We set off for Pitigliano, or what is known as Little Jerusalem on Tuesday morning around 10:00 am.  Heading south out of our little village of Pergine Valdarno, we were armed with an Italian road atlas and our sometimes not so trusty friend, Lucille.  You see, Lucille is the name we’ve given to our Garmin GPS who tells us in her monotone voice what roads to take or where to turn.  She earned that name from us during our first trip to Italy three years ago, while exploring Tuscany.  As we crested a back mountain road and were faced with an intersection with three different directions to go, the GPS unit lost its satellite signal, the monotone voice fell silent and we were forced to choose blindly.  We chose wrong but didn’t discover that until we had travelled 20 minutes over one of the most winding, twisting roads you will ever see.  Realizing our mistake, we turned around to retrace our steps and the Kenny Rogers melody came to mind, “You picked a fine time to leave me Lucille.”  That name seemed to be a good fit for her and we’ve called her that ever since.

Our adventure to Pitigliano started off this time with Lucille directing us almost at once to take a road that I didn’t think was correct but we followed along blindly anyway.  I’m doing the driving on this trip and Doug was still learning the ropes as a navigator.  He still had more trust in Lucille as we started off this day than I did.  He soon learned however that she is a person not to be trusted.  Apparently Lucille likes the twisty, turny routes because she took us on a course that should have taken 25 minutes but instead took about an hour and ten minutes.  With our new navigator realizing Lucille’s penchant for misdirection, he charted a different course and we soon found our way back to civilization and back on track for Pitigliano.  From that point, it became a question of checking everything Lucille told us with the map and then either following her direction or choosing our own course which she would then fall in line with and come up with a new plan.  This is a very exciting way of traveling in a foreign country with roads that are mostly unmarked and signs in a language you don’t understand.  Again, this is where the Wagnerson motto, “Attitude is everything, enjoy the journey” comes to the forefront!

We arrived in Pitigliano around 1:00 pm., after a two hour and 45 minute road trip that should have taken around two hours.  The city is perched on top of a massive bluff with walls dropping down hundreds of feet.  Some of the walls were built 700 B.C. and the remainder were built in the 1400s-1500s.  It was pretty spectacular.  We had a nice lunch at a restaurant perched near the edge of the city wall.

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After a two hour visit to the city, we piled back in our car and headed back to Pergine Valdarno.  On our way back we passed through the hilltop town of Orvieto.  This like Pitigliano, sits on a massive raised piece of volcanic rock.  Again, the word spectacular comes to mind.

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After an all day trip, we arrived back at our temporary home in Pergine Valdarno a little after 5:30 p.m. in order to rest up before dinner.