Tuesday May 26, 2009  Verona

            There has been a dreadful since we arrived in Verona, and the last few days have had : record-breaking temperatures of 95 degrees or more.  I was sweating in a traffic jam for thirty minutes on the way back from Urbino, where the car temperature gage read 34.5 C.  And then finally I found the button for the air conditioning in my little Alfa Romeo, and the last few hours of the journey were much more enjoyable!

            Let me backtrack a bit to Sunday.  For the first time, as I left the Pomaio Abbey (Badia de Pomaio), I did not get lost!  I journeyed again on the same road to San Sepulchro and then took a turn to Urbino.  The next twenty-nine kilometers over the mountains has got to be the most intense drive I have ever done in my life (and then there were another 20 km to Urbino, but some of this was in a wide and beautiful valley).  I swear that every 100 meters there was a turn of some sort, often a very tight hairpin turn.  I never got out of 3rd gear, and in fact when I was following three bicyclists, they were making such good speed descending on the other side of these mountains that I never felt pressured to pass them until I reached the valley.  The road was very narrow; my US minivan would never have been able to pass another minivan on that road.  We went up and over all kinds of hills, valleys, mountains and all.  It was hard to keep a sense of geological direction, although there were not many other road alternatives to take.  One Italian lady I had met in San Sepulchro on Saturday said that it was very easy to get car sick on that road.  Thank goodness I did not have passengers.  My daughter Sarah would have been deathly ill.   I got very brave in time and tried snapping some photos from the car, once the road calmed down a bit.  I wasn’t even looking through the viewfinder, so only a few pictures give the feeling of the landscape I was going through.  They have no good places to stop for pictures or views along the road.  I would stop now and then, but there was not photo opportunity there.

            The palace and town in Urbino was well worth it.  I enjoyed climbing the street that Steven and I had missed in 2001 (because there had been another back “street”—more like a path--from the Hotel Bonconte up to the main plaza).  In one of the more touristy restaurants in the upper square, I had eggplant parmigiana that melted in my mouth (and did not cost an arm and a leg).  A glass of wine and a capucchino hit the spot as well.

            They were having a special show of Raphael’s work in the Palazzo Ducale since Raphael had been born in Urbino.  There were some very fine portraits by him, but I was more interested in the architecture of the palace, the first part of which is by the Laurana brothers and is quite famous for its peace and Early Renaissance harmony.  I had written almost a month ago for permission to take photos to study the proportions of this palace.  It had affected me quite deeply in 2001 when I visited in the summer with Steven, then seven, and I wanted to do some research on the proportions.  But I had not been allowed to take photos then.   This time, no one knew of my letter, and many were distracted by the Raphael show, so I just took what photos I could, sometimes from my waist, so they are not always framed very well.  I hope they will help in a paper or research that I plan to do in time.

            The stairs had seemed magical eight years ago: the proportions are such that one feels a royal dignity climbing or descending.   The measurements are made to enhance a certain long, dignified stride that is unhurried.  I could not measure with a ruler,L, but I did do what I could:  the height of the stair is to my mid-knuckle with my fingers extended, about 3-4”.  The width of each step is a full foot of mine in sandals and the second foot to the arch.  The length between windows in the hall is just a couple of inches longer than the width of my arms outspread.  And from the courtyard, that width is divided by a pilaster.  The brown color, by the way, comes from the light brownish bricks that echo the same tan color of the stone throughout the town.  I expect this is an indigenous stone and by repeating the color in the palace, there is a sense of harmony with the environment.

            It was hard to determine which rooms were the early ones designed by the Laurana Brothers for Battista Sforza Montefeltro before she died at age 26.  (She may have been the impetus behind these wonderful, peaceful proportions from her marriage at age 14 to her death in childbirth at age 26.  She also had a scholarly circle of artists, philosophers etc. around the court throughout her life.)

            But the rooms all had a simple harmony and space that is so unlike the later, busier Baroque architecture in Rome and elsewhere.  The walls were white.  There was nice groin vaulting in the white ceilings, and each corbel supporting these vaults was unique and of a light brown stone.  (Two female guards let me take one picture of these!).  There were circular flat stool-seats built into many of the windows for the ladies of the court to sit.  There were several doors to the outer porches, but visitors are no longer permitted to go there. The fireplaces were simple but beautiful as well; plentifully arranged for warmth (or as much as they could do there without central heating in those days of the mid-fifteenth century).  And in the later, somewhat more embellished part of the palace, there were the most amazing doors of inlaid wood.  Of course, the studiolo here, with its inlaid wood and illusionistic perspective, is most famous.  The larger audience hall was used for the Raphael show.  It was quite large but not overwhelming.

            I was able to take a good deal of pictures in the basement level.  There were kitchens here, huge barrel vaulted halls, methods of collecting rain water into cisterns, and even baths.  The baths had nice, more finished architecture (with a few small Doric pilasters here and there), for the court would bath here.  It seems as if another leaf from Rome was adopted in this advanced Renaissance court in Urbino.

            The drive back to Verona was long but uneventful.  I thought I would stop and see Alberti’s façade for the Malastesta church of San Francesco in Rimini, but I got caught in that horrendous traffic jam instead.

            My one regret with this heat, and with going away for the weekend, is that I have not yet had a chance to walk much around Verona.  As I drove back into the city, and had to park before returning the car the next day, I had the most trouble of the entire weekend negotiating the tiny streets, especially on a curve with cars parked there.  But I managed and was happy to drop off the unscathed car yesterday morning.

            Many of the students got Verona cards this weekend and spent three full days (and 15 Euro each) seeing up to a dozen different monuments, including the Arena, the house of Juliet, five wonderful Romanesque and Gothic churches, the Roman theater and archaeological museum, and more.  Ashley, Kirsten and Chantille ventured to Milano to meet Ashley’s relatives, who took the girls on a whirlwind tour of the area, from Pisa up to the mountains, also driving on narrow winding roads.  Alexandra is letting nothing stop her.  When I returned Sunday night (just as the sky was deepening in blue and the lights of Verona from the main Roman gate by Piazza Bra seemed to welcome me), I saw Alexandra wheeling herself around by the Piazza almost more quickly than I was driving.  I waved and then promptly got caught in the winding roads of Verona! I was most relieved to cross the bridge and find a parking spot for the night just outside my apartment.

            The heat is proving a damper on our spirits.  Appetites are almost non-existent and we are trying to drink all the water we can.  Tomorrow a storm is predicted to break the heat wave, and we will be in Venice.  It may be quite the adventure to be there with torrential rain, but we have our reservations and will proceed nonetheless.

            The students are great and excited and appreciating our adventure.  That’s it for now.