We set the GPS for our next night’s destination, Capalbio, and hoped to find signs somewhere along the road to see the sword of the sword of San Galgano Guidotti de Chiusdino. Mum found a reference to a nearby town so we set the GPS for the new target of Monticiano and followed her lead.
After following narrow, tree lined, back roads suddenly through the leaves we glimpsed weird, red rock formations. Stopping as quickly as was safe we leaped out to go and investigate. It looked like someone had taken a giant cake knife and smeared thick, strawberry icing roughly all over the side of the hill.
Nearly 40km south of Siena, and way off the beaten track, we found the Abbey of San Galgano, said to be the best example of gothic architecture in Tuscany, if not all Italy. Amidst preparations for an opera performance to be held the following evening the abbey was once again filled with pews, if only of the plastic folding variety. This huge ancient building, abandoned 400 years ago, now roofless and carpeted in weeds is undergoing a gentle renaissance of its own. The parking lot is perfectly prepared, but the path from the abbey to the hermitage where the sword in the stone resides is a deeply rutted, loose- stoned track, poorly suited to stock let alone pilgrims. We scrambled slowly up the pathway only to find ourselves with a 30 minute wait for a mass to finish.
For interim entertainment we engaged in a one-sided conversation with the crone from the attached ‘gift’ shop. Much flat out Italian exclamation on her part, which we interpreted to be about her cats – one of whom was apparently killed by a car when only a few weeks old – and much sympathetic nodding on our part. So people, – DON’T PLAY WITH THE CATS - otherwise (a) they might follow you and others to the car park and get run over; and (b) the crone will hiss at you and tell you to go away. You’ve been warned!
The sword in the stone is quite interesting tale set in the later part of the 12th century. Galgano, so the story goes, son of a wealthy family was world-weary with his dissolute, ravaging and rampaging lifestyle and with a nudge and a shove off his horse from the arch angel Michael gave up his knightly ways driving his sword into a rock to prove his determination to change. He proceeded to live as a hermit offering healing to those who visited his hermit shack.
Declared a saint, only a few years after his early death, pilgrims built the current hermitage over the spot, approximately 900 years ago. Scientific testing so far has done nothing to dispel the myth surrounding the origin of the sword in the stone. Metallurgic testing shows support or the timing, suggesting an age for the hilt as C12th.
On the road again we set target for Capalbio and after a hurried lunch grabbed on the fly in made the hotel about 2.30 p.m. A short rest and quick sort out and we headed for ‘Il Gardino dei Tarrochi’ the great mosaic Tarot Garden of Niki de Saint Phalle (1930-2002), a fascinating artist/woman. What I had read and researched had whet my appetite considerably, but nothing had prepared me for seeing the garden for real. Her work is to me a coming together of so much and so many that have inspired me. The ancient Venus figurines, SARK, Gaudi... Explosions in my brain, ideas tumbling and scrambling over each other, rushing, half-formed, into another incarnation of thought and design... words don’t have the ability to describe the experience. This is what inspiration is.
Poor Mum and Caitlin had to give up and went in search of food and water. It took me another hour to tear myself away, having bought two of de Saint Phalle’s autobiographies and a book about the garden.Returning to the hotel ‘Valle del Buttero’ in Capalbio, Mum and I got straight out to the pool. Refreshed and re-invigorated, we put on some clothes and all walked up the hill to explore the ancient walled part of the town in search of dinner. After eating we decided to go back to the piazza where we had seen lights and chairs being set up earlier for a 9.30 start of ‘Leopardi Sotto le Stelle’. Having no idea who or what was about to perform we stood sardine crowded at the edge of the square. After a long wait, the lights finally dimmed and in came someone who went on and on ... until finally he introduced someone who was very nervous who went on and on...and then, at last, the performer himself appeared and went on and on...UNTIL at last we cottoned on... this was a poetry recital. Caitlin made us leave, and giggling our way back to our room we agreed. Poetry in your own language is one thing; in a foreign language, after bad dinner service, a long day and swollen ankles – it is right out...
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