Day 22: Florence

The rain is falling heavily as we leave Florence for Poggio a Caiano to pick up our friend Maddie and her aunt (who is visiting from Chicago) for a visit to Pietrasanta to make an inspection trip of a hotel there.

The rain gets worse as we get closer to Pietrasanta, a small city located near the Tuscan Riviera that has become something of an artist colony in recent years.

We find a parking space just outside of town and we walk to the hotel– the Albergo Pietrasanta–a very elegant and tasteful building located in the pedestrian center of town. We meet the director of marketing, Federica Lo Franco, who gives us a tour of the public rooms and some of the beautiful bedrooms and suites.

http://www.slh.com/files/HUPSAAP/Small_Header_main-image.jpg

We sit in the covered veranda looking out over the terrace

and discuss working together in the future.

It’s time for lunch when we leave and Federica recommends an informal trattoria just around the corner from the hotel. The Trattoria da Sci (Sci is local dialect for the name of the former owner) is one of those family places with no menu, a bottle of the house wine on the table and mama in the kitchen. We squeeze in through the door into a crowded dining room

and have a very delicious lunch while the rain continues to come down outside. We all have the gnocchi with a rich meat ragu to start and three of us have the roast pork with potatoes while I have stewed moscardini (baby squid) over excellent polenta. The wine is easy to drink and it is a very congenial lunch.

After lunch, we make a quick visit to the nearby village of Valdicastello….Maddie wants to check out the birthplace of Giosue Carducci, an Italian poet who won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1906. There is not much going on in Valdicastello on this very wet afternoon but we do find his house but unfortunately (but not unexpectedly) it is closed.

Maddie calls the telephone number listed on the gate but no one is available to come and open the house so we continue on our way.

When we drove into Pietrasanta, I had noticed signs for the village of Sant’Anna di Stazzema, which is the site of an infamous massacre of civilians and partisans by the SS during World War II as well as the location for Spike Lee’s latest movie, The Miracle of Sant’Anna. The movie is loosely based on the incident and tells the story of four black soldiers who are trapped in the village. So we begin to follow the signs for Sant’Anna which lead us high up into the mountains on a very narrow and twisting road. The rain continues and fog develops as we continue to climb.

The GPS and our maps are unclear about how far the village actually is so, as the fog gets worse, we decide to postpone our visit to another time.

We make one more stop before heading back to Florence…..at the very upscale beach resort of Forte di Marmi. It is not the best day or time of year to visit but we are surprised to find the stores–many of which are of the Gucci/Versace/Frette ilk–open for business.

We make a quick circuit of the town, stop for a coffee, buy the last umbrella from an African street vendor and get back on the autostrada.

We say goodby to Maddie and Patsy back in Poggio a Caiano and make our way back during the rush hour traffic and the rain.

For our late dinner, we stay close to home and go to da Mimmo right across the street from the apartment…..a large, very decorated restaurant enlivened by several large tables of English tour groups and later by a party for a recent Italian graduate. The restaurant has one of those large, pan-Italian menus but with a Calabrian accent. We both have pasta dishes…Diana’s has a spicy “nduja” sauce….followed by a dish of carpaccio for Diana and a plate of fried vegetables for me. The food is okay and a bit expensive for what we get. The service slows down considerably during the meal as the Italian group begins to arrive so we have to push to get the check.

But it has been a long day and we are glad that we only have to cross the street to get to the apartment.

I set my alarm for 1 am so I can get up and watch the election returns on the computer…..I stay up until the returns from California and the west coast put Obama over the top. We have a bit of a celebration at 5 am and then are happy to go to sleep.

Tomorrow we are off to Piemonte.

Day 21: Florence

First thing this morning, I meet Mariangela downstairs and she guides me to the big parking garage called the Parterre just beyond the Piazza di Liberta’, about a 20 minute walk from the apartment.

After we walk back to the apartment, Diana and I set out to meet our friend Sally Watkins (and her friend Kay) for breakfast. They are staying at a nice downtown hotel–the Helvetia and Bristol, which is located not far from the Duomo.

Since we are running a little late and the walk is bit further than I had counted on, we jump into a cab for the last part of the trip.

Sally and Kay have been following a similar itinerary to ours….they were in Rome, Puglia and Basilicata and will head for Piemonte next…but this is the only time that we are going to overlap. Breakfast is quite elegant at the Helvetia and Bristol…service is attentive, the room is very attractive and the buffet is overflowing….and we have a good time discussing our mutual trips and the upcoming election.

After breakfast, we head for the shopping district to check out a few stores; Diana has her eyes on an Italian scarf. On our way, we pass by the house on the Via del Sole (just off the Piazza Santa Maria Novella) where my sister Barbara lived in 1993 while on her Fulbright and where we stayed when we visited her on our first trip to Italy. Diana makes some purchases at the historic and very elegant Farmacia di Santa Maria Novella

while I go off in search of a bus map at the tourist office. The weather is now threatening so we hail a cab to go back to the apartment. The cab driver tells us that he may have difficulty getting to the address because there is a demonstration march scheduled–to protest the Berlusconi “education reforms”–that will close some of the streets in the area. Sure enough, when we meet the marchers at the Duomo, the driver says that he can get us to the apartment but only by taking a very circuitous and expensive route. So we get out at the Duomo and walk the rest of the way as the rain begins to fall.

We decide that this is a good day to do a laundry since there is a small laundromat just around the corner from the apartment. We generally have a good sense of Italian laundromat procedures but this one is a bit tricky and we need to get assistance from the two young people–one Italian, one American–who are also doing their laundry. While the laundry is being done, I take the opportunity to explore the neighborhood north of the Duomo where we haven’t stayed before. It is a less touristed area than we generally stay in and businesses that serve local residents predominate. There are a lot of university buildings in the neighborhood and we have seen students everywhere. (Diana spends her time trying to pursuade the undecided young American to vote for Obama. He has an absentee ballot that he plans to fax to the Embassy.)

