The weather took a turn for the worse which, truth be told, seems to by and large been a prevalent feature of our visits to Tuscany throughout this year I’m sorry to say. At the time of writing this, however, there is something of a heatwave in many parts in Italy – but we’re stuck in rainy old Ireland.

Our guest wanted to hang around Volterra to check out bits and pieces she missed, so we didn’t stray from the town – well, not far, anyway.

I got up alone and had a walk. It was a full walk around the walls, which is always gratifying.

The circumnavigation continued…

Not having walked enough, I entered the town through Porta a Selci, walked parallel to the prison and entered the park for a quick circling!

I had walked so much by then, that unfortunately I broke through to another universe altogether!

Fortunately, I was not one of the droids they were looking for, and I was allowed to re-traverse the veil between planes and return to my apartment!

Our guest took their time to explore a little more around the town, while Niamh and I lounged around at home. We went out ourselves after while for a short walk and parked ourselves a while in the main piazza, people-watching. We met up again with our guest (sort of) at the Roman Theatre ruins.

Being impressed as she was by those ruins, we asked her if she want to check out the dig-site of the Roman Amphiteatre. She gladly agreed, and we wound our way down. When we got there, we discovered that some shrubber had been cut away to allow a better look at the site. It’s not fully open to the public, but sometimes they advertise site tours.

There’s really only so much time you can spend here when there’s no tour arranged. We ooh’d and ahh’d a bit before we crossed the road and into the cemetery. I don’t think our guest had seen an Italian cemetery before, so we explained (not that we are experts on the matter) that after a period of burial, the remains are removed to a ‘drawer’ in the walls. All of these slots are well-maintained and many have photos fixed to the front.

We moved from one massive courtyard to the other, by taking stairs down, taking glances at the photos every now and again. Some of them are smiling, some are dour – all are interesting. Niamh suddenly exclaimed “Wow – someone’s put one of the O’s on their grave!” After inquiring what she meant, she instead pointed towards the tomb in question. And it did indeed have one of Staccioli’s O’s on it – a mini-version. Then it struck me: this might be his grave – he is Volterran by birth after all!

I clattered down the stairs excitedly and marched swiftly over to it, and confirmed that it was, indeed, Mauro Staccioli’s grave – his wife is interred there too. I love his sculptures – simple but stark and strong. At stated in other blogs, his works are dotted around Volterra like hidden Pokemon! Google Images of some of his works.

I was filming at the time, so I stood there in reverence for a while, just occasionally nattering at the invisible people on the other side of the camera.

Here’s a video of the day!

We trundled back uphill.. all the way uphill, mind you – the walk there is fine, the walk back can be challenging, depending on your fitness.

We chilled back at the apartment for a while, and then went out for a brief walk (the Sith were still hanging about in the square), and wolfed down our dinner at La Vecchia Lira!

Thanks for reading, all. Please leave a like and let me know what you think!

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