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| From Orvieto |
Now that Mom and Dad Teague have begun their journey back across the pond and Christopher's on a day trip to Villa Adriana, I'm back in rare blogging form. I still can't believe how hard it is to try to keep this poor neglected blog up to date. It really does make a huge difference when you have to walk 15 minutes to use the internet!
Back in October, Christopher and I took a weekend trip to Orvieto, a small hill town in central Italy. We knew it was going to be a great trip for a lot of reasons, but primarily because it was the first time we had traveled outside of Rome TOGETHER! It was also a huge plus to go somewhere that didn't have a lot of major sites, which meant we had more time to relax without the pressure of having to see certain things before we left.
We left Saturday morning, got there in time for a bread and cheese lunch in front of the Duomo and enjoyed a lazy afternoon of exploring. We toured the Duomo and learned a bit about how little Orvieto won a bid for such an imposing cathedral (I explain more here). After that, we took a walk down to Pozzo della Cava for a short tour of some underground excavations of Etruscan-era wells and tunnels owned by a family that discovered the ruins in 1984!
On Sunday, Christopher and I had an adventure! Map and water bottles in hand, we set out to hike around the city of Orvieto. What we didn't realize was that although we had a map, the signs marking the trails aren't without mistakes, and as the sun began to set, we realized we might be in a bit of a predicament if we couldn't get to a staircase that would lead us back up into the city. We both quickened our pace, prayed and tried not to lose our cool (ok, I was fairly close to losing my cool while Christopher maintained his flawless composure and reasoned that at least my cell phone has a flashlight setting).
As the last bit of light seeped out of the sky (totally not exaggerating here) and it looked like we might, in fact, have to spend a night outside the walls of our cozy little hill town, we were delivered. As if on cue to answer all the prayers we'd been silently shouting, an old Italian gentleman called out to us from... somewhere. Using words we couldn't understand, he guided us and we followed his voice back along the trail, through the darkness, up a long staircase to a door and his kind face beckoning us to follow him. He led us, with the aide of a lantern, up another large, spiral staircase and at the end deposited us onto a smooth, paved road outside of the dark tunnel. We thanked him fervently in Italian and thanked God fervently in English, knowing (but maybe not yet fully appreciating?) how close we'd been to a REAL adventure. That night left us high on adrenaline, a little sheepish and so grateful for the Lord's provision... in all things. The spiritual dimensions of our adventure are definitely as real to us as the hiking lessons we learned!
Monday, with the new mercies of morning, we decided to give it a second try. Map in hand (and fully aware that that didn't mean a thing), Christopher and I set out to conquer that stubborn trail in broad daylight... mission accomplished! We celebrated with gelato (my idea) and a wine tasting (Christopher's idea), at which point we decided life couldn't get any sweeter and that it was probably time to head home. What a weekend!
Christopher will have another album to share eventually, but here's mine.
