through an olive grove. These tracks can become muddy after some rain and are better suited for cartwheels and the cloven hoof. Until a few years ago one could meet beasts of burden tramping along here, and those great white oxen, slow, swaying bodies, already worshipped two thousand years ago as the incarnation of the earth-gods:
And to those also, O Lord, the humble beasts, who with us bear the burden and heat of the day, and offer their guileless lives for the well-being of their countries, we supplicate Thy great tenderness of heart.
When you get to the end of this first stretch, head towards the wood. Don’t take the right-hand turn downhill.
The walk through the wood is brief. In the morning a dew-laden spider’s web lays itself across your face and a keen eye can find regurgitated owl pellets of slimy fur and half-digested bone. at the end the path comes to another old, crestfallen farmhouse with a yard and out-buildings. Walk round it, down between rugged dry walls and along a track covered with Summer dust waiting for September winds to make a sally and bare its humps again. After 10 minutes it leads uphill and on to a narrow asphalt road.
Turn right, downhill to the roadside church of San Lorenzo. Across the valley are the quarries of Maiano where Walkway One passes.
A few minutes down the road is the eye-catching Castle of Vincigliata. On the high outer walls are stone tablets commemorating the sojourn of names such as Queen Elizabeth and Beatrice, Battenberg, Hohenlohe and Hohenzollern and the Duchess of Russia.
At the first sweeping bend after the castle, take the track on the left through the olive groves. There is comfort and