In previous years, we’ve just spent one night in Florence and left early the next morning to fly home.  Both times, we happened to be there on a Monday when all the museums were closed.  For this trip, we decided we would stay two nights, so we could visit a couple of the museums and see a bit more of Florence. The drive to Florence was uneventful.  Our driver dropped three women from our group at the airport before taking us to our hotel, the Piazza Pitti Palace.  We’ve stayed there twice before, and it was a wonderful experience both times.  We knew it was a small hotel with a locked gated entry, so we felt safe staying there by ourselves.  We couldn’t check into our room yet, so we dropped off our bags with the front desk and decided to walk the main drag to look for straps for

Our last day of the Prone to Wander retreat was spent at the farm (podere) with a relaxed schedule.  After a late breakfast, we gathered for a cooking class taught by Orsa, our host and the culinary mind behind the lunches and dinners we ate at the retreat.  She has her degree in culinary anthropology, so she has abundant knowledge of regional food, dishes, and cooking techniques. She taught us how to make Pappa al Pomodoro or “bread soup.”  With every meal, we were served a basket of Italian bread.  One of the hallmarks of the bread of this region is that it’s made without salt.  As Orsa said, it tastes “like nothing.”  It became a regular thing for our group to ask for the salt grinder so some could be added to a pool of olive oil for dipping. Apparently, though, there is some thought behind this bland bread

Our second-to-the-last day of the Prone to Wander retreat was spent at “home”.  Instead of taking the bus to an experience, the experience came to us.  Maria Giannini, a paper maker and bookbinder from Florence, came to teach a paper marbling and bookbinding workshop.  The interesting coincidence of Maria and me both teaching workshops at this retreat was that we had met six years earlier when I popped into her family’s pen-and-paper shop.  Their shop was just a short walk from our hotel in Florence, and I was enticed to go inside by the beautiful papers in their window display.  I discovered they carried a treasure trove of new-stock vintage and antique art and writing supplies, so I bought a bunch while I chatted with Maria’s uncle, Guido.  I had met a kindred spirit who loved and appreciated old things, from a different country, language, and generation, and Marian helped