After yesterday's long hike, and with another one possible tomorrow, today is a day for taking it easy. I did walk down to Santa Maria degli Angeli this morning to pick up a few things, about six miles round trip. Clouds began gathering overhead, again, leaving me feeling a bit like Joe Btfsplk, although I've been fairly lucky about not getting caught in downpours. Upon returning I walked over to a local store to pick up some fresh bread, and watched as groups of tourists followed their flag-carrying leaders up into town, accompanied by a flash of lightening. Fortunately, the forecast is for much sunshine in the days ahead.
This is what Assisi looks like out a front window on a rainy day.
I live on Vicolo Fortezza, which means "fortress alley", a likely reference to the fact that if one climbs up those stairs in the picture, plus many, many more stairs and walkways, one eventually arrives at the Rocca Maggiore fortress. If one goes down about fifty stairs descending to the right, one arrives at the fountain in the Piazza del Comune. In Italy the word "alley" does not necessarily carry negative "dark alley" connotations as in the U.S. Here an alley is essentially a pedestrian street, or a road without cars, a vicolo without vehicles. As Assisi pre-dates motorized traffic by many centuries, most of the streets with vehicular traffic in town are narrow and one-way. (Although it is not uncommon to see people driving rapidly backwards down one-way streets in the wrong direction).
My understanding is that a part of the wall of the building in the center-right part of the picture goes back to Roman times. This being one of the oldest parts of the city, extending up from the the Piazza del Comune past San Rufino to the Porta Perlici area, there are many remains dating back two thousand or more years.
Ciao.
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