After the laundry is finished, folded and put away, we get some sandwiches at a local alimentari, have lunch in the apartment and wait for the rain to stop. When it is does stop, we walk to the San Lorenzo market area

and do some shopping….Diana buys some scarves and a wallet….and then we take a roundabout route back to the apartment. The weather is threatening and since the end of daylight savings time the previous weekend, it is very dark by 5 pm.

We don’t want to go too far for dinner so we head to a trattoria that I had found during my wanderings, which is only two blocks away. When we go inside, the Trattoria San Zanobi is almost empty but we get a warm welcome from the woman in charge. Dinner is very good…..I have a pasta dish with mushrooms followed by trippa alla fiorentina while Diana starts with crepes in a cheese sauce followed by the bistecca alla fiorentina and roast potatoes….all very satisfying. With the meal, we drink a very pleasant young Chianti and have an interesting (if halting) conversation with the proprietor about the upcoming election. She is one of the few people we met in Italy who seems to have some hesitation about Obama but we can’t quite figure out what the hesitation iss based on.

Tomorrow we are going on a day trip with my colleague (and our friend) Maddie to Pietrasanta, a small city near the Tuscan Riviera where we have been invited to visit a hotel. Then we plan to do some touring around the area.

Day 20: Chiocchio (Chianti)-Florence

Before heading to Florence, we decide to take advantage of the sunny day and backtrack a bit to the Sunday market in Panzano.

Panzano is a small town south of Greve in Chianti that has become famous in the past ten years due to the notoriety of Dario Cecchini, who is a butcher and has promoted Chianti meat and food for many years. He was featured in Bill Buford’s entertaining book "Heat" which deals the author’s apprenticeship in the restaurant trade.

This has caused a great increase in the crowds–especially English speaking visitors–in Panzano and at the market over the years but it is still fun to wander around the stalls and taste the salami, cheese and the new olive oil. When we step into his shop, Dario is in fact behind the counter wrestling with a cut of beef.



The detour is well worth it for the beautiful views and pleasant weather.



Driving into Florence isn’t such a difficult challenge on a Sunday afternoon and we navigate successfully to the apartment on Via San Gallo. More of a challenge is finding a place to park and we have to circle the block once before Mariangela–the owner of the apartment–gets the okay for us to park in the next door hotel’s loading area. We unload our heavy bags and get settled in the very comfortable apartment. Later, we even find a parking place right across the street…there are no traffic restrictions in Florence on Sundays. Mariangela briefs us on the apartment and the only hitch is getting the wireless internet to work but it eventually kicks in.

By the time all this is sorted out, we are hungry and decide to snack on the cheese, salami and bread that we have with us. After we eat, we take advantage of the sunny, warm weather and take a long walk through the center of Florence–past the Duomo, stopping in at the Orsanmichele church and then through the Piazza della Signoria; the streets are filled with people–shopping, strolling or sitting in sidewalk cafes with a glass of wine; it’s a great day to be in Florence. Our destination is our favorite gelateria–Neri–and the gelato is as good as we remember from previous visits.

In the late afternoon, we get into the car to drive to Vicchio, about an hour north of Florence to have dinner with Jane Nyhan, a guide in Florence with whom we have become friendly, and her family. It is dark for most of the ride and the road–although a main road–is quite curvy and we have to drive carefully. Once in Vicchio, we have to get explicit directions from Jane (what would we do without cell phones?) to get us to her house deep in the country.

We have a great evening with Jane and Carlo and their two children–Tommaso and Federica. Carlo is an excellent cook and he prepares a number of dishes with cauliflower fresh from his garden. We have a spirited discussion with Tommaso, the 17 year old son, who enjoys practicing his English and is very bright and engaging.

The drive back to Florence is much easier than the drive out and we even find a parking space just a few doors up the street from the apartment.

Tomorrow we have to move the car by 8 a.m. to a garage outside the ZTL (traffic limited zone) and then we will explore Florence.

Day 19: Chiocchio (Chianti)

The weather looks mixed as we set off after breakfast for a drive around the Casentino area of Tuscany.

 It is unclear whether the sun will win out or whether it will remain overcast.  The Casentino is located in the eastern part of Tuscany, just to the south and east of Florence.  It is relatively untouristed but no less appealing than the more popular areas like Chianti.  The mountains top 3,000 feet and it is heavily forested as well as having a number of pretty hill towns scattered about.

The Abbey of Vallombrosa is our first destination….it is set in the midst of mountain resort areas and the Abbey is surrounded by hotels and hiking trails.



The ride up the narrow twisty road is mostly through the deep woods so the views are few and far between…but when they appear, they are quite spectacular.   The abbey was founded in the 9th century by the Benedictines and over the years, the buildings have been added to.

http://www.monaci.org/index1.asp

When we enter the Abbey, there is a mass being said so we sit down and stay for the service.  The mass is pretty well attended for a place so remote - perhaps the crowd is due to it being All Saints Day.  We don’t understand too much of the sermon but the priest is very emotional and passionate in delivering it.

We were unable to see much of the inside because some of it is being restored and also because the mass was being said….but it is hard to imagine a better physical setting.

We continue on to Poppi on the back roads that descend from the Abbey to the plain…..the first part of the drive goes through more of the deep woods, and the red leaves that have fallen to the ground make a startling contrast to the naked trees.

    

As we continue on, the woods open up and we get some great broad vistas over the valleys and the adjacent hills.

