Una vista molta triste

Uffa! Today we went to Montepulciano and it was nearly a ghost town. I wanted to stop at Fatamorgana and it was closed, as was Gypsea and several other shops I typically like to visit. Gypsea, was in fact, closed for good--there was paper covering the windows. It was gray and cold today, so maybe it was a good day just  to stay home. I still want to go to Fatamorgana--it will have to wait for another day.

We walked back down the hill and stopped for a cappuccino at Alessandro's bar. Then we walked past Il Sasso and Costanza was outside having a cigarette, so we stopped to chat with her for awhile.

We are still on a mision to try new retaurants so we drove through Pienza, toward San Quirico d'Orcia and stopped at Agriturismo La Fonte, which has a highly-rated restaurant on TripAdvisor. We were not disappointed. In fact, the restaurant is cozy, clean, inexpensive and our lunches were excellent--another good place to put on our website! They also have a good wine list. 

On the way home, we decided to check out the huge cheese-making factory we spotted in Contignano the other night. They have signs pointing to a sales room around the back. We were amazed by the number of large trucks entering the property delivering rivers of sheeps' milk from all over the region. We found the shop and the friendly guy who told us all about the cheeses. They make a very fresh pecorino, one that's aged 10 days, one 20 days, and then a two-month and six-month aged cheese. Also some flavored with black pepper, red pepper and truffles. We bought a couple of the vacuum-sealed truffle cheeses to bring home and two pots of fresh ricotta to eat here. They also have a nice selection of local wines by the bottle.