Today we say arrivederci to our friends. They are flying home tomorrow morning from Rome, and have booked a hotel near the airport tonight. They’ll drive to Fiumicino today, return the rental car, then use the free hotel shuttle to get to the hotel tonight and back to the airport in the morning. Smart and low-stress! Remember, they picked up the car in Orvieto… dropping off your rental car in a different city is always an option to consider. It often costs little or nothing extra in Italy. After breakfast we take one last stroll through Paciano before seeing our friends off.

On the way to Fiumicino our friends will stop in the little town of Fara in Sabina (in Lazio, just over the border from Umbria). This is the home of Teatro Potlach (Teatro Potlatch, a delightful group of performers that has collaborated with Touchstone Theatre of Bethlehem over the last few years. Mary (a Touchstone ensemble member) introduced us to Pino and Nathalie and Daniela, and we will try to visit them ourselves one day.

So far on our tour we have visited places we already know and love. Now we start thinking of the places we haven’t been. We have another nine days in Paciano and two days in Rome before we head back to Pennsylvania, so we start making a list: Potlach (above), Narni (near the geographical center of Italy), Dario Cechinni’s butcher shop/restaurant in Panzano, Gregory’s Jazz Boat on the Tiber River (where our friend Michael Stephans played a gig while visiting last year)… So much to see and do!