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I set the alarm so that we could go shoot the poppies in the early morning light, but, when the alarm went off, it was raining, so we rolled over and went back to sleep... After breakfast, we had a short workshop session. It started with shared photos - Gay and Marion led the group with some photos they had brought from home. Very nice!
Then tried to decide how to spend the rest of the day. The rain had stopped and the skies had cleared. Turns out it was just a light shower and the only time it was raining was when we looked out the window!!!
We spent most of the morning shooting from the road near the farmhouse. There's plenty to shoot just around here. The photo above is our farmhouse, Il Rigo, from the end of its cypress lined driveway. That's a broom in bloom in the foreground. It's really a two story building, but the slight rise of the landscape between the road and the house cuts off the bottom floor.
The three photos above were all taken on the short road connecting Il Rigo to the main highway. The one on the left above shows a field of cut hay and hay bales between bushes of broom. The center photo is of the Tuscan country side and features a fence post, broom, fields, and clouds. The photo on the right is an abandoned farm house that we were given permission to photograph, as long as we didn't go upstairs - too dangerous. We would return to this farm house a couple more times over the next few days.
Near the main highway connecting Pienza and San Quirico d'Orcia were two stands of olive trees. One was very old and one was very young. The five photos above were taken in and around the old olive trees. One member of our group said they reminded her of the Ents in Lord of the Rings. The two photos below show the old olive trees with the young ones. All were blooming profusely and both stands will produce crops of olives this year. As olive trees age, the branches will twist with the weight of the fruit, producing these gnarly trees. Frequently, the center of the tree will split, as you can see in two of the photos above, leaving a hollow trunk.
The photo on the left above is looking from the stand of old trees into the stand of young ones, while the photo on the right is looking from the young trees into the old ones.
We had lunch in San Quirico d'Orcia and did some more wandering there. They have a lovely rose garden (Gardena del Rosa) with some really nice roses in it, as the photos above show. There's a wall around the garden and we climbed the steps to the top for some of these shots.
While in San Quirico d'Orcia, we stopped at the local grocery store for some fresh fruit and other snacks. We only had to circle the block once to find the parking lot for the grocery store...
Then we went back to the farmhouse. We were assembling about 4 pm to go shooting as a group. Carl and I rode with Charlie and Danny. What a pair of crazy Texans!! And they just met each other on this trip! We drove out to what was described as the most photographed trees in Tuscany. We got there and looked at each other. Was this the spot??? What was so special about this grove of cypress? Most of the cypress tree shots I've seen of Tuscany have involved lines of cypress edging the winding roads. This was a large clump of them in the middle of rolling fields. However, I was assured they were famous. They were on the cover of one of the guide books. And I did see them on posters later in the trip.
The photos above are of the famous cypress grove described above.
We spent the rest of the afternoon shooting this area and standing around talking. It was peaceful and relaxing. Then we rode back into San Quirico d'Orcia for dinner at the Forno Vecchio (the old oven). It was good, but a bit overpriced.
Then back to the farmhouse to discover that there wasn't any water running at all!! We scrounged enough bottled water for brushing teeth and taking pills. Carl had stuck in some of the bathing wipes that they used on him when he was in the hospital, so we wiped down with those, which left a slight sticky feeling, but got rid of the day's accumulation of sweat. And so to bed.