Pistoia & the Literary Festival

Wednesday, 29 May 2013

I was in Pistoia (half way between Pisa and Florence in Italy) on 25 May to talk travel, other festival speakers included Colin Thubron, I enjoyed To a Mountain in Tibet, his circuit of Mt Kailash book last year when I was involved with the Dolman travel writing awards in London.

In between the festival events I wandered the town, a delightful place ‘bella and piccolo’ – ‘small and beautiful’ I kept hearing. My favourite Pistoia moment was when I wandered into the large building on the central cathedral square, the Piazza Duomo. In the open courtyard in the centre there was a dog with an orange Frisbee. When somebody came in the dog would come over to you and drop the Frisbee at your feet:

Then it would stand back and wait for you to throw the frisbee:

Chase after it and usually catch it in midair:

Or pick it up off the ground:

After you tired of frisbee throwing, or the dog tired of you, it would take it over to another visitor and wait from them to throw it. I threw it three times.