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We are already awake when the cheese plant starts up at 07:00 [not the ubiquitous 70's house flora before anyone thinks it]. It's a bright morning with superb views over the hills. Ali buys some cheese and coloured pasta then we set off for Lucca at 10:15. Snoopy offers two routes; using the autostradas it it 142 miles in 3hr 27min or 89 miles in 3:39 on the SS12. We choose the latter, 70 miles of which turns out to be a continuous ribbon of hills and bends, two lane but narrow and we navigate the entire journey rarely going above 35mph. However the views are stupendous looking across wide gorges and valleys, passing through numerous tiny hillside towns and climbing, dropping and climbing for miles at a time in 2nd and 3rd gear and seeing whole mountainsides sliced apart in the extraction of marble. We stop numerous times for photos, coffee, lunch, to let cars by or just to give Nick's arms a rest from the constant twirling of the steering wheel. Our highest point is over 1600 metres, where there are ski resorts slowly waking up for winter. In one town we have to wait while a wedding party spills out of the hotel. A red [original style] Fiat 500 is wrapped in bows like a little toy. A table is placed in the road on which Champage or maybe Prosecco is opened, spraying the bride, and a white ribbon is stretched across the road.
Our last few miles are alongside a river most of the way to Lucca. We find the aire at Parcheggio Il Serchio, there are plenty of free spaces and we park easily at 16:15. Soon we are taking the 1/2mile walk into the old town.
Lucca is a walled town dating to Roman times, and despite centuries of rebuilding it retains a grid layout so should be easy to navigate. We wander along some narrow streets with grand stone buildings or terraced restaurants until we emerge into a large piazza. Here in Piazza Napoleono workmen are erecting barriers and using cherry-pickers to hang candle-lights on the buildings. We continue to the wide, grass topped ramparts commonly used for picnics but just now cyclists pedal by as if lives depended on it or oblivious young lovers sit kissing and caressing [the lucky b.....]
We pass the white marble cathedral of St Martino and witness the strange sight of priests running to and fro in their cassocks and surplices. After a few twists and turns we find a curved street which tells us we are on the outside of Anfiteatro. Originally the site of an amphitheatre, the stones were reused in buildings all around the city, but the foundations form, to this day, the oval shape of the piazza. Visitors enter this arena of food and drink through low arches just as gladiators and their challenger would have done. Inside it is colourful in the evening sun and the tables around the perimeter suggest all the restaurants and bars are doing well. After inspecting a few menus we stop at 'Old Charlies' and enjoy a bowl of pasta each with some refreshing beer.
Despite maps and grids, the oval has thrown us and as soon as we are back in the narrow streets we are lost amid the building crowds in the narrow streets. We ask directions of a guide/street warden who gives us directions in perfect English. She also tells us tonight is a huge regional religious festival; people from all over Commune di Lucca come for a candle-lit procession. Rather than follow her directions to exit left out of the old town we decide to stay and watch for a bit. It'd dark now and candle-lights twinkle everywhere. Somehow we end up in front of the barriers just as the parade starts and a warden prevents us from breaking through the crowd. A continuous body of people process carrying placards, standards, huge gilded maces as big as street lamps, and singing, chanting or just walking silently. Many of the placards carry names of the hill towns we passed or saw signs for on our way today. Anyone not carrying aforementioned items or playing an instrument is carrying a 3 foot candle. An hour and twenty minutes later some people are moving so despite protests from our genial warden we break free, squeeze through the crowd and seek our way out. Anyone who offers directions mentions 'the white church'. Eventually we see traffic in the distance and get ourselves outside the walls. 15 minutes later, at 22:25 we get back to the aire and into the van.
At 11:30 there's a huge boom and the ground shakes. We wonder if another van's gas bottle has blown. A few minutes later another, then stacatto pops join in. Obviously fireworks. The noise builds and builds all the way to midnight exactly [no revelry on a Sunday] when it once again falls quiet.
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