Standing on the edge of the hilltop, I stare down into the valley and soak in my first good view of it since I arrived maybe an hour or more ago. The afternoon sun seems to be glistening off the surface of the valley, almost like it’s topped with a giant mirror that’s acres long and acres wide. It suddenly dawns on me, the only thing that can possibly glisten in the sun like that is surface water.
A lake or a large pond. A body of water fed by a wide stream. Maybe the same stream we crossed earlier, near da Vinci’s childhood home.
But, if the center of the valley is the location of the cave, how can a lake be covering it? Maybe it’s possible it has filled with ground water over the centuries. But somehow I’m not convinced of that theory, if only because this region of
