Tuscan Countryside

Untrodden Tuscany: The Casentino

My recommendations for the best of this secluded and spiritual area The Casentino, to the east of Florence, is an often-overlooked area of Tuscany. If you’ve already visited the well-known, well-trodden parts of Tuscany and if secluded and spiritual appeals, you’ll want to see what I have to say about the Casentino. To view this article please go to my Substack

Fall Festivals in Tuscany

Fantastic Fall Festivals in Tuscany Tuscany brims with abundance in Autumn, with the grape harvest in the early part of the season and the new olive oil pressed in the later part of the season. For the updated version of this post go to my Substack.

A Special Monastery in Tuscany

La Verna: a contemplative Tuscan sanctuary For the updated version of this post, go to my Substack

Wild Tuscany, A Visit to Magical Maremma

The Maremma, a region on the southern Tuscan coast, is the wild side of Tuscany. With a rough reputation as a place of bandits and malarial swamps a few hundred years ago, it has become a fashionable place in the last twenty years, while still remaining unspoiled. It gives me a wild, expansive, anything-is-possible feel. The Etruscans were the first settlers of this area and

Tuscan Chocolate Festivals

March is Italian chocolate madness month and I’ve become a chocolate devotee in Italy. I went racing over to Florence in early March simply because a chocolate festival was happening there, in the lovely Piazza Santissima Annuziata. Toward the end of March we had one here in Lucca, in charming Piazza San Frediano. At these festivals you will find Italian artisanal chocolate

Tuscany off the beaten path: The Svizzera Pesciatina

Google the Svizzera Pesciatina and not much will show up. These small stone villages are in the hills above Pescia, and I'd not heard of them until I started living in Lucca. My recent visit to them sure felt like Tuscany off the beaten path. Pescia, a simple tow east of Lucca, suffered quite a bit of damage in World War II, and it's not on the tourist track. Above Pescia,

Where to Have The Most Magical Christmas Eve

To read about this unique and magical Christmas Eve event, go to my article on my Substack.

Memoirs about Italy (And the marketing phenomenon of the word Tuscan)

The word Tuscan has became so overly marketed in the US that a friend of mine said, "When I hear the word Tuscan, I think bull shit." Behind every "Tuscan cheese stick" in middle America, is the marketing phenomenon of Frances Mayes' books on Tuscany. After seven years of success with her first books, Drexel Heritage introduced a "Frances Mayes at Home in Tuscany"

The Santa Fe of Italy–Don’t Miss This Artistic Tuscan Town

To view this article please go to my Substack

What you need to know about hiking the Apuan Alps

Disclaimer: This is not a review of Apuan Alps. This is simply my experience summiting one of them. The story represented is personal and is not intended to malign the location where the story takes place. The mountain near Lucca called Pania della Croce is the fourth highest peak of the Apuan Alps, and is referred to as "The Apuan Queen." It has hefty rounded sides that

Where to Spend Liberation Day in Italy

When I first heard of this massacre, I was in the Tuscan town of Pontremoli, chatting with a B&B owner and her husband, about World War Twohistory—while on my pilgrimage. Go to my substack to read about this profoundly significant site.

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Tuscan Countryside