Italian Adventures – We Bought a House in Italy!

I think I first learned about a Prickly Pear cactus when I was on a business trip in San Antonio. The clients and I were out to dinner on the Riverwalk and we ordered prickly pear margaritas. I had never heard of such a thing but what a beautiful surprise when it arrived. I thought to myself, I need to learn more about these tasty little fruits!

Fast forward to 2017, many years later, I rented a house in Castellina in Chianti for a month. The house was one of several on a local vineyard at Querceto in Castellina. The place has been updated since but even back in 2017, it was amazing and the perfect experience (I rented Tinaia).

I chose my ‘house’ because of the space and the terrace, knowing that I would have friends and family visiting throughout the month. Four bedrooms (2 upstairs & 2 downstairs), 3 bathrooms, a large living room and kitchen, an amazing terrace AND a community pool! And to my surprise, all around the property were HUGE prickly pear cacti (?) in full bloom. Not knowing what to do or how to handle the fruit, I simply admired and took many pictures of them.

Fast forward to January 2023. I am now designing the renovation of the garden of our vacation home in Umbria. I MUST have a prickly pear cactus somewhere. I was questioned whether one would grow in the Umbrian climate but I assured them they would, as there is one just up the road and many more throughout the region (as seen in the opening photo).

I desgined the garden layout, including the new upper terrace off the kitchen. This part of the garden had a fairly steep slope so I wanted to level it out and soften the slope, level a portion out for the dining terrace, and create a retaining wall to further soften the slope down to the lower garden, which I now refer to as the gaming yard. Think Bacci, Kuub, Cornhole, etc.

I envisioned aloe vera on both sides of the yard, just above the retaining wall and steps down to the lower yard. Then I thought the one western corner, just below the retaining wall near the street, would be a perfect spot for the cactus.

Fast forward again to the spring when I returned to Italy. The garden was starting to take shape and the terraces were installed in February. The upper dining terrace is perfect! The two aloe vera are also exactly what I envisioned.

But when I asked my gardner, Adriano, about the cactus, he just wrinkled his nose and shook his head. I reminded him of the plans and showed him the pictures, but he just said NO!, shook his head and walked away. HMMMMM! This is just the begining of my ‘defiant’ relationship with Adriano.

You can read and see more details on the garden design and development in two of my previous posts… Oct 2022: Il Giardino – Cleanup & Redesign and Spring 2023: Time to finish the garden.

Needless to say, despite Adriano’s Strong NO! I was determined and found the perfect place to purchase my soon to be perfect prickly pear cactus. I think I have posted about this place previously but it’s worth mentioning again. If you like succulents and cacti, this is the place for YOU! Giromagi about 10 min from Castiglione del Lago. I LOVE this place.

Anyway, this is where I found my long desired cactus. I purchased a fairly decent sized one, big enough to survive my departure but not so big that I would have trouble planting. It is a cactus, after all, and there are VERY sharp needles. Trust me!!!

I brought it home in the trunk of my Panda, along with a small box of other lovely succulents, looking forward to bring things to fruition.

I was super hopeful that I could get one of Adriano’s guys to plant it for me…BWAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

The next time Adriano arrived, he was alone and I asked him about planting the cactus. He just wrinkled his nose and shook his head. Now mind you, I am struggling with my Italian at this point, but I persisted. I shifted the tone to be more about asking where he thought a good place would be to place the treasured plant. This helped, but only a little. He was willing to play my game.

We walked over to the corner near the fence, just below the retaining wall and I pointed to where I wanted to plant it. But in true Adriano form, he said NO! Then I followed him up to the upper garden area, behind the upper terrace and behind a tree and he said Qui! (here) I responded with NO! Hee hee hee.

We walked to the gaming yard, and he pointed to another tree and said Qui! and I said NO!

We then walked over to the other yard, which I call the Orchard, past the fire pit and over to the fence, he pointed to a spot beyond the fence, near the water tank, and said Qui! I emphatically responded NO! Sheesh! I want to see the dang thing, seriously!

So, we proceeded to walk back over to the original spot, in the corner just below the retaining wall, near the fence along the rode. I pointed, once again, to the spot I thought was good, he shook his head, pointed to the sprinkler head, paced out 3 large steps and said QUI! Va bene! We agree!!! SHEESH!!! OMG!

But naturally he wasn’t about to touch the thing so I planted it over the weekend myself. Here is the little beauty waiting to grow into a magnificent and bountiful plant!!! (Please note, that it is bearing fruit! This wil make sense in a few minutes)

As you can see above, it’s exactly where, well…almost exactly where, I had designed it to be over a year ago.

Fast forward AGAIN, to spring 2025 when my friend Heather was here with me. She pointed out that she didn’t think the cactus I bought was fruit bearing, as there was not a flower or bud anywhere to be seen. DOH! I smacked my head, disappointed that I bought the wrong cactus, not remembering what it actually looked like when all of the turmoil I went through to get it in the ground.

So, in the Fall of 2025, off to Giromagi I go again to get a new one with fruit. DOH! Now that I am writing this, I am smacking myself for not remembering. Va bene.

I bought a smaller one this time and planted it next to the one planted from last year. They would be cute together and be fast friends. Or so I had hoped.

Alas, the little guy didn’t make it through the winter. So sad. Even the original one had a hard time through the winter.

So here it begins again.

We are now Spring 2026, early April, dopo Pasqua, and Adriano’s crew arrives. Daniel, Adriano’s brother, is at the house with two workers. There was supposed to be a bigger team, including Adriano, but his truck broke down along the autostrada and didn’t make it. I had a new well dug (a HUGE story for another post) and Adriano’s team was here to clean up and connect the new well to the irrigation system (or so I thought).

I love Daniel! He is friendly and delightful (despite being a chain smoker), and speaks a little English. Adriano…NO! OK, Adriano is very good looking (secondo me) and somewhat similar to Thor (as referenced in earlier posts).

Here’s a little ‘tea’ on Adriano’s brothers…There are 3 of them, as noted in earlier posts. All three of them have children…ALL boys!!! Talk about a strong bloodline. But they are amazingly nice humans and I love that they are part of my life.

OK, so I got off track thinking about all of these men!!!

When I arrived in the spring of 2026 and realized that the little new prickly pear had died, I immediately set out to replace it. Now it sits in a pot next to its new ‘big brother’ waiting to be planted.

When Daniel and crew arrived, I had asked him (in Italian) if he could dig me a few holes for some plants. One was for one of the wisteria plants that didn’t make it and the other was for … you got it…the new prickly pear cactus.

Daniel jumped right in and dug up the old, dead wisteria plant and inserted the new one, instructing me to give it water. Then, when I showed him the new cactus to be planted…BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA. He actually made the EXACT SAME WRINKLY NOSE FACE that Adriano made over a year ago!!! WTH!!!

So, after several exchanges, all in Italian – ‘ish’, we thought the best solution was to plant them on the outside of the fence, along the road, which I learned in a very difficult way, two years ago, was also my property. SO…. here we are, replanting the original cactus, along with the new cactus, in an area along the road that I can’t truly enjoy visually, but can certainly enjoy the fruits of their labor!!!

I will share pics once this actually takes place. Alas, it’s spring and raining. No one can certainly be expected to work in the rain!

Given that I live in Seattle…need I say more?!!!