The French leg of our journey was over. It was time to move on. So we set the SatNav and made a beeline for Italy, where we were due to spend a week with my parents, who have restored a beautiful old farmhouse deep in the hills of rural Tuscany. It was a shock to the system, living in a house and for a couple of days I actually missed living in the van, but there were definite compensations, not least sleeping in a real bed!  And as brilliantly as David and I have got on, it was good to see my parents.The weather was beautiful, and we enjoyed exploring the countryside around the house with them  and their chocolate lab, Coco, taking small hunting tracks into the woods or skirting around the edges of fields. The views were beautiful, with rolling hills, woods and the occasional farm or hill village. Grapes had been harvested and olives were next on the calendar, but due to a particularly hot, dry summer, the locals said it was going to be a very poor harvest. Meanwhile, a new farmer had moved in next door and was preparing his fields for thousands of new olive trees.

On our second day, we walked down to the River Ombrone, which at certain times of year is a huge river. Right now, the river was virtually dry, the banks towering up over our heads as we walked along the river bed.  Uprooted trees littered the landscape, bleached bone white.  It was very hot, and Coco soon found some water and waded across to the other side. My mum picked up half a walnut shell from the sand and we wondered where it had come from. On our way back, we passed a tree and realised it was a walnut tree – a squirrel had probably stolen a nut and dropped the shell down by the river.  We gathered a few nuts from the ground and took them home with us. They were very good eaten with the traditional Italian dish of pecorino cheese and pear drizzled with chestnut honey.

On our return to the house, a few white shapes started to move across the fields towards us. It was a pack of five or six Maremma sheep dogs. They are bred to guard the sheep from wolves, which are still found in this area. Two puppies and a dog made it up to the house and the puppies started to growl and nip Coco. She stood her ground and they soon left her alone and started to play fight each other. They are beautiful creatures, and very friendly, but I resisted the urge to stroke them – they are working dogs, not pets, and I suspect they might have fleas.

 

Once they were gone, I got out the ladder and set to work stripping the last of the figs from a tree behind the house. Most of them had been picked in the summer and made into jam and the remaining fruits were beginning to split and the bees were having a feast but I managed to uncover a couple of dozen good ones. David set to work making a traditional Tuscan desert, a fresh fig tart, which we enjoyed eating that evening.