Time for another update! Starting where I left off.... on
our last day in Rome, thankfully it was a bright and sunny day because we
decided to rent bikes for the day. Our pedaling feet took us through a large
and beautiful park not far from the hostel, where we cruised down many paths
and stopped to eat lunch on a bench. Later, we pedaled all along the river,
back and forth, watching the rowers as we went along. It was a nice way to see
Rome. I didn't realize how much we had walked the days before until we rode
down the same roads. We walked a ton! I also found the city to be hillier than
I remembered when walking haha.
The next day, we headed north to Siena on a train. When we
got there it was pouring down rain, and after receiving disappointing news from
Hertz that we couldn't rent a car since we are under 25, we took a taxi
straight to our B&B a little out of town. We made ourselves some dinner,
consisting of frozen goods and pasta with a little too much salt :/ and settled
into our cold room. Apparently Italians aren't too fond of heaters?? Luckily, I found a brochure from a
local rent-a-car company that would rent to us under 25ers and so the next day
we set out to Siena to get ourselves a car!
We spent the next day driving all around Tuscany, stopping in
the teeny tiny towns along the way. Most seemed like ghost towns, so we didn't
stick around long, just enough to try some wine and see the pretty scenery.
North of Siena was more foresty and saturated by wineries, where the south was
very very green and hilly, SO beautiful. We stopped several times along the
road to take pictures, but I don't think they do it justice. We ate dinner in
Montalcino, a larger town at the top of a hill/mountain and had some tasty
meat! Wild boar and chicken in wine sauce. Mmm mmm good!
Sadly, we eventually had to return our car and move on to
the next stop, which took us not far from Siena to our next HelpX. To greet us
at the train station was a sweet little old Scottish lady named Rosamond. She
drove us back to Sasso (the name of her homestead) where we met two other
HelpXers; Arthur, a Brit, and Jeurn, a German fellow who's mastery of English
makes for some hilarious moments. We started working almost immediately on the
tree house, fixing a hand rail along the stairs up to the 2nd platform-- there
are three altogether. And this tree house is what every kid dreams of. The top
floor is decorated with all sorts of random scraps of wood and shudders. It
reminds me of the one in the movie Jack. It's really cool.
Arther sort of introduced us to Sasso and the ways of
Rosamond. She's very scatterbrained and not many things are in working order so
you kind of have to make due with the tools that she's got. Sasso itself is a
huge establishment. There are bathrooms and bedrooms around every corner, this
place would make for the best round of hide and go seek anyone could play!
Rosamond told us it actually started as pigsties and cow pens, so they
obviously have done a lot of work over the years. She said they once housed 50
people at one time for New Year's Eve. And over the past few years you can tell
it hasn't been kept up so much, so there's a lot of fixing and cleaning that
needs to be done.
It's been a lot colder this spring than usual, but still no
heater, so I have been trying my best to stay warm under piles of blankets and
layers of clothes. The past few days have been a bit more sunny, and we've been
doing a lot of yard work consisting of hedge trimming, mowing the lawn, and
gardening. My hands are starting to show for the work we've done. Almost every
day I get a new cut on my finger somewhere; yesterday we had to cut these nasty
hedges that have huge thorns on them and it's almost inevitable that you will
get poked, which I did at least ten times. I even got a thorn through the shoe
and one through my pants, which both bled on my socks :(
There are 3 cats; Rono, Sukumos, and Shakti; 4 turtles;
Holy, Cow, and two I can't remember; 2 peacocks; Pythagorus and Penelope; and 2
hens; Henrietta and Theodora living here. The male peacock likes to make lots
of noise, especially when I'm around, and is more obnoxious than a rooster.
It's only my fifth day here and already I want to shoot it and cook it up for
dinner. Take that Pythagorus! Oh, but Rosamond is a vegetarian so there won't
be any cooking meat in her kitchen... ha
Speaking of Rosamond, if you have ever seen the movie
Duplex, you will get a pretty good picture of the kind of person Rosamond is.
We often eat meals later than normal because she will get talking on the phone
or working on something else that she forgets that we are all waiting with our
mouths watering and our tummies grumbling. Not that I'm complaining. She
actually makes good food, it just takes her time to get around to making it.
And she's also quite a jokester, so it's easy to get along with her.
Today it rained almost the whole day so we ended up cleaning
one of the rooms meant for HelpXers to hang out in... but I haven't really cuz
it's so cold! It was covered in spider webs and dust from head to toe, but we
got it looking like new. Sometimes with the work I get frustrated because it's
not really my cup of tea (surprisingly I actually enjoy cleaning a lot more
than working in the yard) and I forget that I'm in this beautiful place in
Italy. It doesn't even feel like I'm in Italy here. Maybe because I'm not
actually living with any Italians... but I'm trying to stay motivated and
thankful that I even have the opportunity to be here and to meet these people.
I'm starting to miss my friends and family a lot more, the stress of always
being in a new place, though exciting, also wears on my nerves and I am looking
forward to coming home to LA after we are done traveling. Not that our trip
will be cut short. No no, too much left to see yet :)
