We woke up Friday morning ready to go on our last field trip, this time visiting a few places in Montalcino. Our first stop was to Abbazia di Sant’Antimo, which was once a Benedictine monastery and is now considered one of the most beautiful Romanesque churches in all of Italy. I will say it was beautiful, with so many intricate detailing in the columns, on the outside, and within the altar.
We stayed for about 30 minutes before heading off to our second destination of the day, the Tenuta Fanti winery. I wasn’t much too impressed by this winery compared to the previous ones we had visited, but it was interesting nonetheless. After getting a tour of the premises, we had a wine tasting and lunch where we got to taste their Rosso di Montalcino and Brunello di Montalcino. I enjoyed both, but it wasn’t my favorite Brunello. Their olive oil was a different story…my table went through half a bottle (there were 8 of us!!) within maybe an hour and a half…it was amazing. They finished off the lunch by bringing around a bottle of grappa for us, which i knew better than to put myself through that.
On our way back to Cortona, we stopped in Montepulciano for about 2 hours to “explore”…most of us were tired and wanted to get back to study for our final the next morning, but we made the best of it by getting some gelato, doing a little shopping, and sitting down at a cafe to have an espresso and crank out some study questions. Before we knew it it was time to trek back to the bus to go home. With some Tonino’s dinner in our stomach (our last meal there!), we went back up the hill to (begin) studying for our final that was in a mere 14 hours.
