Tuscany - day 2

Next morning started with delicious big breakfast with spectacular view over the Tuscan hills, the restaurant in our hotel was a new building built on top of the stone wine cellar and it had three walls made of glass. What a great start of the day! 

On the evening before we made a plan to first drive through the Chianti region, South of our hotel, and visit couple of smaller villages or towns, to get the feeling for the area, and we deliberately didn't choose the most touristy spots.

The ride alone was already exciting, several times we had to navigate very narrow streets through the villages. But luckily the traffic was very light, there were almost no tourists and not even many locals on the roads.

 

Our first stop was a small walled town of San Donato. It of course sits on the top of the hill.

The narrow stone paved streets and pretty old houses were adorned with lots of flowers.

But apart from few locals it was almost empty.

Surprisingly was the church outside of the village a bit down on the hill...

...and in front of it was the carpet of small daisies.

Our next stop was the village of Castellina in Chianti. It is a pretty town, not as spectacular as many others, but we had a nice walk through it. There were plenty of old houses, churches...

...and palaces to be seen.

Then we drove to  Monteriggioni, another walled town on the top of the hill with very high defence walls. This was the only town mentioned in tourist guides of the ones we visited this day, and as such it was more crowded and the only one where we had to pay for parking.

But it looked very pretty...

...and there was lots to see, like this old fountain.

From the outside it looked really impenetrable.

While driving to our next stop I had to make a photo of this very typical Tuscan scenery.

On the edge of the forrest we saw this Stinking hellebore (smrdljivi teloh or Helleborus foetidus) and we had to make a stop for the photo.

Our next stop was village of Panzano, I wanted to see the butcher shop or Macelleria Cecchini, that I saw long ago on one of the Jamie Oliver's cooking show. The shop was full of delicious looking things, but we didn't buy anything, we weren't returning home for couple of days yet and it would be difficult to store anything fresh till then. When reading about macelleria I found out they also serve lunches and dinners, but here is the catch: the lunch starts at 12, which is way too early after our big breakfast, and dinner starts at 7 in the evening, which is too late for us to have a big dinner with lots of meat. We usually eat late breakfast and then lunch/dinner combined in late afternoon. And this does absolutely not fit with Italian eating schedule, they eat lunch from 12 -15 and dinner from 7 or even 7.30 in the evening to 10. And in between it is very difficult to find any decent food, especially in rural area. 

While we walked back to our car we noticed that Panzano also has an old centre and decided to take a look. It was up on the hill, of course and the surrounding were very pretty.

Along the way between the old houses we found this pretty and very vocal orange cat.

On top of the hill there was a church...

...guarded by another cat.

Right next to the church there was a small bistro and we were getting a bit tired so we decided to have at least a drink there. Then we saw that they also serve snacks throughout the day, so we ordered a big platter of charcuterie with some pickled vegetables and fresh bread and a glass of Chianti wine each and it was very tasty. And we even managed some desserts after that, Tomaz had a chocolate cake of course, and I had some cantuccini with vinsanto. 

The bistro also had a terrace, but we were sitting inside in the closed part, as the weather was quite cold.

Then we were ready for next adventures. We planned to stop in Radda in Chianti, another pretty old town on the top of the hill, but as we were driving towards it we saw that the surrounding streets were full of people and parked cars and there was no parking to be found. So we decided to pass and drive on. Later we read that there was a running event there and that's why it was so crowded.

So we drove to Montefioralle, only to find that there were tons of people and cars there as well. They were having a Frittelle festival, where they were all, the whole village, frying fritters and selling them for charity. At least we could find the parking and then strolled through the town. But we were too full to eat any fritters.

The town is very pretty...

...I particularly liked this red door.

Then we drove back to the hotel, we were a bit tired and cold and we went to bed early.

To be continued...
 

Tuscany - day 1

 In the middle of March we made a trip to Tuscany. This trip was already planed for last Spring, but as I was still getting over my legs injuries then, we postponed it to this year. When we travel, we like to walk a lot and explore new places on foot and that would not have been possible last year. 

