Hiking from Sesto Fiorentino to Cercina, Italy

Our guide on part of the trail.
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This weekend I enjoyed one morning of hiking around Sesto Fiorentino and one morning of hiking up to a town called Cercina.

The first day, January 14th, I went hiking with a fairly large group of students from the Villa with a guide named Mario. He is 74 years old and still going strong. I think he tackled the mountain better than I did, in fact I know he did. On our way to the hiking trail that Mario took us on, we stopped to see an Etruscan tomb. Unfortunately, they are building a new railway line near to the tomb, so it is being held together by scaffolding and we couldn't really see that much of the tomb. However, this area of Tuscany is filled with Etruscan relics and tombs and museums so I'm sure that I'll see more Etruscan things later on in my trip.

The animals each received a medal.
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From the tomb we made our way up the mountain. It was a really fun time. Mario took us past waterfalls and what would be a really good lookout point if it wasn't foggy. That day the fog was really dense, so we could only see the bushes right in front of us instead of the view of Florence that we would normally be able to see on a clear day. Sometime I'll have to hike back up to get the bird's eye view of the city. He also showed us a nativity set that he put up himself inside a crevice in one of the rock walls that we passed. He has had to hike up the mountain several times with a ladder to place the nativity every year and every year someone vandalizes his work :-p so he comes back time and time again to fix the vandalism that he sees.

Olive groves.
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Our second day we hiked to a town called Cercina. There we joined a church for their Sunday morning blessing of the animals. This happens once a year and everyone brings their pets or farm animals to the church to be blessed by the Priest. There were a number of dogs and horses, not too many cats, and even one fish. After the animals are blessed they receive a medal commemorating their blessing that depicts animals being blessed by the patron saint of animals (whose name escapes me right now). There was even a band to celebrate the festivities.

Me by the waterfall.
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While we were there we got to meet the Mayor of Cercina. Actually, he introduced our group of students, about 6 in all, to the people that had come for the service and we were given a warm welcome with applause for hiking up the mountain to join them that morning. After the blessing of the animals we were treated to some really good garlic bread dipped in warm olive oil and a glass of wine. After a little while of conversing with the people there we headed back down the mountain, passing olive groves and views of Sesto Fiorentino, to return home for a shower and a nap!