  

Poppi is another one of those handsome Italian hill towns with narrow streets, stone buildings and an air of well-being even after 500 years.  The castle is at the top of the town where there is a broad expanse with views in all directions.  Since it is time for lunch and since we find a parking spot right in the front of the castle which is also in front of the Albergo Casentino’s restaurant, we decide that fate wants us to eat there.   

The restaurant is vast and pretty well filled today…it is a holiday in Italy–All Saints Day.  It is traditional to visit the family graves and also to have lunch in the country.  They are able to seat us in a smaller overflow room with three or four Italian families and we have both a good meal and a good time watching the Italian families enjoy themselves.  We split an antipasto plate–great prosciutto and salami along with Tuscan crostini followed by grilled pork ribs and roast potatoes for Diana and grilled sausage and spinach for me.  After a very pleasant lunch complemented by the very nice house red, we walk across to the castle.



The castle tour is a lot of fun….you get an audio guide that has an actor impersonating the original lord of the castle and, while informative, it is very tongue-in-cheek and is a great contrast to the highly technical and stilted scripts that you frequently get.   The castle is very fine….from the modern art in the courtyard

 

to the grand staircase inside



to the finely decorated room now used for meetings

s

and the 15th century frescoes in what had been the living quarters.

 

And I get the added bonus of climbing to the top of the tower for great views over the town of Poppi and the Tuscan countryside.

  

We return to Chiocchio just before dark and have a chance to rest before going out to dinner with Rita and Lino at a local restaurant in the next town over, Strada di Chianti.  Lino had once worked at Il Caminetto and we get a warm welcome from the owner.  The dinner is great….tagliolini with duck ragu for followed by a nice tagliata of beef for Diana, and polenta cakes with bacon and cabbage followed by delicious cervelli fritti (fried brains) for me.  The wine is the best we have had so far…a 2000 Vistarenni Chianti from Codirosso…..and only Euro 14.00 a bottle.  We drank two….

Off to Florence in the morning…

Day 18: Rome-Chiocchio (Chianti)

Time to leave Rome….our last breakfast in the apartment where we enjoy more treats from the great bakery–Roscioli– just down the street. The warm "pizza bianca", fresh cornetti and terrific tiny rolls are all fantastic.

The cab picks us up and gets us back to the same car rental office without difficulty and our drive out of Rome–while taking a slightly different route–is uneventful. We are meeting our friend Miriam Margolyes–one of the Italian connections whom we met in the 1990s on the Italian Forum on Compuserve. She has a house in Montisi in southern Tuscany where she spends some time and also rents out for most of the season.



The weather worsens as we leave the autostrada and the rain begins in earnest as we drive the hilly country roads, but when we arrive in Montisi, it stops. We have a great get together with Miriam and a pleasant lunch at La Toretta in Castelmuzio–the next town over from Montisi.



After lunch, we stop at the Montisi cemetery where our friend Glenn Scott’s ashes are interred. He was another friend from the Italian Forum, who died in Rome in 1998.

We then take the beautiful back roads through southern Tuscany into Chianti. We are staying with Rita O’Connor and Lino Ferracin…she’s from New York and he’s from Florence and they now live in Chiocchio, a small village just north of Greve in Chianti. We met through the Slow Travel web site and they run a tour company that does small group tours in Italy.

By the time we arrive it is dark but we manage to find the right house. We have a relaxing dinner with good food and lots of wine in their comfortable kitchen and have no trouble falling asleep.



They have done a great job fixing up the house, which dates from the 1600s and has a beautiful setting.



Tomorrow we will explore the Casentino, a relatively untouristed part of Tuscany, located to the east of Chianti.

P.S. From Diana

P.S. from Diana -- Monday, November 10, 2008

Some incidental facts:

1. One day, Jim took a nap. No doubt he'll deny it, but it's true.

2. In case we don't get caught up to Nov. 5: Hooray!! We are very, very happy- and so are the Italians. The guy from whom we bought the olive oil in Florence, the woman in Piedmont who before she sold us the ticket to visit the castle, asked beaming, did we vote for Obama?, people in restaurants, everyone we've met. Jim set the alarm for 1 am and stayed up 'til 5, watching and reading on the computer. I dozed and woke up for hourly updates. What a great event.

3. Our past observation that Italian design genius takes a hike when it comes to bathrooms remains true. Either the shower is so small one cannot wash one's feet, or there is a hose and shower head in the tub but no bracket on the wall, or the floor gets soaked, or everything is wedged in so tightly you get black and blue negotiating the fixtures, or, or, or. It's so hard being an American tourist. (It may be different in 4 or 5 star hotels.)

4. On this trip I read:

What Are You Like by Anne Enright. Novel by dazzling Irish writer.

Mooncranker's Gift by Barry Unsworth. Sexy but creepy. Set in Istanbul.

Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen. Yuck.

A Thousand Days in Venice: An Unexpected Romance by Marlena Di Blasi. Double Yuck.

At Large and At Small: Familiar Essays by Anne Fadiman. A gem, as anticipated. I love Anne Fadiman. Can I be president of the Anne Fadiman fan club?

The Road to Oxiana by Robert Byron. Classic travel book (1930's Persia and Afghanistan) and deservedly so.

The Judges by Elie Wiesel. Interesting novel, a bit ponderously philosophical. Book Club book.

Ghost Soldiers by Hampton Sides. Hard to read about Japanese cruelty to American POW's in Philippines, but ultimately gripping and exciting. Book Club book.

Currently reading At Play in the Fields of the Lord by Peter Matthiessen. Another classic I'm finally getting to. Very disturbing but excellent novel about missionaries, mercenaries and Indians in a South American rain forest.

Lest you think we take too many books, I left some of the above here. And Jim brought tons of guide books -5 books about Florence, where we spent 3 days. Luckily he's the official shlepper.

