Friday April 28, 2023
Eggs a La Carol for breakfast again. Get ‘‘em while you can. It is a relaxing morning as our first attraction does not open until 1030. We meet Dave and Gwen in the main Piazza around 1000. This is to make sure we find the entrance to Palazzo Sorbello. It is by tour only and the first one is at 1030 and we want to be on it. It is a very short walk from the piazza and we find it with no problem. Since we have a little time, I walk to find the entrance to the Etruscan Well that we will visit next. Yesterday some people told Carol they had trouble finding it which is why I go to look but they must have walked with blinders on as it is easy to find and well marked. Still with a little time, I find an ATM to get some more cash. Errands complete, I return and 5 minutes later the Palace opens. We get our tickets and wait outside on their veranda for our tour. This spot rewards us with great views of the Dominican Church, St Peters Church, ancient buildings and the surrounding mountains.
Our tour starts and we get a nice young girl who speaks very good English. The Palazzo dates back to the end of the 16th century and contains books, paintings, ceramics, and textiles of the Marquises Bourbon di Sorbello. The family still lives in another half of the place. We start in the library which has some of the first travel books of the area both in Italian and English. The illustrations are cool and one shows the street that we travel to the Piazza Novembre from the1700s. The buildings have not changed. We learn some of the history of the family. More recent history tells of Ruggiero Sorbello who was a councilman and took great care to preserve the library and artwork that he inherited. In 1902, he married a young American Romeyne Robert who was from New Jersey but educated in Germany and Italy. She enriched the family library and had an entrepreneurial spirit. She started the Sorbello school of embroidery and also the Montessori School. Moving along we see some more illustrations from manuscripts that were all degrading to women. One portrays them as monkeys. There are some beautiful chandeliers made of Murano glass from Venice, some were made in pieces and have metal rods in them to help support being moved to light the candles. There is a button collection, fine porcelain (one set had over 300 pieces, each with a slightly different garden scene on them), and an interesting letter from a young boy in the Montessori School. He says that they were trying out new ideas on the children and using them as guinea pigs. Out of the mouths of babes. It was a very nice tour and the girl knew her stuff.
We leave the Palazzo and walk down the block to the non elusive Etruscan Well. The well dates back to the second half of the 3rd century B.C. It is about 180 feet deep and 16 feet in diameter. The original Etruscan trusses interlocked without the use of mortar. we are able to descend to a bridge that spans the bottom of the well. Well, well , well, look who’s in the well (for you youngsters, a little rascals reference), It’s Carol.
Our next stop on todays tour is the Rocca Paolina. It is an ancient fortress built in 1540 for Pope Paul III. It was built by incorporating part of the houses, towers and streets of an entire neighborhood and building up from there. The fortress was a symbol of Papal Authority until 1860, when most of it was destroyed following the unification of Italy. We enter at Porta Marcia which has Roman inscriptions declaring Augusta Perusia a Roman colony and was the most important southern entrance into the city. We enter the underground fortress and walk the streets of the town that was used. It is very cool. There are signs explaining the history of Perugia, the Baglioni Family in charge, the refusal to pay an increase in the tax on salt by the Papacy, which led to the salt wars and the quick military victory by the Papal armies. Wanting to expedite the building of the fortress is the reason they just incorporated parts of the city into its structure. It makes for a very interesting underground journey.
We exit the fortress via a series of escalators and not knowing where we exit, we become slightly misplaced looking for the Dominican Church and a nearby pizza place for lunch. Directions given to me at a hotel desk are clear as tinted plexiglass and we wander a bit before getting back on track and more importantly streets on our map. We stop at a small shop for some type of calzones only made with a flakier pastry crust. Filled with ham and cheese, they are very tasty. The Dominican Church is closed but we check out its convent courtyard. We walk under St Peters Gate and try not to follow the light too closely. It has two facades and faces Rome. Our task now is to find. Way up the hill back to the area of the Piazza. There is a long series of steps up and we are walking towards that when I notice Via Septembre, a street I remembered as being below the mini metro station. Looking at the map it seems we can walk there and it should be mostly flat to the station where we can catch our elevator up to town. Sounds better than another Italian stairmaster. It is a flat walk and not very far to the station and up we are whisked.
To celebrate, we get a couple of beers in the grocery store and sit on the steps of the Palazzo del Priori, relax and people watch. It is graduation week from the university and we see several students wearing a wreath of Laurel to indicate their graduation, no cap and gowns here. One person is dressed in some kind of costume, not sure what that is all about, but it makes for interesting spectatorship. Carol and I go check out the nearby Jesuit Church which is open and has some nice paintings and frescoes. We then find Dave and Gwen in a bar so we hang out there for a bit and have a glass of wine. Carol eyes some pure organic gin in an old looking engine oil type tin but does not partake. We leave and walk a small portion of the ancient aqueduct before eating dinner at, (you guessed it) the Torta place. I told you Carol was addicted to the Nduja they have. We return to our place for dessert, two very nice pastries we bought earlier. A great last day in Perugia and tomorrow we move on to Arezzo. See you there. Expenses Palazzo Sorbello and Well 18E Two Sandwich Lunch 5E 2 Beers from Market 2.94E 2 Wine Sit Down 8E Torta Al Testa Dinner 12E Pastries for Dessert 2.60E La Casina di Perugia Apartment 63E Walked 7.7 Miles
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