We went down to the Travel Agency near the main gate of the town this morning. Yes, down the face of the cliff only to have to return using the same rappelling ropes and carabineers to scale the sheer cliffs on this town back up to our apartment. Some days it sure seems like that and today was one of those days. We were there to purchase our tickets for the overnight ferry from Ancona, Italy to Split, Croatia that we will take Thursday night boarding at 9:00 pm and arriving at 7:00 am Friday morning. We used a travel agent to make sure we reserved a stateroom with a toilet and shower.

Two more days here in the apartment, that’s all. Certainly we will leave with mixed emotions on Thursday. We now know where everything important to us is and how to get there. We no longer require a map to get anywhere in the area by car. We know the gelateria man, the internet shop owner, newspaper seller (a grump – even I cannot make him smile), the vegetable lady, and the man and woman at the Café-wine bar that Ann caught smooching after they locked their doors one evening (Ann never fails to say buongiorno to them), the lady at the Cantina Ercolani where we buy our Ercolani wines, and the waiter at the Trattoria Cagnano. Ann says the obligatory “Buon Giorno” to every resident she sees as we ply the streets of Montepulciano.

We have now achieved what we had set out to accomplish: To have ownership of the town. We realize we do not speak Italian; we cannot call a plumber to help us if we needed to, we certainly cannot speak on the phone but we are comfortable here. We are not members of the community nor did we ever expect to be but we are not tourists. We are somewhere in-between.

I like hearing the same elderly ladies and gentlemen speaking Italian a hundred words a minute on the benches overlooking the valley under our windows in the evenings. I love the sunsets over the hills. I love the wonderful weather (even the Italian News is commenting about the long summer). Mostly I love waking up each morning and having the crisis of the day be, “where shall we go and what shall we do this day”. I love that nothing has to be done in a hurry - there is time for everything and if there isn’t it can be done tomorrow or the next day. And I love sitting here in the extra bedroom typing on the computer or editing pictures with the window open, no screen, of course, looking over the countryside. If I were talented I could write a novel sitting right here. I know P. B. Shelley thought the same about his poetry written in Tuscany.

So, as it is said, our work here is done. But a tear will be shed when we drive away.

Today we went to Cortona. That is the town nearest to the Hotel Corys and Giuseppe. We had not gone into the town yet. This is the town that Francis Mayes made famous with her book, "Under the Tuscan Sun". The town caters to American tourists and we saw more here than anywhere else we have been in Italy. No resident in this town, I believe, is allowed not to speak English like a native. Every store sign is in English and all waiters speak better English than I do. That is disconcerting to be sure. Cortona is therefore very popular with Americans. It is in a beautiful location on the side of a mountain with easy tour bus access from the main toll road. There are a bazillion apartments, hotel rooms and rooms to rent. When I was in this town in April 18 months ago it was deserted, cold and accented with a frigid, wet, north wind. Today it was warm and cloudless with a vibrant tourist horde – speaking American.

If Montepulciano is a hill town of the first order then Cortona is the steepest town this side of Nepal. Ann said that if I had taken her to this town at the beginning of our days in Italy rather than the end when she was not as fit, she would have cried. Fortunately, she merely whimpered a little.

Lesson for Day 35: All good things must come to an end but we still have two days left.