5. I thought about Josie twenty times a day. And also about Noa and our whole wonderful family.

Two days left. What a wonderful trip. What a beautiful, endlessly interesting country. How fortunate we are.

Diana

Days 14, 15, 16, 17: Oct. 27, 28, 29, 30: Four Days in Rome

Since we spent a lot of time during our four days in Rome socializing with friends, I will take the liberty of combining four days into one report, which also has the advantage of helping me catch up.

The almost coast to coast drive from the Adriatic to Rome takes about 2.5 hours and the mountain scenery in the middle of the peninsula is quite striking as you drive along the autostrada at 140 km/hr. The highest peak–the Gran Sasso–reaches 9,000 feet but there is a long tunnel (about 6 miles long) that takes you underneath instead of having to go over one of the mountain passes.



The drive into the city has become pretty routine for us and we find the car rental office in the parking garage under the Villa Borghese park without difficulty. However the taxi ride from the parking garage to the hotel is more problematic because there is a big demonstration being held in the Piazza Navona causing a number of street closings. So our cab driver has to circle around and find alternate routes to the apartment which is near the Campo de’ Fiori. And he doesn’t know how to approach the street where the apartment is so I get the apartment owner on the phone to talk the driver in. The ride ends up costing almost Euro 30.00 because of the extra time in traffic.

The owners of the apartment–Massimo and Biancamaria–meet us at the door and help us wrangle the luggage in the very small elevator up to the 3rd floor. The apartment is very bright with a nice view over the rooftops of the neighborhood.



We spend some time talking and then we all go out for a light lunch together at the Ristorante S. Anna, just around the corner.

What we did in Rome:

-took a walk on the Via dei Coronari, a beautiful street lined with antique shops and stopped for a gelato at the Gelateria del Teatro…delicious.



-went to the Bellini show at the Scuderie del Quirinale gallery….a spectacularly mounted exhibit of art from the master of the Venetian renaissance.



-went with our friend Maureen to the exhibit Etruscans, The Ancient Cities of Latium at the Palazzo delle Esposizioni…a stunning collection of artifacts from four of the Etruscan cities near Rome. While we are waiting to go in, we got to see another demonstration against Berlusconi’s education "reforms"…..masses of people marching down the Via Nazionale, holding banners and singing and dancing.



-spent a morning at the Crypta Balbi, a fairly new, very fascinating archaeological museum in the heart of Rome, which examines the development of one block from Roman times up to the present. The "Time Out Guide to Rome" has this description.

The Crypta Balbi displays one of Rome’s more interesting recent archaeological finds, combines the best of the ancient
with state-of-the-art technology and is packed with displays, maps and models that explain (in English) Rome’s evolution from a bellicose pre-Imperial era, to early Christian times and on through the dim Middle Ages.





-spent a hour in the church of Santa Maria sopra Minerva near the Pantheon. The church is a large Gothic influenced building with a non-descript "modern exterior". Santa Maria sopra Minerva is best known for the Bernini elephant sculpture supporting an obelisk in the piazza in the front. Inside there is the grave of the artist, Fra Angelico, a Michelangelo "Risen Christ" as well as breathtaking frescoes by Filippo Lippi covering the Caraffa Chapel, which include an Annunciation, an Assumption and The Triumph of Saint Thomas Aquinas.



-went to the Vittorio Emanuele II monument intending to take the panoramic elevator to the top for the view over Rome, but were deterred by Euro 7.00 cost per person for the ride. So we contented ourselves with the view from terrace and had a coffee at the cafe on the terrace.



Then we walked back through the Campodoglio and the Ghetto on the way to having a porchetta sandwich at Aristocampo on the Campo de’ Fiori.

We also made our mandatory visit to the Pantheon and strolled through the Piazza Navona and the Campo de’ Fiori.

One of the nice things about Rome is that we have a lot of friends there and have the chance to get together with them. On this trip, we were busy everyday…

On Monday, we had dinner at a restaurant near the Colosseum with our friends Bonnie Kramer and Michael Rosenbush from Washington DC who are living in Rome for six months. On Tuesday, we were invited to a dinner party at Maureen and Franco’s apartment near the Colosseum. On Wednesday, we visited with Tony Polzer, a guide in Rome who I work with. Later that afternoon, we spent time with Rob Allyn, who was good friend of Frances Nacman–another guide in Rome who was also a good friend of ours–who had died the previous week. That evening, we went to dinner in Testaccio with Leon and Jill Kammer, who run a villa and apartment rental company in Rome. And on Thursday night, we had dinner with a college classmate of mine–Victor Simpson, who is the AP bureau chief in Rome and his wife Daniela–at Pierluigi’s.

The weather in Rome was extremely unsettled…..on two evenings, there were torrential downpours with thunder and lightning. One night the rain was so severe that the stairwell of our apartment was flooded and the elevator was knocked out until the next day, which meant that we had to walk the four flights of stairs to get to our apartment. It rained on and off for all of the four days in Rome.

Next stop, Chianti and then on to Florence.

Day 13: San Benedetto del Tronto

It’s a beautiful sunny day as we have our breakfast on the veranda of La Torretta Bianca.

Our plan for the day is to get in the car and head for the countryside, perhaps hitting a couple of the “sagras” (festivals) celebrating chestnuts or some other seasonal foodstuff.

We only have to drive about a mile and we are already in another example of the incredible Italian scenery…..in the Piceno area of southern Le Marche, it is quite hilly, the fields are beautifully tended, olives and grapes are everywhere and the views are stupendous. (This may sound like a familiar description but it doesn’t mean that it isn’t accurate.)

