#hill towns

[swforester]

A road trip through the hill towns of Western Massachusetts with stops in Chester, Becket, Hinsdale and Worthington. With visits to an abandoned state park, Chester factory center Cemetery, Becket Center Cemetery, Hinsdale Cemetery and North Cemetery in Worthington. It was beautiful and melancholy on a dark winter day such as this was. A rewarding ride to say the least.

[captainclaudeandthehiddenlogs]

Heyyia Claude! 🥰

Ho bisogno de tu ayuda con una mia fic...Qual è per te la città più romantica della Toscana? E che tipo di attività possiamo fare allí?

Better ask first someone native then go look in articles or something...Seems more legit that way! :D

[Ignore the obvious Spanish I left there... 🤭]

Ciao! 🥰

Coucou, Red! Merci de ton patience 🩷 et pour ton ask!

I'm going to answer in English, maybe it can be useful for other people as well! I'm always happy to talk about my region, i love it so much, so thank you again for asking my recs!

I think it depends a lot on the vibes that you are looking for. I will give you an overview of different options, i hope that they can be inspiring. If there's something you like, i can go more into detail! Let me know if i can be of help with anything!

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If you and your characters love art, Florence is an amazing city.

(Duomo di Firenze, Cattedrale di Santa Maria del Fiore, credits pic)

Its art, history and architecture are extraordinary. The Uffizi Gallery (Galleria degli Uffizi) is an absolute must if you love Renaissance. A great way to admire Botticelli, Raffaello, Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and Tiziano's art, in one museum.

Moreover, you can walk around Cathedral Square (Piazza del Duomo), where you can see the Cathedral built by Brunelleschi, Giotto's Campanile and the Baptistery, and Piazza della Signoria, where you can find Palazzo Vecchio, David by Michelangelo and Loggia dei Lanzi, and admire their masterpieces for free. 🏛️

You could also visit the Boboli Gardens, where you can enjoy the Italian garden style, created by the Medici family, that became a model for many European courts.

And a night at the theatre could be a great idea for a date! At Teatro Verdi, for example, there's plenty of different shows!

Obviously, these are just some ideas.

By the way, if i have to be honest, i love Florence, and i always gaze in awe at the beauty of its monuments ...but it's also a little chaotic for my taste. Sooo, maybe for a romantic getaway I would choose something else. (It depends on what you like!)

(Boboli Gardens, credits pic)

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For something more adventurous, what about Grotta del Vento? It's a beautiful system of caves in the Apuan Alps (Garfagnana), with stalactites and stalagmites. Its karst environment is unique and fascinating. 🦇

(credits pic)

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A Tuscanian city that I love is Lucca.

I adore walking along the old city walls (you can go there by bike too!): a panoramic walkway overlooking the city that conceals secret passages, hideaways and ramparts. Their secular trees make the view magic in every season. In autumn, foliage is beautiful! 🍂

(credits pic)

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If you and your characters love the sea and the story is set in summer, you could take into consideration a mini cruise in the Tuscan Archipelago. In one or two days, you can explore some of its islands, like Giglio, Elba, Giannutri. Swimming there is beautiful. If you don't like the idea of spending time on a boat, the coasts of Monte Argentario are wonderful too! 🌊

(Isola del Giglio, credits pic)

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There could be less activities than in bigger cities, but I think you could also go for a romantic getaway in one (or more) of our hill towns. Great view, amazing food, and an enchanting experience! And it feels more intimate than in the main cities. Monteriggioni, Cortona, Pienza, San Gimignano, Volterra... The atmosphere is so poetic...And you can spend some time in the surrounding countryside, idyllic!

(Eremo Le Celle, Cortona, credits pic)

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For a lovey-dovey day, you could write about a day at the thermal springs! There's plenty of thermal baths in Tuscany, and there are usually hotels and spas where you can have lunch, sleep, have a couples massage and enjoy the hot springs. Rapolano, Sassetta, Sorano, Montecatini,... In Tuscany you can find lots of thermal springs, so you could also have a day at the thermal baths and one in a nearby town.

