Birthday trip, part 2

• Manja Maksimovič

Immediately, while the memories are still hot, here is the second part of my Sunday birthday trip. Today we enter the Orsini Fortress in Sorano for the first time and there is no telling what we might find.

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Sorano! This was my long-time wish, the third town in the Pitigliano-Sovana-Sorano triangle, a trio of old old towns, built on tufa, the volcanic ash composite. Since it was raining gently, we gladly parked at the first imposing building without knowing what it is or whether we would be able to proceed with the dog.

It turned out that it was a huge fortress but fully open and free to visit, at least its outdoors. We could continue and descend down a million steps into town but we left it for the next time.

Again, the feeling was that of an amusement park for adults, even though I’m sure kids enjoy playing hide and seek here as well. So many arches and nooks and corners and courtyards and above all – it goes without saying – so many doors.

I did my best to leave the doors for the upcoming Thursdays but still managed to come up with a selection that makes for a good Orsini Fortress showcase. If you want more history, be my guest and google it. I was enough alarmed by a board that said, as you will see, “Niccolò III Orsini 1510-2010”. In Maremma, vampires are alive and well.

After that we returned via Pitigliano, had cappuccino (gasp! never in the afternoon, say Italians) at the roadside bar, and when we reached our hometown were surprised to see our local gelateria open, even though it was cold and I had to put on my cardigan to warm myself up a little before I could hold a gelato.

No photo evidence of that since my hands were full, but there were entire families milling around happily, as if the fathers were not thinking of where to get a beer instead. So unlike Slovenia. (Generalising, of course. Nothing would prevent my father from having that gelato.) Amore refused but bestia happily snapped a piece of waffle with crema flavour.

And the trip was thus complete.

  • The first view of the fortress. The entrance is tiny. Amore announced that he could see some people inside.
  • “Do they have a friendly dog?” I asked.
  • That’s an impressive presentation.
  • The first exit. There were some other visitors too, but not so many.
  • Another entrance. And so it went in and out and up and down.
  • If somebody can translate, be my guest. I don’t even know what a capacciolo is.
  • We didn’t go down there but it looks pretty.
  • Interesting tiles and so many arches.
  • Here it is, the vampire. Nahh, it just says that they put up this plague at the 500th anniversary of his death.
  • We could proceed here.
  • And eventually reach the town but we left it for another time.
  • Bestia was impressed.
  • I like it how the light comes in.
  • The neighbour had some fancy windows put in.
  • These steps were extremely unlevel and hard to walk on, obviously to let the rainwater run down.
  • Back out. Thank you for letting us run around, fortress.
  • The Orsini coat of arms, I presume. I can see apples and grapes.
  • Another inviting neighbour.
  • Bar La Capannella. Bestia is smelling cappuccino. It’s been half a year since my last one.
  • Again we pass Manciano, the spy of Maremma. Another half an hour and home.

29 thoughts on “Birthday trip, part 2”

    1. Yesss! Thank you, Bushboy. Chi chi or cin cin, never mind, I could feel it. 😉 And yes, it was a most excellent day. And today I booked three garden tours for Sunday! It’s an open-door day and some villas open their gardens.

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  11. More wonderful sights. In the place where you did not go, is that an arch? I love the craggy cliffs with windows in them. Do people live there? It’s the same rock formations as Cappadocia in Turkey, where many people carve homes into the rocks, so I wondered if the same thing is happening here.

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    1. Thank you, Crystal. That is a stone bridge of sorts, it seems. This town, as well as Pitigliano where we went first and had lunch, were built on tufa, the material made from the volcanic ash, and they indeed dug holes in it, it appears. You can see – and you will – how they still have garages and shops dug out. In this fortress no one lives but the town continues down below. I have yet to visit Turkey but have seen some photos from there. Might be a similar matter.

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