We make a couple of stops…one at the chestnut festival at Ripatransone where we drive up to the top of the handsome “centro storico”

but the town is so crowded that we can’t find a place a park so we turn around and head for Moresco, where there is a “sagra” devoted to roast meat. In Moresco, a much smaller but no less attractive town, we park below and walk up to the main piazza where everything is set up for a luncheon feast. There is a giant wood fire ablaze and townspeople are manning a number of grills cooking pork, beef and sausages. There is a band just setting up and people are buying tickets and waiting for the food to be ready.

But it is unclear when the meal would be ready so we decide to leave and find a country restaurant for a traditional Italian Sunday lunch. We call our first choice but it is already full–Sunday lunch is a popular activity all over Italy–so we head for the small hilltown of Montefalcone di Appennino where there is a Slow Food osteria that sounds very good. Montefalcone is another charming Italian village, set high up on a cliff on a very narrow, curvy road.

On our second pass through town, we see the restaurant and find a parking space. Unfortunately but not unexpectedly, they are also full, which brings to mind the wise words of our friend from Lerici–”If you don’t book, you don’t eat.” There is another restaurant in town–the Locanda del Lupo-where they can seat us. It is a very local place with many regulars and the food for the most part is fine, especially the pasta dishes. Diana has a simple spaghetti with oil, garlic and hot peppers and I have parpardelle with meat sauce (wild boar actually) and they are both very tasty. For a second, I order the house antipasto–a delicious plate of prosciutto, salumi, cheese and vegetables–which is quite good as usual –and Dianahas a “mixed grill”.

On the way back to San Benedetto del Tronto, we stop for a gelato in Amandola, which is tucked under the Sibillini mountains. In the evening, we have drinks with Valerie and Bryan–Americans who live in Ascoli Piceno–who we know from the Slow Travel web site and then we all go out for a “light” dinner at a local place that specializes in “antipasto”.

Tomorrow we are off to Rome.

Day 12: Matera-San Benedetto del Tronto

This morning we pack up and leave Matera….we have enjoyed our stay here very much.

We look at the map and program the GPS to take the back roads for part of the trip to our next destination–San Benedetto del Tronto, in Le Marche but just across the Abruzzo border.

The route takes us across La Murgia, the Pugliese plateau, and the landscape is again quite striking for the most part….rolling empty wheat fields stretching off into the distance. We do have to go through a patch of heavy industry just beyond Altamura before we hit the pretty scenery. We descend from the plateau through another stretch of continuous olive trees and grape vines until we get on the autostrada and head north.

Lunch is a sandwich at one of the autostrada rest stops. We pass through a small portion of Molise where the road runs very close to the Adriatic and then we are in Abruzzo. This portion of the trip passes through a very nice landscape–more rolling hills but there are neatly tended fields and many modern, well-kept houses on the hillsides. As we get closer to Le Marche, we get nice views of the water and the nice looking beach resorts of northern Abruzzo.

San Benedetto del Tronto is a very big beach resort, stretching for ten miles up the coast and there are a lot of commercial developments, apartment buildings and hotels. There is only one local north-south road–the two-laned Via Adriatica–which goes right through the business district and has many stop lights. We make our way slowly to the turnoff to our friends’ bed and breakfast–La Torretta Bianca–where we will be staying for the next couple of nights.

http://www.bebtorre.com/

We are visiting Romina and Thomas, young friends of ours whom we met through our son Jonathan. She is Italian and he is American and they have a two year old daughter Gloria. The b&b is set high on a hill almost in the country and has a view of the water along with very attractive grounds and a lot of olive trees.

After we say hello and catch up, we get settled and then just hang out and relax around the b&b. Romina, Gloria and I go out on a last minute shopping expedition to get some supplies for tomorrow’s breakfast and some pizza for our dinner.

Tomorrow we plan to spend the day driving around the area and maybe go to one of the local “sagras” (festivals).

Day 11: Matera

A bright sunny day as we climb to the center for our day of exploring Matera.

We stop first to buy some postcards and stamps but we feel that we have been overcharged for the stamps, so we stop at another “tabacchi” to check the price and he confirms that we have paid too much….so we go back to the first place and get our money back.

Next stop is at the new art gallery in the center run by Sgr. Enrico Fillipucci, the dealer from whom we bought our Carlo Levi. He does remember us and tells us that he really didn’t expect to ever see us again. We have a nice conversation about the art business in Italy and some of his projects and before we leave, he shows us the web page of the large family villa located near Spoleto that they have developed as a rental property.

We continue our stroll around town–we actually meet three Italian tour groups visiting Matera–and stop in front of the Duomo. Unfortunately, there is scaffolding along one entire side of the building and the doors are shut tight…..”in restauro”. We will have to wait for our next visit to see the inside.

The food market is next…..it is just up the street from the main piazza and we are pleasantly surprised to see that there are many stalls and crowds of people doing their shopping.

We buy some local oranges (from near Policoro on the coast) and look for a bar in the sun to have a drink and write our postcards. The bars on the main square are both in the shade but we see a sign for a bar with a “vista panoramica” located on the roof of the movie theater. We take the elevator up and see tables set in a sunny courtyard with big open arches and views over the square and the “sassi”. (The crane in the picture is working on the “in restauro” duomo.)

We enjoy our freshly squeezed orange and lemon juices (spremuta), write our postcards and relax in the warm sunshine. By now it is almost 1 pm and it is too late to get into the art museum so we stop at a fancy food shop for some salumi, a “forno” for some bread and a “patisseria” for some cookies and take our food back to the hotel for a picnic lunch.

After lunch, I set out to explore the “sassi” and walk all the way through both ravines, stopping to view the deep gorge of the Gravina River and climb up through the more deserted and still undeveloped section at the other end of town.

In the late afternoon, we get in the car and set out for ride in the countryside. We drive through some lovely farmland set in the rolling hills outside Matera and pass an immense quarry where they taking up huge pieces of “tufa” for building. We drive up to the small but pretty hill town–Montescaglioso–and make a quick circuit of the attractive “centro storico” stopping for a few pictures of the main square and the view from the top.