(Terme di Sassetta, credits pic)

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Wherever your characters go, I think food play a big role if you want them to enjoy their Tuscan trip to the full.

Pasta is always delicious. There are lots of different types of pasta, for example pici and pappardelle (long pasta), tortelli (filled pasta, the filling depending on where you are: for example in Maremma they are filled with ricotta and spinach, in Mugello they are filled with potatoes), topini (small lumps of dough made with potatoes, flour and eggs). Pasta is our first course, in Italy it's not served as a side dish for meat or fish.

(Warning: I'm going to talk about meat dishes. If this makes you uncomfortable, skip until 🌱)

Pasta may be served with ragù (Bolognese sauce, a meat-based sauce), ragù and aglione (aglione is a delicate type of garlic), melted butter and sage, mushrooms, or tomato sauce. 🍝

(Pappardelle al ragù, credits pic)

Before pasta, as an appetizer, you may have cured meats (salame, prosciutto, finocchiona, lardo di Colonnata,...), cheese (various types of pecorino), coccoli (lumps of fried dough) and crostini (slices of bread served with ragù, mushrooms, fegatini which is a sauce made of chicken liver, or other sauces...).

(Traditional Antipasto Toscano - Tuscan appetizers, credits pic)

I don't live by the sea, so i know meat dishes better 😅 As second course, a Bistecca alla Fiorentina or a Tagliata di Manzo (beefsteaks - rare is the perfect way to have them but i get it that it's not to everyone's taste) may be perfect. 🥩

(I also enjoy pizza so much, and you can eat it everywhere in Tuscany, but the foods i've written about are more traditional)

🌱

If your characters enjoy drinking, Tuscany is famous for its wines (like Chianti Classico, Morellino di Scansano, Vernaccia di San Gimignano, Brunello di Montalcino, Bolgheri Sassicaia). Desserts go well with vinsanto (a dessert wine). 🍷

For dessert, you might go for cantuccini (almond biscuits) with vinsanto (we dip them in the wine). If the story is set during Christmas holidays, ricciarelli (almond and sugar biscuits) and panforte (a dessert with almonds and candied fruits) are some of our traditional desserts.

(Cantuccini and vinsanto, credits pic)

You may have coffee after the dessert. And, after generous meals, ammazzacaffè (a small glass of liqueur) too. General recommendation for your characters (and for tourists visiting Italy): it's better not to ask for a cappuccino during lunch or dinner (please 🩷)!

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I hope this is useful, sorry it took me some time, and please, let me know if i can help you somehow! Je suis si heureuse que tu es en train d'écrire une fanfiction qui se déroule en Toscane 🩷🩷🩷 Je te fais de gros bisous, bonne soirée et joyeuses Pâques 🌷🐰🐣

~ Claude ~

[techdriveplay]

14 Best Places to Visit in Italy for a Bucket List Experience

Italy captivates with historic cities, breathtaking landscapes, and extraordinary natural wonders. From the drama of the Dolomites to the ancient history of Sicily, choosing where to go to experience authentic Italy can be a tough call and one you can’t afford to get wrong. I curated this list of the best places to visit in Italy based on two criteria: they offer something special that…

[lemonspades]

She's so helpful in the remake isn't she?

[prupket]

SHE SAID SHE WAS FINE BY HERSELF 🙄

[space-cadet-haze]

[deafeningdreamlady]

Some may travel to Kerala for a refreshing vacation. For some, the beaches of Goa hold the key. But those who want solo adventure will find relief from their daily grind in hill towns.

[serpentface]

The pylidaigh, a type of vampiric snow ghost, as imagined in folklore in and around the Highlands.

