Category: Alpi Apuane


The Six Hour Clocks of Italy

April 11th, 2010 — 12:51 pm

Although I’ve been coming to Italy for more than ten years, I didn’t know about 6 hour clocks until we found one yesterday. They were apparently common between the 15th and 17th centuries, but very few survive. There is only one hand and the numerals go from one to six, dividing the day into four parts to regulate the monastic ‘hours’ of prayer.
Spring has suddenly arrived in Tuscany - rather later than usual. The sun has real warmth now and the cool wind from eastern Europe has stopped competing with it. This seems very unfair when I’m packing up to leave. I hate packing and this time it’s an impossible task - there’s so little you can take on a Ryan Air luggage allowance. So I have to decide what I need immediately, and what can be stored to bring back in the car in a couple of months time. Then there’s the house to clean and restore to its original pristine state before the summer visitors arrive ….
So yesterday afternoon, with temperatures of 24 degrees, we played truant. The nearby Lucchese Pass, which goes through the Alpi Apuane to the Garfagnana, has been closed since 2001 because of landslides. But recently, after a lot of work by the Commune, it’s been opened again and we decided to go exploring.
As the crow flies the distances aren’t great - we probably travelled no more than 15 miles or so inland - but the roads wind up and down the hills in endless hairpin bends and it seems to take forever to reach the other side.
We found a little hillside village called Convalle - a typical mountain settlement in the chestnut forest. You have to park your car outside the village and walk. Inside the original cobbled pathways lead you around a maze of alleyways and courtyards, always upwards, to the church at the top.

Many of the houses are empty and shuttered. They are summer retreats for wealthy owners in Florence or Rome. Recently they’ve been bought up by Germans, Swiss, and people from eastern europe. Most of the permanent residents we met were elderly. Young people don’t want to live so far out. There’s no shop here and no bar. The residents are ‘contadini’ - country people who live by harvesting the chestnuts and cultivating the narrow hillside terraces with the help of study mountain ponies.
On the way back we stopped at Pescaglia, only three miles further on, and found the six hour clock on a very old bell tower. Then we went to the little bar for a much needed prosecco - which probably explains the photograph below!

5 comments » | Alpi Apuane, Clocks, Convalle, Italy, Peralta Tuscany, Pescaglia

The Beach in Winter

January 29th, 2010 — 02:44 pm

This morning we took the dogs to the beach, which is about thirty minutes drive from where we’re staying. The sky was grey and overcast, with the mountains just emerging from cloud in the distance, white-capped and unreal. The sea was almost as grey as the sky, but with big waves rolling in - very unusual for the Mediterranean.

All along the coast, the road is lined with beach clubs - you have to pay to go in and use their facilities. In summer it’s nice to have an umbrella, a steamer chair, a shower and a bar! But in winter they’re all closed and boarded up and you can stroll wherever you want.

Today we had the beach to ourselves, shared only with a couple of men exercising horses. We were surprised at the amount of debris. Apparently this is the result of the Xmas floods, which have washed down a whole forest of trees - they estimate it will take months to clear.

It was cold, but very beautiful. I feel very lucky to be here.

Comment » | Alpi Apuane, Peralta Tuscany

A Walk in the Mountains

January 25th, 2010 — 01:41 pm
It seemed a shame to waste such wonderful weather, so yesterday we went for a walk in the mountains with the two dogs we’re looking after for a friend. Elly is a small Italian terrier who spends all day chasing after sticks and pine cones and anything else she can persuade you to throw for her. Frank is a Spinone - a pedigree breed, large and shaggy as a sheep, and rather similar to the English Lurcher. He’s good natured, but enjoys chasing and biting people on bicycles, so he has to be kept on a lead near pathways.
The views were spectacular as we climbed up towards the ridge of Mount Prana, and we could see far out across Torre del Lago (still swollen by flood water) and across the Mediterranean as far as Corsica.
These ancient pathways through the olive groves are punctuated by shrines, still decorated with flowers and candles, however high up or distant.
There are wild flowers everywhere - we found some small orchid like plants with flowers like cobras, spectacular funghi growing under the chestnut trees, hellebore along the edges of the paths, daisies and cyclamen.

We passed through a small mountain village called Torcigliano, perched precariously on the slope of the hillside - the streets accessed only by steps. Like most of these villages it still has the communal washhouse in the centre, fed by a spring.
All over the hillside, in the olive groves, are ruined, abandoned homesteads whose owners have migrated to the valleys, to big cities like Milan, or even to America, in search of an easier life than the subsistence farming these houses represent. We look at them longingly - dreaming of owning one and restoring it. We imagine sitting on the terrace, drinking our own wine, nibbling our own olives, looking at the views of mountain and sea on summer evenings ……. But the reality is that these ‘rusticos’ as they’re known, are very sought after as holiday homes for rich Europeans who drive down from France or Germany, or further east. Even in ruinous condition in an isolated location, they fetch 150 to 200 thousand euros. We had better keep buying the lottery tickets!