Taking a different route back to Matera, we somehow get on a road that features one of those breathtaking endless vistas over the hills with numerous mountain ridges stretching out in the distance….unfortunately, it is a bit too dark to get a picture.

We park outside the art museum which is also the headquarters of the Centro Carlo Levi and, at this hour (6 pm) we are the only visitors. The museum is in the very striking Palazzo Lafranchini and has an interesting collection of modern paintings of local artists, a very nice selection of Renaissance art from the area as well as three rooms of Carlo Levi works. We think that the space is terrific and some of the works are quite appealing….especially some paper mache sculptures from the 16th century and some very good altarpieces from churches around Basilicata. We are very happy to see the Levi collection–this museum had been closed seven years ago–and we admire the very large politically themed mural that he did in the 60s called “Lucania ‘61″

We also get a tour of the current exhibition of modern sculpture on the top floor gallery and, as a special treat, the museum staff member who is escorting us takes us out on the roof top for a view of Matera at dusk.

Dinner is at a more upscale and, on Friday night, busy restaurant called Le Botteghe. The service is quite professional although as the place gets more crowded, the pace of the meal slows down considerably.

Diana enjoys her view of the cook who handles the open grill. The food is pretty good–a pasta dish with ceci in a broth that Diana enjoys very much and a less successful mixed grill. The whole potato is “baked” on a skewer over the open coals which is unusual and tasty. I stick with my Basilicata regimen–orecchiette with sausage and excellent grilled sausages. I ask for the panna cotta for dessert and it is pretty good although it takes way too long to arrive.

It is a nice stroll back to the hotel. Tomorrow we leave Matera for Le Marche.

Day 10: Matera

We climb up to the town, go to the garage to collect our car and set out for Aliano on our Carlo Levi pilgrimage.

We are big fans of Carlo Levi, the author of “Christ Stopped at Eboli”, an astute and moving sociological profile of this very rural community. It was written when he was exiled to remote southern Italy by Mussolini for anti- fascist activity. Levi was a doctor and also a well-known painter and we had bought one of his watercolors when we were last in Matera. We visited Aliano seven years ago and today we are making a return visit.

As we are driving out of Matera, we get stuck in a traffic jam which is caused by a large student demonstration, complete with banners and torches. We later learn that it is part of a nationwide protest against Berlusconi’s new education proposals.

Aliano is more than hour from Matera and the scenery is a mixed bag….some of the time, we drive through forested mountains, other times through dry and dusty river valleys. The approach to Aliano is quite dramatic however…..the road twists up from the valley floor and the views over the eroded sides of the neighboring hills are startling. Similar to “le crete” in Tuscany, the gashes in the deforested, sandy hills are called “i calanchi”.

Aliano is a village of about 1,200 people and, at first glance, doesn’t seem to have changed at all since our previous visit. However, we do remember that when we entered the village seven years ago, we passed an old woman dressed in black leading a mule loaded down with wood. Today, we see only small trucks and tractors. The old men still congregate in the main square and not too much seems to be going on. But, as we drive through town we see a new park with a bust of Levi

and the new “pinacoteca” (art gallery) devoted to Levi’s life and work. The house where he lived during his 9 months in Aliano has been fixed up and is now open for visitors. The pizza restaurant across from his house has even been renamed “Amici (friends) di Levi” Pizzeria.

Our first stop is the “pinacoteca” where we take a look at the collection of documents and pictures related to Levi’s life–both before, during and after his time in Aliano. There is also a small collection of Levi’s paintings and drawings on display. After we have seen the exhibits, we are escorted down to the “casa confina”–the house where Levi lived in Aliano. In the basement, a museum devoted to the farm culture of the area has been set up and we get an overview of how an Aliano farmer lived and worked. The second floor living quarters have been restored but at this time, the rooms are unfurnished. Before we leave the house, we go upstairs to the roof terrace where Levi did much of his painting.

The last stop on our visit is the cemetery where Carlo Levi chose to be buried…even though he lived here for less than a year and had a full life as a writer, painter and politician in Rome. At the cemetery, we run into a group of German tourists who are also visiting Aliano. The gravesite has been dressed up with two new brick walls flanking the marker and there are flowers as well as a number of small stones that have been left by visitors.

We leave Aliano around noon and decide to drive down to the coast to visit the museum at the archaelogical site Heraclea in modern-day Policoro. This was an important settlement in Magna Grecia along the Ionian Sea. We want to stop for a picnic enroute but have a hard time finding a suitable spot until we make a detour to the town of Valsinni and find a bench located in a pretty park under an imposing castle where we enjoy our bread, cheese and salumi.

As we drive down to the coast, we see fields of trees laden with oranges but we are disappointed not to find a single stand selling any of them.

The museum at Policoro is a very pleasant surprise. The rooms are well laid out, the displays are imaginative and informative and the holdings quite impressive. There are reconstructions of the settlements and clear explanations of the life and work of the people of the area. We are particularly struck by some of the jewelry on display, especially where they have mannequins modelling the jewelry as it would have been worn.

Our visit to the beach area in Policoro and neighboring Metaponto is disappointing however. Since it is off-season and mid-week, the towns are deserted and the whole area appears rundown and uninviting….there was not even a gelato stand open. It would certainly be different in the middle of the summer.

The ride back up to Matera is much pleasanter, through an attractive rural landscape. I take a quick walk around Matera before dinner and we decide to stay down in the “sassi” to eat. Nadi is only a few meters away from the hotel…at 8:15 there is only one other table occupied although more customers do show up later. But we have a very good meal…..Diana has a local pasta dish with garlic, anchovies and bread crumbs followed by a delicious plate of roast lamb with very good roast potatoes. I stay with Basilicata sausage–orecchiette with sausage and mushrooms and grilled sausages. We are able to drink a half liter of local white followed by another half liter of red. Diana tries the panna cotta which is pretty good.

