Tuscan Trails: Montecatini Alto

The entrance to the funicular

Montecatini is a town that has two parts -- Montecatini Terme, the spa area, and Montecatini Alto, a medieval village above the former. It is also much older, originally built in the 1300s.

The car at the top of Montecatini Alto

It's not hard to get up there -- if you're feeling energetic there's a trail that takes about an hour to hike up, or there's a funicular, a cable railway where there are two tram cars that pull each other up and down a steep slope, passing in the middle.

That explains why they go every half hour from 9.30am and then there's a break after 1pm until 2.30pm.

We caught the 11am up for 7 euros return and sat in an old wooden car painted red, that are named either "1" or "2". 

Passengers face each other on wooden seats and then if there isn't enough room (squeezing a maximum of five per row), then there are standing room only sections in the front and back of the cars.

The fantastic view overlooking Montecatini Terme

At the appointed time, the doors were fastened and we made the slow ascent that took over 10 minutes. We climbed higher and higher through a path in the trees that included cypresses and olives.

When we arrived at the top we were awarded with an amazing view overlooking Montecatini Terme. Today the sky was so clear we could see very far into the distance, but geographically we didn't really know what we were looking at.

Nevertheless, we wandered around the village and it was evident the place was very tidy, and everyone put some pride into their homes. There is a path for cars -- but only very small ones -- to get past very narrow streets. We were surmising that perhaps this was the equivalent to The Peak in Hong Kong, but it's only a guess.

Contrasting pictures over 100 years apart

We wandered into a church that interestingly held a community-organized photography exhibition, showing pictures from the 1900s and today. A good number of them were taken in the same spots to illustrate the changes. Some had more trees in the area, or rustic bricks were plastered over and smooth walls were made, or others looked pretty much the same.

Then we made our way into the centre of the village which wasn't far and there were a few souvenir shops for tourists. In the middle of the square are several restaurants, one after the other and our guide recommended we try La Torre, or The Tower.

I had a rustic soup of barely and canellini beans served in a mini green Le Creuset pot, and shared a tuna salad with my dad. He had another soup with chard, beans and tomato. In my soup the beans had disintegrated, which meant it had been simmering for a long time. The antipasti dish was declared delicious as well.

What was also interesting was a kind of bread we were given, not quite like pizza dough, but had a similar taste to spring onion cake but without the spring onions. It was crispy and had a pastry kind of texture seasoned with salt.

A rustic bean and barley soup for lunch

There wasn't much more to see in the town and we decided to get a head start in getting into line for the 2.30 funicular ride back down. It turns out we didn't have to wait that long because the staff allowed us to sit in the car shortly after 2pm and by 2.15pm we were slowly making our way back down.

Too bad by the time we arrived at the bottom the shops were closed for siesta! So we also napped before doing some window shopping...

Mid-Autumn Open Air Concert

The Mid-Autumn moon at midnight over Terme di Montecatini

This year's Mid-Autumn Festival will be a memorable one for me.

First of all I brought to Italy some mooncakes from Hong Kong to celebrate this special event with my parents and their friends.

I brought both the highly prized egg custard mooncakes from The Peninsula, andd also traditional ones from a place in Fanling where the baker may retire any time now.

After a dinner of rustic barley soup, swordfish and tiramisu, we tucked into some mooncakes and then headed to Terme di Montecatini to listen to a gala evening of music.

The beautiful setting for tonight's concert

The spa itself is gorgeous -- built in the 17th century, it has painted tiles on the walls, frescoes on the domed ceilings and marble columns and floors. The property is large and spacious, and off to one side are the actual waters -- Regina, Rinfresco and Tettviccio to name three of the six that come out of taps.

With the full moon slowly rising above, we sat outside in the open air to watch a concert featuring four opera singers in an exercise in musical diplomacy between Italy and Russia, or more specifically Montecatini and St Petersburg.

It seems ironic the concert is happening now with the current conflict in Ukraine, but perhaps that's what music does -- trying to bridge political gaps through mutual interest.

The fantastic tenor and soprano with the conductor in between

Nevertheless, it started off late, well after 9.30pm and then there were the translations of welcome messages from the Montecatini mayor and a Russian representative in Italian, English and Russian, so the concert didn't actually start until after 10pm.

Half an hour later there was a 15-minute intermission which made us wonder what was going on. But it seemed like many of the locals were there to socialize and didn't mind the early break.

Following the intermission was when the concert really came together and the audience was rapt by the performances of the tenor and soprano in particular. The other soprano had fallen ill and the conductor called another to replace her yesterday. She did a fine job.

The conductor even sang a few lines in a duet with the substitute singer which was amusing. It was also impressive that he could speak in the three languages relatively effortlessly.

So who can forget a Mid-Autumn Festival with a full moon overhead and listening to the operatic works of Tchaikovsky and Puccini like La Boheme and Turandot in a gorgeous Italian spa?

An Italian Spa Town

The Spa Excelsior has gorgeous ornate architecture

On Saturday night I took an evening flight on an Air France A380 and managed to sleep most of the way (though on and off) to arrive in Paris at 6am.

Another spa down the road to drink the water

Just to transfer flights we had to go through a massive line for security and then another for our passports. Then I waited for my parents and their friends to arrive from New York for our connecting flight to Florence at 10.10am.

And I waited and waited... and almost all the passengers had boarded when they finally arrived.

An hour and a half later we finally arrived in Florence and began our tour which took us to our hotel in Montecatini, an hour's drive.

The town only has a population of 22,000 and completely depends on tourism. During the high season up to 100,000 people will be in the town, which is famous for its spas.

As our guide pointed out, these aren't the spas that are about facials, massages and treatments, but the old school ones where people were diagnosed and drank spa water to cure their ailments.

A carousel for kids to have fun on a Sunday

Montecatini apparently has six different kinds of waters and a building with classic architecture -- libertarian as they call it -- is most probably a spa.

We were also told the water isn't like spring water and those who are advised to drink it may take some 10 minutes to sip it. And then they may be recommended to drink another kind of water before drinking the last one, which apparently has the same salination content as our bodies. The guide said drinking too much of the last one will have you peeing all day!

The town is also known for composer Giuseppe Verdi coming here in the summer, and apparently wrote some of his best operas here.

Everyone checking out the desserts at a sweet shop

It's very walkable and easy to navigate here, lots of shops and cafes. However, shops are closed during siestas, which run from about 1-ish to 4-ish -- the "ish" meaning whenever they feel like opening...