On the way down, against the red sky of a setting sun, we found these skeletons of wild clematis.

Comment » | Alpi Apuane, Flora, Peralta Tuscany, Torcigliano

Il tempo fa bello - ma ……..

January 22nd, 2010 — 03:51 pm

The weather is beautiful in Italy at the moment - the sun warm enough to have coffee on the terrace in only jumper and jeans. The nights are cold - down to 2 degrees, but it’s worth enduring them for the clear skies studded with stars. Mars is visible at the moment, large and very, very red. Mars, the planet of War and human aggression, of which there is plenty. No doubt, if I knew where to look, Saturn is out there too, spinning its rings of misery-dust.
It seems unfair to be in such idyllic surroundings when there is so much suffering in the world - and I’m thinking continually of Haiti, where people are still being miraculously plucked from the rubble. What I can’t bear to think about are those who survived the quake and then perished, buried alive, for want of rescue.
The numbers of dead and missing are staggering. Somehow it’s always the poor countries, the deprived areas, that suffer most. Those rich enough to be able to afford to get out of such places have gone long ago, so only the poor remain. They can’t afford good, well-built housing, earthquake proof, and they don’t have the political power to force their government to build it for them. And, as in the Chinese quake, they are vulnerable to corruption. We don’t live in a fair, well-balanced world, but one that sometimes makes me ashamed to be human.
Here in Italy there is a great deal of sympathy for the Haitians and the Italian mobile phone companies have set up a text-and-donate service, asking everyone for 2.50 euros - a small amount, but multiplied by a million or so …….
The earth we live on doesn’t conform to any health and safety regs, as the Italians know very well. All around us there are examples of the earth’s violent activity - Italy is literally being torn in half. In the mountains we found a ruined tower - no idea how old - medieval perhaps, though some ruins date back to the Romans or even to the Etruscans. But, though the walls are several feet thick, the tower was destroyed centuries ago by an earthquake that no one now remembers. People still live in this area, though the settlement around the tower has long since vanished. I sometimes think that we humans manage to live in disaster zones only because living memory goes back so few years, relative to the passage of geological time.
When I look at the tower I wonder what happened to the houses that once surrounded it, to the people who lived in them and what their stories were. So much of our past history survives only in myth and legend - come down to us as stories; Atlantis, Noah’s flood, the Iliad, the Norse sagas, the Welsh Mabinogion. And I wonder what will survive of us in story 2,000 years from now?

Comment » | Alpi Apuane, Earthquakes, Italy, Peralta Tuscany, myths and legends, stories

Back to Work

January 13th, 2010 — 04:48 pm

Xmas is over now and all the offspring have returned to their own homes, despite snow, ice, delayed and cancelled flights and other obstacles. So there’s no excuse for not getting down to work again. Neil has returned to the marble yard where he’s converting a plaster maquette into a glittering white marble sculpture. He has bought a block of ‘statuary grade’ Carrara marble, which looks rather like Kendal Mint Cake. You can see it above. The man standing is Pietro who is providing the marble and the blue overalls belong to Anat, an Israeli sculptor who owns the marble yard.

Marble yards are filthy places - white dust everywhere like snow; pieces of marble piled up haphazardly among the machinery; fork lifts and hoists. Even a small piece of marble weighs a ton - quite literally.

Since Monday Neil has been attacking the block with an angle-grinder and diamond blade. I would be terrified of sawing off the wrong bit - unlike writing, once something’s edited out, it’s out for good! But his block now looks something like this.

And I’m back to the editing of the book - now working on the end notes and references, which is a long and frustrating process. Will my reputation as a biographer really be ruined if I can’t read my handwriting when I jotted down a reference 5 years ago? I don’t believe it will, but my editor has other ideas! Thank goodness for the internet.
The weather here is still cold and often wet. We are staying in a large, unheated house with marble floors, high ceilings and draughty doors. Last night it was cold enough for two duvets, a pair of fleecy pyjamas, a cardigan and the electric blanket. But at lunch-time I went outside and ate my lunch on the terrace in the sun. Miraculous!

Comment » | Alpi Apuane, Peralta Tuscany, sculpture

Epiphanic Mayhem

January 8th, 2010 — 10:46 am


January the 6th was Epiphany, or 12th night. In England it means you take down the Christmas tree and all the decorations or you will have bad luck all year. But in Italy it seems to have a much wider significance that mixes pagan and Christian in a very interesting way. It’s not just the anniversary of the arrival of the Magi at Bethlehem, or the descent of the holy ghost, but a public holiday with celebrations and music. Children are given stockings filled with sweets and a witch - La Befana - flies on her broomstick.
We were having a pizza in our local bar when suddenly the door opened and a group of musicians and singers arrived, visiting homes and restaurants like carol singers and playing strange eastern European music. It’s fascinating to live in a place where local traditions are still strong, spontaneous and not just something trotted out for tourists.
Neil did a small video of the music, which I will put up here, though the quality isn’t very good because it was filmed in a very dark bar!

