dancing – Our Man In Volterra

Warning! This post is media-heavy!

We got up, breakfasted (I skipped my walk), showered and headed out to the Festival. We bought the tickets, got our wristbands and waltzed through security. Or at least I did – the ladies had to have their bags checked.

The Palazzo dei Priori was our first port of call, to play dress-up and rent a costume for the day. It was one of those weird occasions where you don’t think you’d need an official piece of identification, but we did – at least our guest had her driving license with her, which she had to leave with them as collateral. I got a monk’s robe, and Niamh was a woman-of-modest-means, and our guest was a chaste peasant! I may post pics another day, but you can see us down below, having a bit of fun with the mixologist from Antica Velathri Café.

We mooched around the main area – pretty much skipping the performance by the sbandieratori, as we’d seen them a lot the previous night. Once done, we all had a killer sausage and onion sambo to stave off the hunger.

Then it was off to the park to watch the falconry exhibit again. No movies this time – you can check out Day 1 again. Niamh tried using the crossbow, and came very close to hitting the targets (the targets were tiny – apple sized – nobody was hitting them), and afterwards, both the ladies tried archery. Niamh was worryingly good at this. I’d better watch my back! Again, photos may be forthcoming later.

It was getting really warm – even though the monk’s habit was curiously insulating, and so some refreshment was in order. We left the park by the other gate, and headed to Antica Velathri Café, where we became celebs for about 3 minutes. The guy there is really sound, and is happy to help me practice my Italian. He took photos of us to put on his social media sites, and a couple of other onlookers joined-in and took pics of their own!

Of course we had a little booze – iced mulled-wine and Moretti. The mulled wine was yum.

We were roasting by then, and went back to the apartment to chill. But not only to chill, as we had an All-Ireland hurling final to watch! Tipperary, against the odds, pretty much trounced Kilkenny, which made Niamh and her family very happy indeed.

We headed out again for another wander about town, but this time we brought our costumes back. We only thought briefly of wearing them again, but we knew we were going out to eat, and if it was too warm out, if would have been too much of a trial.

We were early to our restaurant, and it wasn’t yet opened. Cursing our luck, we joyfully skipped to Quo Vadis for a swift pint to while away the time! Once sufficiently pinted, we strolled to Ombra Della Sera Pizzeria and yummied down pizzas, and a small, shared plate of fries.

About halfway through our pies, our guest and I swapped pizzas and carried on guzzling, and kept up the calorie count by creeping around to L’Isola del Gusto for a naughty cone.

Unfortunately, I think we missed the skill-at-arms competition, and maybe even an archery competition somewhere… ah well… it just means we’ll have to come back next year 😉

The market at night is cool. The stalls are nicely lit up, and different sets of jesters and performers patrol the streets. We didn’t stay for the full closing ceremony, but hung around the main square to catch a closing act.

Both ladies bought really cool masks made of leather – Niamh’s one is now on display in the apartment.

The sbandieratori closed off the whole show (we know this, because we heard them from our balcony, whilst gulping down wine).

Below are some photos and videos of the nighttime fun.

This morning, I wasn’t feeling too bad, and so both I and our guest went around by Porta San Felice, Porta San Francesco, past the Roman ruins, down to the Docciola carpark and took the arduous stairs back up to town. A shortish route, but with some challenge, especially at the end.

While our guest is out being a tourist, we have to get some shopping in, keys cut, and we might see about framing that artwork we bought.

This evening, we’ll attempt to go (and park!) to San Gimignano. The jewel in the hilltown crown. Pretty is, as pretty does, mind you – I still think Volterra has more to offer!

We felt it had cooled down sufficiently to go back outside. In addition, we really wanted to attend the combat competition and the falconry exhibition. We headed towards the main square (Piazza dei Priori), and found we had managed to catch the end of the medieval dance lesson activity. We grabbed good seats at the top of the bleecher’s and started watching.

It looked like great fun, but with my coordination I could forget trying it. It would take about 5 pints of Moretti before I’d give it a go. You can watch some of it here:

The Master of Ceremonies began announcing the commencement of the combat competition. He was the same guy who ran the opening ceremony, and his speeches rhymed and were delivered with tremendous skill. I realised yesterday that he is riffing his speeches – most of it was off-the-cuff, making it hugely impressive. What a talent to have! He was interrupted a couple of times by drummers, church bells and stilt performers, but handled it with grace and humour.

Here’s a quick video of those stilt performers!

The men representing Volterra’s 8 contrade (town districts) were introduced to the crowd, and kids lined up to grab (I think) stickers with the contrada emblems printed on them. They were paired off and fought each other.

I’m not 100% sure of the rules, but it looked like you scored a point if you hit the armoured part of the head, or the heavily padded torso, and it was the best of 3. You face disqualification if you hit an illegal area (e.g. the face – as one combatant did with a pike – no injury was caused, but he was still disqualified).

While they fought, the drummers thundered out a tattoo, which added to the urgency and excitement of the bouts.

It was effectively a knockout competition, and eventually the two finalists fought, but it was the best of three matches, each match having different weapon-sets (pikes, sword and buckler, club and shield). It was a close competition, but eventually the favourite of the ladies in the crowd, representing Cingiale (the Boar) had his hand raised.

We also caught some action on video, here:

After we’d recovered from that, we made our way (slowly – it was very crowded), to the park to check out the falconry exhibition. It was a fabulous location to have it, as there is a natural hollow in the green around which people can sit and observe – and a few hundred did just that!

It began a bit poorly, as the first falcon they released didn’t want to play the humans’ little game, despite the promise of food, and the handler’s whooping and crying. So they let him alone and loose for a while, and tried a second bird, who duly obliged by wheeling and skimming, sometimes inches, over the heads of the excited audience. Fun for adults and kids alike! Eventually, he was done, and was rewarded by his master with a few tidbits.

It was only then that the other fellah got a little bit jealous of all the attention and food, and began to perform for us. He wheeled overhead, much higher than the other, and flitted from tree to tree. At one point, however, the handler threw a morsel high into the air, and the bird swooped and, with a barely perceptable pause, caught the food mid-flight. Amazing to see.

I also got some video of the second, more compliant, bird here:

After that excitement, it was time to eat! We went to the Torre del Porcellino, and opted to eat inside, on the basis that we thought it had air conditioning. We were right: it did, but only for about 2 tables – we were sat at the back and began to stick to the furniture. The food was fab, though! Niamh had spinach and ricotta ravioli in a tomato sauce, and I had similar, but mine was stuffed with pecorino cheese and served in a mushroom brodo (broth). We both had the same main course: stewed beef cheek with red and white cabbage, and we got a couple of sides. Always delicious food there, but damn it was too hot!

We went back to the apartment then.

As it was also the last night of the arts festival in the Roman amphiteatre, I wanted to check it out, so I headed out alone. On the way I snuck in some gelato from L’isola del Gusto, of course! Even at 10:45 they had queues 7-8 people deep.

I can’t quite describe what the act in the amphiteatre was – it seemed to be some spoken word between jazzy piano numbers. Not my thing, although the pianist was very talented.