Destination: Italy

Every night at around 9:30 or 10:00, there’s a knock on the guest room doors at Agriturismo Cretaiole. It’s Luciano — the 75-year-old farmer who owns the place — inviting people down to the veranda for a nightcap. There’s no point fighting it. Yes, you’re tired from your busy vacation. But Luciano has been working the fields all day, and he’s ready to party. You have no excuse.

Trading your pajama bottoms for blue jeans, you make your way to the glass-enclosed patio. Luciano has laid out his little plastic cups, and bottles of his three homemade spirits: grappa (grape brandy), limoncello (grappa infused with lemon rinds), and Vin Santo — the prized “holy wine” that’s made with concentrated grapes, fortified with grappa, then aged lovingly in special casks.

Luciano pours everyone their slug of choice, then puts on his Sinatra records. As the sprits flow and Frank croons the classics, Luciano nudges his guests to the dance floor. Emboldened by the Vin Santo — and by the general aura of Tuscan romance — couples who haven’t slow-danced in eons grip each other and sway to the music. Occasionally Luciano cuts in for a dance of his own.

The old man loves to talk, even though he speaks no English. Despite his guests’ protests that they don’t speak Italian, Luciano just keeps chattering away — making himself understood (more or less) with meaningful eye contact and by speaking slowly.

Recently Luciano discovered the Google Translate app. So now, when he wants to convey a more complex point, he borrows someone’s smartphone. He speaks into it with a measured, gentle ease — his velvety voice submerging the phone in Italian charisma. After a pause, the phone spits out a rough translation in Siri-speak. It’s a jarring juxtaposition. But — like the traditional-meets-modern mix of the agriturismo itself — it just works.

The old man is stubbornly old-fashioned. One of his relatives joked, “Luciano’s idea of progress is getting two new sheep for the farm.” Luciano may be the paterfamilias, but his daughter-in-law, Isabella, is the business brains of the operation. By converting his farm into an agriturismo, she created a bridge between Luciano’s rustic ways and a steady stream of visitors from faraway lands. Now that he’s gotten used to it, Luciano has a newfound purpose in life: connecting with tourists, and proudly sharing his traditions. This old dog is learning some new tricks…and loving it. Well, most of the time.

One day, Luciano invited his agriturismo guests to participate in the olive harvest. A few hardy and curious souls showed up, and put in a couple of hours’ work: spreading out tarps, gently raking plump olives off of spindly branches, then stooping over to gather them up.

At the day’s end, as the sky became a deep purple, Luciano built a roaring campfire deep in the grove. He pulled out a straw-wrapped bottle of his homemade wine, and began to cut slices of bread to toast on the open fire. He rubbed each crispy slice with garlic, drenched it in a generous dollop of his bright-green, fresh-pressed olive oil, and handed it around. “Bruschetta,” he said. “This is the real peasant cuisine.”

Luciano’s exhausted work crew of tourists huddled around the fire and crunched into our reward for a hard day’s work. But Luciano wasn’t quite as impressed with us as we were with ourselves. “Here’s the thing about this agriturismo business,” he muttered to me with a wink. “It’s an awful lot of turismo and not much agri.”

While people come to Cretaiole for the food, wine, scenery, and cultural activities, I think that when all is said and done, some of their most prized memories come from their time with Luciano. Yes, things would be easier if Luciano learned some English. But I sure hope he never does.

Some habits die hard. I must admit, when I got home from our Tuscan Thanksgiving dinner,  I checked the football scores. And the next morning, it just felt right to do some shopping.

Fortunately, “Black Friday” in Tuscany is pure pleasure. There’s no getting up early to stand in line. No mob scenes in pursuit of doorbusters. And not a shopping mall in sight.

My wife and her sister wanted some proper Tuscan holiday gifts. So after breakfast, we headed out on a mellow shopping trip.