4 comments » | Alpi Apuane, Epiphany, Italy

A Picnic on Monte Corchia

December 14th, 2009 — 11:23 am
We’ve been having a series of lovely autumn days here - too good to stay indoors. We try to stick to a routine of working in the morning and then going out for a walk in the afternoon. Yesterday we decided to head up into the marble mountains just behind us - a short distance as the crow flies, but longer on the tiny roads that slalom up and down the slopes. Monte Corchia is quite high, but you can drive up the quarry road to about 4,000 feet - 1300 metres before it turns into a 4×4 track. The views are spectacular.
We ate a late lunch (4pm!) at the side of the road, next to the shrine, and stayed to watch the sun go down. It was bitterly cold - ice on the road - but the view is so wonderful it’s worth suffering for. You can see across the Mediterranean as far as Corsica. The sea seemed to go on forever beyond the glare of the sun.

On our right was the marble quarry of Mount Altissimo. The summit of the mountain has been eaten almost completely away by centuries of mining. It’s a visible reminder of the way human activity has affected the landscape.
As the sun goes down the colours change and the whole landscape glows. We drove home in the fading light, reminding ourselves how lucky we are to be here. Tonight the weather is changing - there’s a cold wind from eastern europe rattling the windows and storm clouds gathering over the mountains, so probably no walk tomorrow.

2 comments » | Alpi Apuane, Altissimo, Corchia, Italy

Driving in Italy

December 8th, 2009 — 11:18 am

This is Pruno - one of my favourite hill-top villages in the Alpi Apuane and it’s about twenty minutes drive from Pietrasanta. The driving here is not for the faint-hearted, though you do get used to it. Italy has one of the highest death rates in Europe, due to a combination of speed, bad driving, and a lot of machismo. We’ve witnessed some unbelievable behaviour since we’ve been here. And it doesn’t help that the roads are not as well maintained as elsewhere in Europe. Italy has a large network of tiny mountain roads and it struggles to keep them up to scratch - this one is typical of Tuscany. They were never built for motorised traffic and are only wide enough for a small car, with steep gradients and right angle bends you negotiate with your front bumper among the flower pots and your wing mirrors scraping the corner of someone’s house!

It’s wise to hoot very loudly before beginning the ascent/descent because there’s nowhere to go if you meet another driver. The metal safety barriers are a recent innovation. Locals tell hair-raising stories of coming back from the bar late at night in winter and being found next morning hanging from a branch, completely sober but minus a vehicle.
Tourists aren’t expected to tackle the chicanes. They can leave their cars in the car park and walk the last few yards. When we first started coming to Italy we came across blurb which read ‘We will collect your luggage with the Ape’ which produced much hilarity. This useful animal is pronounced ‘Apay’ in Italian and isn’t a gorilla, but a narrow vehicle constructed around a motor bike frame like this.

There are no easy options in this part of Tuscany, but the tranquility of the mountains and the views are worth any amount of effort to get up here.

2 comments » | Alpi Apuane, Italy, Pruno, mountains, roads

Vazha, Sculpture and the Misty Mountains of Pruno

September 3rd, 2009 — 08:42 pm

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I’ve just come back from the studio of Vazha Mikaberidze, who sculpts as ‘Prasto’. Vazha is a Georgian, living and working in Italy. His work extends from the figurative to the abstract and even the conceptual and his studio is crowded with examples. Huge textured plaster sheets stand against the wall, with seductive tactile patterns. Vazha takes a rubber mould from the trunk of particularly interesting trees. He then cuts it lengthwise and opens it out flat to reveal the patterns of the bark, selecting sections to cast in plaster and then in bronze or nickel. In another corner a life-size man springs from the wall, arms spread out, his jacket flying on either side like wings. This is Sergei Parajanov - a Georgian film director whose work and personal
beliefs put him in a soviet gulag for more than six years. The plaster model, bursting with character, is the maquette for a bronze outside the opera house in Tblisi.


Around the floor are beautiful abstract forms - many of them referencing the natural world. Delicate figures form a circle around a pair of feet, like a corps de ballet - a sculpture that was actually made as a stage set for a ballet. It is part of a body of work that is a homage to the choreographer Balanchine which Vazha is currently working on though the project is on hold at the moment until the situation between Russia and Georgia is resolved.

Vazha’s stories are a reminder that, whatever the problems of funding in Europe, the politics of art are much simpler and less dangerous here than elsewhere.

Afterwards we drove up into the Apuane to have lunch at a little hill village called Pruno, where you can have a plate of home-made pasta with wild-boar sauce for 6 euros and where the wine comes in earthenware jugs.


The weather is changing with the full moon. After two months of searing temperatures and no rain, clouds are gathering over the hills, and everyone is hoping for some wet weather. The trees are scorched to brown and the rivers are dry. Tonight it is so humid our clothes are sticking to our backs and the mosquitos are attacking every square inch of skin not coated with chemicals. Not quite paradise - but almost!

3 comments » | Alpi Apuane, Balanchine, Italy, Prasto, Sergei Parajanov, sculpture