Cowboys, bows and arrows, not what you'd expect

Enthusiastic Germans from the Wild West.

IF YOU HAVE never seen a… mature… German choir dressed in cowboy/girl outfits singing ‘She’ll be comin’ round the mountain’, in German… you’ll be fine. Truly. And in case you were wondering, it’s ‘Von den blauen Bergen Kommen wir’, which actually says ‘We come from the blue mountains’. Same tune. Followed by a rousing ‘Singen ya-ya yi-pee yi-pee yeh’. Yes, I can hear you now. That’s enough.

Drop this surreal combination into a small piazza in a medieval Tuscan village and it gets even weirder. For good measure, the choir threw in tortured versions of ‘Tom Dooley’ and ‘Volare’ for the English and Italian speakers respectively and everyone had fun. Certainly, it was funny.

In a showdown, I'm with the archers.

Weekend warriors

THE NEXT DAY I imagined this group facing off with the archers in medieval costumes who competed with bows and arrow in various nooks throughout the town. Although it is relatively common to see people in medieval costume in Anghiari, these were not local people, they were visitors competing in a national event that takes place in different towns throughout Italy.

They were all over the place. One had to keep one’s eyes peeled to avoid walking around a corner into the path of a speeding arrow.

They were good too. Judging by the number of bulls’ eyes I witnessed, and the fact that the Germans’ weapons were toys, I would definitely put my money on the archers in a showdown.

Who doesn't love a Vespa?

It was a glorious, busy, blue-sky weekend in Anghiari, attracting many visitors. As I write, it’s 5pm and still 28 degrees C.

The Caffé Garibaldi had to swing into action twice when large groups of motorists turned up. The first were expected, so long tables were assembled especially for their arrival – dozens of contestants in the annual Vespa race through outlying mountain roads. They started in the Piazza Baldaccio on Saturday morning and wound up back there around 4pm, taking about seven hours in all. Cold drinks in ice buckets were ready.

A few years ago I had the great good fortune to watch the Christmas Eve ritual in Anghiari whereby 100 or so Santa Clauses (Babbo Natale) drive Vespas down the Corso Matteotti which cuts a straight dividing line between the medieval and Renaissance parts of town. What a treat that was – absolutely favoloso!

This Sunday morning brought a different group of motorists into the main piazza – with their dozen or so sparkling, loved-up sports and vintage vehicles including several Fiats, some kind of loud-revving racing car, an MG and perhaps you can tell me what that lovely dark blue one is (below right). Again, an extra long table was quickly put together outside the Caffé Garibaldi. I fell in love with the shapely little Fiat, below, with its concertinaed roof and back window. My friend Giorgio tells me it's probably from the late 1940s or 1950. Che bella macchina!

I can just see myself tootling around in this.

Anghiari is a musical town

Every July tourists pour in for the Anghiari Festival, hosted by the Southbank Sinfonia from the UK. This year it will run from July 20 to 26 in various outdoor venues throughout the village and in churches – with performances of symphonic, chamber and coral music.

Having seen a prelude concert at Anghiari’s main church, the Chiesa Della Propositura, about six weeks ago, I know it would be beautiful and uplifting to be here, but I will be back in Australia by then. (Rental prices go up then too.)

The School of Music here has a good reputation and attracts students from around the region.

I don't know what the blue one is, and now it's gone. A friend here tells me it is an Alfa Romeo Spider, about 1960. Any advances on that?

Checking the real estate

I’m having a look at a medieval apartment for sale tomorrow morning, just out of curiosity. For your interest, the listed price is 89,000 euros, which is close enough to $A145,000 at today’s rate. It is advertised as having two bedrooms and 60 square metres on the second floor of a historic (i.e., ancient) building. I’ll keep you posted.

Greg and Amy, a lovely American couple from New Orleans, have retired to live here, lock, stock and barrel. What a step. It can’t be easy struggling with the language to organise a renovation in a medieval village, but they say they have had expert local advice and assistance. During the course of the work they were excited to find vaulted ceilings hidden by a previous renovation. Thanks to them, those classic ceilings are now here to stay.

Without a car, three months here is too long

A friend asked me recently why I chose to stay in one place for a whole three months. It’s a fair question when there is so much to see in Italy, with its interestingly distinctive regions. Apart from having committed to Italian lessons with a teacher here, the answer is simply a matter of budget. As it turned out, the dollar isn’t nearly as healthy this year as it was for my previous visits when everything seemed cheap compared to in Australia. Of course, I also wanted to experience life in this village I have come to know a little, but I'm yearning to look around more.

Not having a car is very limiting. But a car is a major expense. While friends have taken me to outlying areas a few times and I have become familiar with the bus service to nearby Sansepolcro and further away Arezzo, which has the nearest train station, I am not used to being so confined. I’d like to visit again next year – there doesn’t seem much point in learning a language if you’re not going to use it – but I would travel around Italy first before coming to Anghiari for perhaps a month or so to see the people here I would like to see again.

I’m planning to lash out and finally hire a car for a few days next week in order to take my next visitors to places that are otherwise hard to access. These are my long-time friends Eleanor and Phillip who have just been in Rome, Positano and Pompeii. They’ll stay in a larger apartment on the Corso Matteotti, and Eleanor has organised for us to attend a cooking class next weekend in Arezzo. Should be fun.

Piatto (plate) of the week: My downstairs neighbour Giorgio, who was a professional chef and ran restaurants in Melbourne back when, invited me to dinner last week. It was a hot night so he served a salad called panzanella, a typical Tuscan dish of lettuce, tomato, cucumber, thinly sliced red onion, a few basil leaves and bread which has been soaked in water, then squeezed almost dry. This is all tossed together and dressed with olive oil and white wine vinegar, salt to taste, and that’s it – simple and refreshing.

Giorgio used to make this in Australia but he says he couldn’t get the right type of bread back in the 1970s. It should be pane casareccio or something similar. I think these days sourdough would be perfectly fine. – Mimi