The church is very dirty, and so indeed is everything else; but no amount of grime can disguise the charm of the cloisters.
The Certosa is a mere half-hour from Florence, Impruneta an hour and a half; but Vallombrosa asks a long day.

One can go by rail, changing at Sant' Ellero into the expensive rack-and-pinion car which climbs through the vineyards to a point near the summit, and has, since it was opened, brought to the mountain so many new residents, whose little villas cling to the western slopes among the lizards, and, in summer, are smitten unbearably by the sun.

But the best way to visit the monastery and the groves is by road.

A motor-car no doubt makes little of the journey; but a carriage and pair such as I chartered at Florence for forty-five lire has to be away before seven, and, allowing three hours on the top, is not back again until the same hour in the evening; and this, the ancient way, with the beat of eight hoofs in one's ears, is the right way.
For several miles the road and the river--the Arno--run side by side--and the railway close by too--through venerable villages whose inhabitants derive their living either from the soil or the water, and amid vineyards all the time.

Here and there a white villa is seen, but for the most part this is peasants' district: one such villa on the left, before Pontassieve, having about it, and on each side of its drive, such cypresses as one seldom sees and only Gozzoli or Mr.Sargent could rightly paint, each in his own style.