[I just realized I have exceeded the longest holiday I have ever taken. Last year I was away 42 days, now I’ve been gone 45. Trying not to feel bad that the remaining days are dwindling.]

We made a few stops on our return from Volterra to see more of the Toscana (Tuscany) region.

A Staccioli statue to frame the view:

Then to the medieval hilltop portion of the town of Certaldo:

Part of the hilltop area was bombed during WWII and later reconstructed. You can see the difference because of the modern bricks.

Certaldo claims the early Renaissance writer and humanist, Giovanni Boccaccio, was born in Certaldo in 1313. There’s also a house in Florence that claims he was born there. He is most famous for The Decameron, a collection of short stories, told in the Tuscan vernacular, each story by a different member of a group secluded in a villa as they try to avoid the plague. The tales are often comic and sometimes bawdy. It was a great influence on Chaucer, who wrote The Canterbury Tales.

After a windy bumpy drive, we had a wine tasting and lunch at Villa Le Corti, which has its own winery featuring Chianti Classico and Super Tuscan wines.

We made a brief stop at the American Cemetery just outside Florence. I could not help thinking about the sacrifices made to stop dictatorship and whether that has meaning today. Or is it another case of if we forget history, we are doomed to repeat it.