First, we drove 10 minutes from our agriiturismo into the delightful Renaissance town of Pienza. Work crews were just setting up the town Christmas decorations, and the golden-stone lanes were ours alone.

We browsed through Pienza, window-shopping pecorino cheese displays and wispy cypress centerpieces. A leather shop caught our eye. And my wife and her sister enjoyed the sales clerk’s undivided attention as they tried on some shoes…a perfect early Christmas present for each other.

Next up: wine. Hopping in the car, we twisted for 40 minutes through some of Italy’s most stunning scenery to the town of Montalcino. World-famous for its Brunello di Montalcino wines, this town can be a little intimidating for low-end-intermediate wine-lovers like us.

The Enoteca di Piazza was just what we needed. More practical than quaint, this shop is designed for a surgical strike to assemble a cross-section of local wines to ship home. Its ingenious, automated system let us try samples from a hundred different open bottles. First, we picked up an electronic card to keep track of what we tasted. (You pay per sample, but if you buy a bottle, the sample is free.) Then, with the help of the clerk, we roamed around the store — which was organized geographically — to get a feel for the “big three” nearby wine regions: Brunello di Montalcino, Vino Nobile di Montepulciano, and Chianti Classico.

Once we had our bearings, we could zero in on some of the nuances of a particular type of wine. What’s the difference between a riserva and a table wine? Which wines are better to drink right away, and which are an investment for aging? What’s the difference between traditional vintners, and those experimenting with modern methods? A taste can tell you all you need to know.

Don’t get me wrong: A more intimate wine-tasting experience — where you actually wander through vines, get to know the vintner, and sip samples straight from the barrel — is a must for wine-lovers. And we had some of those experiences, too. But the catch with a winery is that they sell only their own wines. (And unless you have a designated driver, connecting several rural wineries by car is an iffy proposition.) For a broader education, head to an enoteca instead.

Having shipped our favorite bottles home for Christmas gifts (and maybe a few for ourselves), it was time for a late lunch. Enjoying a stand-up slice of pizza overlooking Montalcino’s main square — not missing stateside strip malls and food courts one bit — we  decided we’d had enough shopping for this Black Friday. The sun was already heading for the horizon. And Tuscany beckoned.

My goal here is not to make you envious…at least, not in a bad way. It’s to inspire you to break free from some of your cherished holiday traditions — whether it’s eating turkey at Thanksgiving, waking up early on Black Friday, or hitting the Boxing Day sales — and see what the rest of the planet is doing. You have a lifetime to lovingly keep up your traditions. But one of these days, consider creating some new ones…someplace else.

While Italy lacks a Thanksgiving kick-off to the Christmas season, by late November big cities and little towns are dressing up in their holiday best.

In Pienza, the day after Thanksgiving happened to be decorating day. Doing our “Black Friday” shopping in the traffic-free town center, we watched work crews erect a proud Christmas tree on the gorgeous Renaissance square, and lovingly hang garlands along the lanes.

Orvieto’s square was also freshly adorned with a not-yet-decorated tree.

Montepulciano—which was hosting a weekend Christmas market—was the most elaborately decked out, with wooden market stalls, an illuminated tree, and a lightshow on the facade of the otherwise austere city hall.

Bustling Rome was less adorned than we expected. But the high-roller shopping streets near Via del Corso were all lit up.

Not surprisingly, the Vatican had perhaps the best Christmas spirit in Rome. On the first Sunday in Advent, St. Peter’s Square heralded the impending birth of the Christ Child with a Rockefeller Center-sized tree (and a not-yet-unveiled nativity scene).

On a previous trip this year, I’d visited Naples — the epicenter of Southern Italy’s passion for nativity scenes. Getting a head start on my holiday shopping, I shipped home the perfect presepe for my mother. Direct from Signore D’Auria’s workshop, my mom now has a perfect Italian addition to her crèche collection.

Wherever you might be headed for Christmas or New Year’s — at home, across the country, or abroad — I wish you holiday travels that are merry and bright!