Tomorrow we will stay in Matera and explore the town.

Day 9: Trani-Matera

Another beautiful day…..we are able to eat breakfast outside in front of the hotel, the pleasure reduced somewhat by the noise from the street construction that is going on in front of the hotel. We pack the car and set off for Matera, which is less than a two hour drive.

But we first go “dolmen” hunting on the way……

The La Chianca Dolmen is located just off the autostrada in the midst of an olive grove that is dominated by gnarled old trees….and right now the trees are laden with olives–green, black and many shades in between.

The dolmen consists of three vertical slabs of stone covered by a fourth slab laid across the top to form a roof……there is a “pathway” to the dolmen lined with other slabs. It is believed that they are connected to religious rites of Middle Bronze Age peoples - from between 1800 and 1400 BC - and they are found all over southern Italy.

Many of the dolmen sites are unfortunately trash littered (this one is pretty clean) and defaced with graffiti. We are very impressed by the paragraph written on the historic marker, erected at the site by the Ministero per i bene le attivita culturali. The English reads as follows:

” The Chianca Dolmen, like other similar monuments, is exposed to atmospheric agents and is therefore subject to a slow, gradual deterioration. Adequate protection measures are being worked on, and it is also regularly cleaned of the graffiti and drawings defacing it that seem to be the product of an irresistable desire on the part of some visitors to leave their mark. We would appeal to these people to reflect for just a moment, before their act of desecration, on the antiquitiy and value of these witnesses of the past, before which we are quite insignificant and any phrase of ours is paltry in the extreme.”

We finally make our way back to the main road after unsuccessfully searching for a neighboring dolmen and being stuck on a very rutted, very unattractive trash strewn back road, and begin climbing up the plateau through the ever present olive groves and vineyards. Suddenly, at the top of the plateau, the olives and grapes completely disappear. This is certainly wheat country but with nothing in the fields, the land looks like a moonscape.

The city of Altamura is our next destination….this is the town that is known throughout Italy for its wonderful bread. We circle the city outside the walls (along with many Altamurans) looking for a place to park so we can go into the “centro storico” and get some bread at one of the famous old bakeries. We are finally successful in finding a space, get out of the car and follow a sign from one of the old “fornos” that points through the “porta” to the center of town.

In fact, we stumble on one of the bakeries almost immediately…..a counter on one side with breads and fresh baked pizzas piled high and a large wood fired brick oven on the other–lots of wood piled on the floor for future breads.

We buy a couple of slices of pizza to eat immediately and one of the smaller loaves of Altamura bread to take with us.

We finish the delicious slices while sitting and admiring the front door of the cathedral

Before leaving town, we stop at a food store to buy some supplies for lunch…prosciutto, parmigiano and a local cheese.

Arriving in Matera a half hour later, we find our hotel which is located deep in the “sassi”….a deep ravine below the center of Matera. The “sassi” used to have cave dwellings where the poor lived…in recent years, the area below the town has been redeveloping and, with the increase in tourism–some of it due to Matera’s presence as a movie location–there are many new hotels, restaurant and businesses in this area.

There are two “main” streets that run through the area with lots of walkways and alleys up and down the sides of the ravine. “Main” is a relative term….at the widest point, the road can just manage two cars going in opposite directions. When we pull up at the hotel, we have to quickly off load our luggage and pull the car flush against the wall so that cars can slip past before the garage people come to pick up the car.

The hotel–the Locanda San Martino–is new since our last visit seven years ago. The reception area and breakfast room are on the bottom floor and the rooms are on three levels up the side of the hill. There is an elevator that serves the first two floors but, even then, guests have to negotiate uneven paths and steps to get to the rooms and it is still a bit of a climb to the level of the town. The rooms used to be caves but the walls and ceilings have been finished and tile floors laid. Many of the rooms have no exterior light except through the door…we are lucky to have a floor to ceiling window with a view over the “sassi”.

After checking in, we finish our lunch–Altamura bread, cheese and ham–on one of the terraces of the hotel and then I go out on a short exploration of the town. It is a very attractive, lively town and the streets are full of people even though many of the shops don’t re-open until 5 pm or later. I check out some possible places for dinner, walk over to the Duomo and reaquaint myself with the town.

Later in the afternoon, we join the “passeggiata” around the center, then sit at a bar and have a prosecco and some nibbles and watch the passing parade of Materans.

For dinner, we stay down in the “sassi” and walk over to one of the nearby restaurants–the Zuppa del Re. There are only a couple of other people in the restaurant on this Wednesday night but the staff is friendly and the food is very good. I have a pasta dish with great local sausage and wonderful mushrooms, followed by polpettone (meatballs) in a very savory wine sauce. Diana has a pasta dish called “strascinate” (really stretched orecchiette) with a cream of broccoli and bread crumb sauce followed by a less successful “stracceti” (beef strips stewed in balsalmic vinegar sauce). The very rich chocolate cake makes up for the disappointment. On the way out, we talk to the chef, who used to live in California.

Since we also polish off a liter of local red wine with no difficulty, we are glad that the hotel is only steps away……

Tomorrow we plan to return to Aliano, the town where Carlo Levi was exiled in the 1930s.

Day 8: Trani

The early morning overcast disappears by the time we set out for Bari….the weather for our first week has been wonderful–warm and sunny during the day, cool and pleasant at night.

