Have nearly finished the first week at Il Sasso here in Montepulciano with a small group starting to learn Italian. Quite intense really…4 hours every morning and the teaching uses a lot of immersion so the explanation or instructions are in Italian! Lots of grammar… verbs, adjectives, articles of determination….I need more of the Vino Nobile Montepulciano! Luckily there is a great cafe close by for lots of coffee in the breaks! Vorrei un cafe macchiato per favore and vorrei un cappuccino doppio caldo somehow gets close to what I want.


Learning Italian….
06 Jun 2013 1 Comment
First day in Montepulciano….
03 Jun 2013 1 Comment
Walked down the hill to the supermercato…closed for inventory???….walked back up the hill for a cappuccino in Cafe Poliziano…sun shining so took a cup of tea onto my terrace and met neighbours and invited them to share my terrace which soon followed by an invitation to join these 3 lovely Canadian ladies for lunch at Il Grotto. Sat in the courtyard and had some divine Italian food..duck liver on Italian toast followed by hand rolled pasta with quail and prunes.
Lovely wines and the girls were great fun. Did a little wine tasting on the way back up the hill and bought my first bottle of Vino il Nobile Montepulciano which is the red wine this place is famous for..12 euro a bottle was pretty good for such a beautiful wine! 7pm for welcome drinks at the Italian language school Il Sasso where I am starting some lessons tomorrow morning. Welcomed in Italian and no one seemed to speak or want to speak any English so I guess its immersion from the start…not sure how I will go???? I did meet John McCarthy QC the Australian Amassador to the Holy See in Rome…i.e the Vatican and Pope!!! He was recently appointed by Julia Gillard and replaced Tim Fischer but has only 100 words of Italian! Should be an interesting week!
Arrival in Montepulciano, Tuscany, Italy…
01 Jun 2013 2 Comments
Used a private transfer by car to drive through the countryside ,which was green and lush,to my next abode for 4 weeks, Politian Apartments. Montepulciano is a medieval town and Tuscany’s ‘loftiest’ hilltop town with remarkable views of the surrounds and its vineyards, olive groves and little villages. The apartment is located in the highest and oldest part of Montepulciano near the 12th Century Fortress and monastery of Santa Maria die Servi. My bedroon is huge and there is a spare! The original features of the building are preserved but all modern amenities are here. The paintings, furniture and decorative objects all belonged to the family of the owners and the original palazzo (house). The sheets, bedspreads and tapestries all belonged to a wedding trousseaux from the late 1800’s…when the owners found them they were new and never used! My photos don’t do it justice…












