10/31–Livorno and Ghost towns

Happy Halloween! We are safely in Livorno – we actually arrived last night around midnight (a disappointment for the crew as a bunch of folks were going to go out last night if we arrived at our expected time of 10pm).  The weather is cool and a bit cloudy – and the forecast is for rain, but more so tomorrow, so we plan on going to what appears to be the most interesting ghost town today, Buriano, to escape the rain.  We wander off the ship around 8:30 and only have to wait a few minutes for Eva from SifraCar.  We’ve been renting from SifraCar for years now, and we almost feel like part of the family.  The original owners sold the company to the employees last year, but it is all the same staff and they are so nice and good to us.  We sign the paperwork on the back of Eva’s car, they set up the GPS for us, and Eva gives us her card in case we need her for anything (and oh by the way, she is an artist, so we also have her Instagram account – which we will look at when we get better internet access).

We do have a little discussion about not keeping the car for 2 days since the forecast looks dreadful tomorrow.  But Eva tells us to just decide in the morning and give her a call, so the pressure is off as we drive out of the port on our ghost tour route.  We are docked at the pier closest to the city, which makes it really easy to walk into the city (and we are planning to do that this afternoon) but also longer to get out onto the autostrada.  It is amazing how far around the docks and piers we have to drive just to get to the roundabout close to where we are normally docked in the bigger ships.  As we head toward the autostrada, we pass a back up at least a mile long of cars and trucks trying to get into the port.  Yikes!  We will make sure not to come back into town this way – which should be fairly easy because Eva has told us we must drive up the coast on our return, as it is beautiful scenery.

Our first stop today is the Villa Saletta, a town abandoned in the 1990’s when the sharecropping system fell apart in this area. Prior to that, it was occupied by Nazi troops and used as a shelter in WW2.  It is said to have two beautiful churches and a very logical layout to the town streets and buildings.  After passing all the traffic, the drive on the autostrada is quite peaceful.  Leaving the autostrada we begin to climb into the Tuscan hills, with the leaves just beginning to turn and the olives being harvested, there are beautiful vistas everywhere we look.  IT takes a little less than an hour to reach Villa Saletta, but alas, the village has been fenced off and locked gates greet us on both ends of the town. Darn!

We pull into the drive anyway, and take our chances that we won’t get into trouble just taking pictures outside the gate.  Leaves crunch under our feet as we walk up the access road lined with both deciduous and olive trees.  The town looks so cool – it is a shame we can’t get in there to explore more. The architecture seems plain, except for the incredibly cool decorations at the corners of the buildings – which makes us want to see more of the architecture in the interior of the town.  Looking down the long straight street, we can just make out the church tower at the end, presumably on the square.  Bummer, but just standing here, you can imagine the peaceful quality of life here when the town was occupied – and on the opposite spectrum, how the Nazi occupation must have felt.

A nice little stop, even if we couldn’t actually explore the place.  We backtrack to the main road, and head south on our journey to Buriano, stopping along the way when we find an abandoned house that looks cool on an empty little side road (that, btw, was quite interesting to turn around on!).  What the heck!  It’s abandoned – probably because of earthquake damage - so it fits nicely with our tour theme.

From here, we start to really climb up into the mountains.  The scenery starts to change, and the roads begin to wind up and up, with twists and turns, and a few rain drops, oh, and Italian drivers passing us at every chance.  They really are crazy drivers, good drivers, but crazy.

We stop in the little town of Montecatini Val di Cecina for the views.  It is spectacular up here. Long views of the mountain ranges, beautiful Tuscan buildings clinging to the mountain side. A nice way to stretch our legs for a bit as we continue our ghost town journey.