Awoke to another wet day in Castelnuovo, so took breakfast leisurely while planning what to do on our last day at Villa Bertagni. Massimo had been researching brochures on the Garfagnana region. We decided on an outing to the 'wind' tunnel, Grotta del Venta, so named because of the convection wind created by temperature variation between outside and inside.  

Allan spent most of the morning catching up with the blog entries; still frustrated by intermittent wifi . Susan was a big help continuing with text entries when I took the girls into Castelnuovo to get out of the Villa.  Allan and the girls walked around within the walled part of town, had the compulsory gelato for the girls and café for Dad. By the time we returned, the others were finishing their lunch and we were scheduled to leave for the Grotta at three to make the four pm walk through.

We all set off in two cars for Gallicano, about 15 min south of Castelnuovo, then west up a winding valley. I could not find Grotta del Venta on our Tomtom so could not loose the other car. Sure enough, we lost the other car when Rob missed a turn in Gallicano and had to turn around and we ended up down a one-way street and into a school car park. Fortunately, Uncle Antonio was with us and following his nose, got us back on route and we caught up with the BMW; however by now we had lost 15 min and were not going to make the four pm walk through of Grotta del Venta, so we decided visit the Eremo di Calomini Monastery before rather than after the Grotto. Both are high up some steep 'goat track' type roads where you don't want to meet anything coming the other way. The roads were also spotted with signs warning of rock fall, deer, narrow roads and even though I was now used to driving a manual left hand drive, these roads took all my concentration.

The Calomini monastery was amazing. Built into the side of an overhanging escarpment high up a mountain, the church was dated 1631 and the monks have been digging a Grotta into the hillside behind the monastery since the twelfth century. Unfortunately, the monastery and grotto was not open to visitors when we visited, but the chapel was. Pilgrims come from all over to bathe and drink from the gushing water, believed to be sacred. It certainly tastes pure. We headed back down the switchback road then on up the valley road to Grotta del Vento.

We left the aunts in the café shop while the rest of us took the last guided tour of the day. We opted for the one hour itinerary. There was no wind in the cave because the temp outside and inside were similar. Still it was a spectacular tour, with the route we took dropping and climbing 80m from the height of the cave entrance.

Returning to the villa, the evening was spent packing and planning our departure for Florence and on to Positano. Rob and Allan were sent into Torite for pizza. They were away nearly an hour and over-catered by about four pizza. So our last meal together at Villa Bertagni was takeaways and left-overs.