Tuesday, July 17, 2007

A TUSCAN DREAM PART 1

For the past year or so I have been searching for the best places where my imagination of a fantastic vacation in Italy would take us.
Steve has wanted to go to Croatia,so I have been trying to include this side trip in on the itinerary.

I may go about this completely the wrong way, but I search rentals and bookmark them checking their availability within our date frame. When I find a winner, I discuss my findings with the flight scheduler and there you have it!

I had bookmarked three great Tuscan dream places, and carefully watched as the calendar dates became filled. I tried to tell myself that it was going to be alright, there was still plenty of time, but as the days swiftly passed,and the calendar was beginning to fill, I told Steve that now was the time to act.

Getting the OK, I excitedly e-mailed my #1 choice,and with caution to the wind told them that one of my secret dreams has been to meet Francis and Ed Mayes and tour their garden and home,just in case they knew them personally. One never knows!!!(She is the writer who wrote Under the Tuscan Sun and many other great books about Italy , and I think that they now live there in Cortona at least part of the year if not year round.)

I promptly was informed that the dates were booked,so I moved on to see if the next week was booked, to make a long story short, there was no room in the inn for us. I checked out plan #2 and it was booked also.... Sadly I went to plan #3 , requesting dates and got no response. Usually I write and the next day or two I get a response, sometimes even the next morning, as it is evening there when we arise. This I find to be very timely for communication. When I get no response after a few days (1 week to be exact,) I have to guess that they are booked .

Bummed, I don't know where to turn , we were even entertaining the thought of a cruise to Alaska at the last minute, BUT I don't want to hurry that trip. I want to plan the best trip cruise and take the train into Denali National Park and make it wonderful, just in case we don't venture that way again.and I would love to see the Northern Lights.

Once again I go to choice#1 , to sigh and dream, thinking that maybe we should postpone the Italy trip until next spring. There before my eyes are two weeks in September open. Embarassed to be the pushy American, as we are sometimes thought of, I wince and write once again to my host to see if these dates are truly open, or is it a figment of my imagination!

EUREKA!!! Someone has just canceled due to illness.( I am so sorry that they have cancelled, but this is my dream! )WE ARE IN!!!!
One week in Cortona, in a stone cottage among the cypress and olive groves with a sweet little veranda to drink our morning coffee and eat breakfast or a wonderful home made Tuscan dinner! The hosts are English and will suggest wonderful places to wander about in the Tuscan hills and towns. We can play Italian House and pretend that we live there and relax among the olive groves in splendor! Bellisimo!

The trip is taking form and I am blessed beyond belief that I get to go stay in my Tuscan Dream.