This is a ghost believed to come into being when a person dies in the snow and their body is not found before their soul (still trapped without its funeral rites) 'freezes' inside of it. The body then reanimates into a pylidaigh's twisted form. It looks like someone who slowly died of starvation, just a thin layer of flesh over bones. Its skin is as white as the snow itself, so pale it can blend seamlessly into a blizzard. Most of its body appears subtly stretched and lanky, save for its exceptionally unsubtle long, skinny arms, which drag on the ground behind it when it walks. After a big meal of blood, its belly swells like the abdomen of a tick.

A pylidaigh can only tread across snow and ice, and so doorways and windows are best kept clear of snowfall during the winter in order to prevent it from reaching inside. It mostly comes out to hunt during blizzards when there is little that can prevent it from catching its victims.

In spite of its fragile appearance, a pylidaigh is supernaturally strong, and can run at great speeds when it wants to. No mortal weapons can pierce its body, nor can any bonds known to craftsmen hold it in place. It is usually said that chains forged like iron but made out of ice can bind a pylidaigh and render it immobile, but this smithing technique remains tragically elusive to the average joe.

This ghost is either cast as a wildly dangerous but tragic figure, or one that is more simply malicious. In either case, it is described as experiencing nothing but bitter cold. It shivers endlessly. It retains distant memories of what it was to be alive, and it is motivated by a futile desperation to experience the feeling of warmth again.

In more sympathetic framings, it is described as using its freaky gibbon arms to capture its victims and pull them into an embrace, rather innocently trying to warm itself against their body. This inevitably fails, and the embrace becomes a bone crushing squeeze. When that too fails to warm the ghost, it rips out the person's throat and drinks their blood until the victim is as cold and drained as the pylidaigh itself.

In other cases, this more pitiable narrative of a ghost seeking warmth with no comprehension of its actions is discarded in favor of making it purely monstrous. Here it is a type of vampire with an insatiable thirst, practically a physical manifestation of the worst of winter itself. Some tales acknowledge both variants, suggesting a pylidaigh's violent attempts to warm itself may be initially devoid of malice, but turns into an act of furious jealousy of the warmth of the living after years of suffering.

The only (more or less) surefire method to permanently kill a roaming pylidaigh involves trapping it with fire. They are attracted to any source of heat, and will attempt to warm themselves with the flames (if not tempted away by a juicy living human body). The fire itself cannot kill them (as the sheer cold of their body is more powerful even than flame) but they can be trapped if kept near the fire long enough for the snow it depends upon to melt. This does not kill the pylidaigh either. The monster will remain in stuck in place (and potentially become a threat again if it snows more) for the duration of the winter. Only when the spring comes and all the snow melts does it revert into a normal human carcass (though mysteriously invulnerable to decay), at which point it can be cremated.

Pylidaigh in the wilds also revert to a human corpse during the snowless seasons, but will roam again each following winter unless it is burnt in the interim. It is of critical importance that any human corpse found in high mountain pasture is cremated- not only out of respect for the poor soul trapped as an earthbound ghost, but to prevent the threat of the possible dormant pylidaigh emerging next winter.

[ghost0casper]

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Bonus 13: Beware the Grapes of Wrath.

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[ives57]

[thegroundhogdidit]

his autistic mannerisms and lust for blood have captivated me

[ed13d1]

they grow up so fast

[mother-lee]

thank God

[hetchdrive]

When I was driving back from Worcester last night I almost ran out of gas on the highway for the first time ever in my life and the two miles from the "rest stop: 2 miles" sign to the actual rest stop was the tensest five minutes of my life. Shit was like a horror movie to me.

[r0ttdweller]

𝗦𝗜𝗟𝗘𝗡𝗧 𝗛𝗜𝗟𝗟 𝟮 (𝖱𝖤𝖬𝖠𝖪𝖤) - 𝙿𝚂𝟻 𝚜𝚌𝚛𝚎𝚎𝚗𝚌𝚊𝚙𝚜