We booked a hotel some 30 km South of Florence, some 5 hours drive from our home. For the stop along the long drive we chose the town of Ferrara. It has an old town centre and we thought, why not use the opportunity to see something new and pretty if we are going to make a stop anyway. The old town centre of Ferrara was very pretty with old walls...

...big churches...

... medieval palaces...

...and even a castle...

...with the moat.

We also discovered this interesting round building, that seems to house a theatre nowadays.

We didn't have time explore the town very thoroughly, but we took time to have a pizza and a beer in one of the restaurant and we even grabbed few local pastries from one of the bakeries. 

After another two hours of driving we reached our hotel, Borgo Salvadonica in the late afternoon. It dates back to 14th century and borgo means a tiny village or hamlet, often on a hill. And our hotel was just that. We were staying in this stone building, that maybe once was place where they kept animals or stored wine or olive oil or kept tools to work the land.

Our room was also looking very old, with stone wall, window with steel bars and wooden beams and clay ceiling...

...and a gorgeous view.

Bathroom was behind the lower wall...

...and while it was completely modern and obviously added recently, it still had a big wooden beam in the shower. So lovely.

There were old beams and old wine barrels in the corridors...

...and the stone steps were so worn down we had to hold on to railing when climbing them.

It was all so charming and the surroundings were so pretty as well. All around our hotel were lovely Tuscan hills with lots of old houses and borghos, wine and olive grows...

and obligatory cypress trees as well.

We were quite tired so we just made a stroll around the hotel and then had the dinner in hotel's restaurant, La Volpenera. Food was delicious and the wine, that they are producing on the property, fantastic. We were again very lucky with our choice of the hotel.

To be continued...

Winter of 2026

 This past winter was rather cold here in Žabnica, but there was not much snow. As every winter we were feeding the birds and they appreciate it. The most common birds on the feeder are Tree sparrows (poljski vrabci) and they really created a traffic jam on the feeder.

Sometimes, especially when there is snow, we see more rare visitors, like Eurasian jay (šoja).

Unfortunately this year I didn't see my favourite birds Long-tailed tits (dolgorepke) often, but his pretty guy came almost every day, the Great spotted woodpecker (veliki detel).

On one of our walks in January we saw the Kestrel (postovka).

Already in January there were days when there was enough sun so one got the feeling that the spring is coming soon.

Around our village there are plenty of deer (srn).

On a clear day we can see the hills, the Kamniške alpe.

And already in January the Common pheasants (fazani) started to mate.

At the end of January we spent couple of days in Portorož, we really liked our stay there last winter. Our room had a view over the sea.

Luckily only the first day was cloudy, after that we had sunny but quite cold weather. But it was perfect for long walks. We spent mornings and evenings in the pool and during the day we were exploring the area, by car and on foot. This is the view over Izola. And in the late afternoon we usually found us a good restaurant for some nice fish and a glass of good wine.

On one of the days we drove to Piran and then walked around the town. It is really very pretty.

I liked the sculptures that are carved into the rocks on the wave breaker, there was also a turtle and a dolphin there.

In the beginning of March we spent some days on our boat in Skradin. The rosemary was still blooming.

We made a trip to the Krka falls national part and on the way, besides the road, we found this pretty orchid.

The park was magical as always. It was still rather cold and there weren't too many animals around, this was one of the few frogs that we found.

But in spring there is usually lots of water and the falls look really grand.

These guys were already mating...

...and in the sun the colours of the feathers on the males were really very bright.

I just love how the water flows everywhere, through the trees, over the grass...

...and water has carved some interesting shapes in the rocks.

Under the bridge in the deeper water we saw some good sized fish.

And I had to include the photo of this pretty and fluffy cat that we found there.

This is the view over the upper part of the river above the waterfalls.

But I was quite happy to be home after couple of days, where there was cozy and warm. 

One day after lots of rain we found this pretty guy at our door - the Italian crested newt (veliki pupek). It was a first for us!

At the end of March weather got better and we found some Snake’s head fritillarys (močvirske tulipane) on one of our walks. And we knew the spring has definitely come.