way, us Yankees would consider the 2nd floor. It’s in an old building with all of the conveniences: air conditioning, little refrigerator, or as I like to think of it “wine cooler”, a bidet, located within spitting distance of the cathedral (the hotel, not the bidet–although technically, i suppose it is both). Not that I would ever spit. But if I did, I could probably score a bull’s eye.

Okay. It is official. My connection with the Internet is a lot like my high school dating experiences–on, again, off again. So, I will quickly get some photos up before the Internet breaks up with me.

No, that was not the interior of the Duomo. You can’t take pictures inside. Well, you aren’t supposed to, but i noticed some tourists boldly ignoring the rules. Didn’t they see that fresco of Jesus passing judgement? Didn’t they see what happens to the rule breakers? I did. And let me tell you, I wasn’t taking any chances.

The second photo is actually the staircase in one of Orvieto’s little shops. If I had 120 euros that I didn’t know what do do with, I would definitely have bought one of their Miss Piggy tee shirts. I may return, just to take a photo of one of those suckers–they are quite unique! Something to anticipate in future posts.

I wandered around town by myself, then later with Sally, while we waited for our fellow companions to awaken and for the restaurants to start serving dinner. 7:30 is the earliest, and is an accommodation to those of us from across the pond. Italians dine later.

This is such a lovely little town, full of interesting alleys, with shops, restaurants, wine stores, museums. Sally and I ducked into a wine store and had our own private tasting. We determined that white was the way to go, after tasting three reds, en chose our favorite from among four whites. Time to weave our way back to join the others for a fantastic dinner and a good night’s sleep.