I love Paris in the the Springtime.

I love Paris anytime, but it’s best in the spring. Let’s not kid ourselves.

Maybe it’s because everything, everything in the city is in bloom.

Maybe it’s because the parks begin to refill with not just plants but also people.

Maybe it’s the profusion of pretty pastel shades you see truly no other time of year.

Maybe it’s the sweet bursts of sunshine that are by no means guaranteed, making them all that much sweeter.

Maybe it’s the way that tourist season hasn’t started in earnest and you feel like the city is just yours to hoard, to secret away.

Maybe it’s none of these things.

Maybe it’s all of them.

Whatever the case, Paris, je t’aime.

In Autumn's Garden

I’ve never felt as if I had a great grasp on London. By all rights, it should be one of my preferred travel destinations: relatively quick flights (I’ve done JFK-LHR faster than JFK-SFO a few times), nicely melded architectural mix, legendary culinary scene, bustling metropolis, etc. It never grabbed me, and I would have said that I hadn’t seen much of the city.

Upon reflecting, I noted on my most recent visit that I had in fact seen most of the major sights (at least the ones I wanted to - not much of a palace person) and could navigate both the streets and tube reasonably well. Freeing yourself from the burdens of tourist to-dos is the best way to enjoy urban tourism. Eat. Drink. Dance. Experience.

In that vein, I set aside time on the last day for a walk through Hyde Park - people watching and playing with my new camera in one of the legendary urban green spaces is of course one of the easiest ways to decompress before a longer flight.

There is a joy in the dying gasps of color of Mid-Autumn, the fight of the last few shining red-gold leaves clinging to spindly tree branches, the pop of a late-in-season flower against a bleak gray sky.

She Flies Through the Air with the Greatest of Ease

Here's a quick confession: I'm Tuscan. It's where my surname originates. It's where I first came to love Italy. It's in my bones, in my cooking repertoire, and (sadly) in my accent. Yet when I picture the Central Italian countryside, my brain immediately hops to Umbria.

Umbria is a feast for the senses: rolling green hills cresting over a valley of kelly, gold, and forest fields, bejeweled with a sprinkling of vibrant red, buttery yellow, and rich purple wildflowers. The air smells like sun-warmed grass, a faint but often present hint of smoke, and happiness. There’s no place I’d rather be for a country trip.

I’m used to seeing Umbria from the hill towns outside of Perugia, over the meandering rivers and streams feeding the Tiber as it wends its way down to Rome. This last visit, I finally made the journey east to Gubbio, one valley over, after years of trying to find a way out there.

Gubbio is a pristine, formidable, medieval town, built atop Monte Ingino, a hill in an Apennine no man’s land between Perugia and the equally formidable and equally medieval Urbino in Le Marche, the neighboring region.

A quick aside: that region's name is sometimes translated when discussed in English, as opposed to the standard anglicization à la Florence (Firenze), Venice (Venezia)... Leghorn (Livorno, truly the worst of the bunch). I remember a guide book my parents had twenty or so years ago called Umbria and the Marches, and I could not for the life of me figure out what parades had to do with a region of Italy and why they were so important as to merit inclusion in the title.

There are views to be had from the winding streets that work their way slowly up the mountainside, but the best viste are from the top. And what better way to get up there than a two-person cage? Enter the Funivia Colle Eletto.

I had anticipated a standard funicular as you see not uncommonly across the peninsula, but the funivia is something unto itself... somewhere between ski lift and go-go cage, flying over the greenery of Monte Ingino.

The ride alone was thrilling, but of course the real reward came after disembarking and getting a view of the whole valley from on high.

Beyond taking in the panorama, there is a bar and a restaurant, along with the church of the patron of Gubbio, Sant'Ubaldo. Sant'Ubaldo himself rests in his own church, displayed in a glass sarcophagus before the altar, complete with a mitre that makes him look more wizard than bishop.

Un po' d'Africa in giardino.

“Cerco un po’ d’Africa in giardino
Tra l’oleandro e il baobab”

— Paolo Conte & Vito Pallavicini, "Azzurro"

(I'm looking for a bit of Africa in the garden, between the oleander and the baobab.)

They say you can't go home again, and – maybe – they're right. I'm finishing the last of a three day stint (to be fair, 36 hours or so) in Bologna, an 8 minute walk from where I lived ten years ago. There are waves of nostalgia, a million familiar sights, an unshakeable feeling of the unceasing march of time, and a song in my heart so strong I feel ready to burst. This city made my life so much richer, and I will forever be grateful for the gifts it gave.

There is, however, something to be said for no longer being on a student budget.

The apartment has one of those sun-drenched, terra cotta wonderland terraces that you only hear about, but I seem to have found. Being nestled in the heart of the university district, you can hear opera singers warming up, piano lessons in flight, and the constant warm hum of student conversation. It's a little slice of heaven and respite in the ever churning energy of this gorgeous city, and I am beyond loath to leave it behind.