We have never been to Bari….it is a city that has a reputation for being a bit rough, chaotic and forbidding–similar to Naples and Palermo. So, although we are not generally timid travelers, we do feel a twinge of anxiety as we get closer to the city. We exit the main highway a few miles away from the center and immediately hit a steady stream of traffic but it moves along in an mostly orderly flow. Suddenly we find ourselves on the water (the old city is on a peninsula jutting out into the Adriatic) and passing the piers for the large ferries that go to Greece, Albania, Croatia, etc.

Once past the port, the traffic diminishes and we start looking for a place to park along the wide street that hugs the water. We notice that the parking on the inland side is all restricted to cars with local permits, but on the other side of the street, metered parking is available for visitors and there are plenty of spaces available. We are able to park right outside the gate that leads to the Basilica of San Nicola, the major church in the city.

San Nicola, who is the same as Saint Nicholas (or Santa Claus), also has a great following in the Russian Orthodox church, and there are signs in Russian on the street and around the building. His relics are housed in the lower crypt and there are usually a number of pilgrims worshipping at the altar. The main sanctuary is restrained and serene….it is lined with attractive columns and there is a dramtic series of arches connecting the two sides.

Less sober is the intricately designed ceiling with paintings and gold leaf…

(An added attraction of the basilica complex are the well maintained rest rooms that are available to the public.)

Leaving San Nicola, we enter the narrow, twisting streets of the old town-Bari Vecchia, which open up at intervals to brighter piazzas surrounded by apartments, many with laundry hanging out of windows to dry.

In fact, the neighborhood doesn’t feel oppressive or forbidding at all…..the area had been heavily bombed during World War II and the houses were newly rebuilt but the street plan was unchanged so the sense of the town is both old and new. After strolling for a good while, we leave the old town on the Via Vittorio Emanuele, a main street that divides old Bari from new Bari. The street has broad sidewalks and many benches and provides a good place for a short rest. New Bari was built on a regular grid in the 19th century and the streets are filled with shops, some very exclusive.

We walk down towards the water and visit the fish market which is located on the Piazza Ferrarese, a wide open square that houses many restaurants and spills over into the Piazza Mercantile which is also bright and attractive. We complete the circuit of the old town and end up at the basilica San Nicola and go back to the car. We take a short drive around the rest of downtown Bari and admire the series of fountains that spout streams of water into the air.

To borrow a line from our friend Ulf (in his case about Albania): We were robbed in Bari……robbed of our preconceptions and prejudices. We enthusiastically recommend a visit to Bari.

For lunch, we drive a few kilometers down the coast to Torre a Mare where we eat in a restaurant recommended in the Slow Food Guide. As soon as we are seated in the covered rooftop atrium, the waiter asks us if we want “antipasto” and when we say “si”, plates start to arrive immediately filled with all sorts of seafood in many different preparations–some raw, lots of octopus, some delicious fish, a cone of ricotta cheese, a plate of fava bean puree, some baked “muffins” and an exceptional dish made with grain, potatoes, tomatoes and mussels. A delicious bottle of a local white wine goes very well with this feast.

The room is filled with other diners and every table is being served this antipasto array. Once we wind down, the waiter asks us if we want pasta but we decide to skip it and ask for fish. We get a large platter with baked fish prepared with potatoes, olives and tomatoes and we are able to finish most of it. The waiter then asks if we would like some “sorbetto” and we say yes. The sorbetto is served in a little ice cream cone and as we are finishing it, a large plate of panna cotta and cream puffs covered with more whipped cream and chocolate sauce arrives. When we groan, the man at the next table tells us that it is “included”, and we do manage to eat a good deal of it. We do resist tasting anything from three bottles of liqueur that land on our table……

We ask for the check and are surprised to see that the lunch is a fixed price–Euro 35.00 per person, including everything…..quite a lot of delicious food and drink for the money.

We take the fast route back to Trani–with a short detour to Bisceglie, another port town where we end up driving the wrong way down a narrow one-way street and are happy when the other driver accommodates us and backs up to the intersection so we can pass. We do spot a sign that indicates the direction to a nearby “dolmen”…a stone monument common in Puglia that date back to the Neolithic age…which are frequently found in the middle of old olive groves. On our previous trip to Puglia, we enjoyed “dolmen hunting” and we will try to visit the Bisceglie dolmen tomorrow.

Later in the afternoon, we pay a visit to a bookstore-cafe on the port that I had read about in an Italian magazine and was intrigued because one of the pictures showed the cafe with a portrait of Thelonious Monk on the wall. The name–Maria del Porto–is from a Georges Simenon novel and the owner is known for sponsoring literary evenings and “Dialogs” on public policy and cultural issues. The store does have a nice, eclectic selection of books that we browse through….but the cafe is closed and the staff is not very friendly so we don’t stay long.

We don’t have much appetite for dinner after our big lunch outside of Bari so we walk to the closest pizzeria–La Buca Navarra–where we have a light dinner–an okay pizza for Diana and a surprisingly good antipasto plate with delicious salumi and cheese for me. We make a short detour so I can take a picture of the cathedral at night

before we go back to the hotel.

Tomorrow we pack up and head for Matera…

Day 7: Trani

The weather is overcast this morning…lots of clouds over the water that we see from our window.

The breakfast room in the hotel is exceptionally bright and cheery and the breakfast is very good also. Our first stop is the cathedral which is right outside the hotel door. The Trani cathedral has the most striking location…..set on a wide piazza just on the water’s edge. The cathedral is taller than most because it is built on top of two older churches. Entering from the side, we first go down to the low-ceilinged crypt which contains the remains of Trani’s patron saint–San Nicola Pellegrino–and some old frescoes on the ceiling.

Upstairs, the main space is quite restrained….no wall decorations but many handsome columns, graceful rose windows, some lively floor mosaics and the original carved bronze doors now displayed inside.

Outside in the piazza, the view of the front of the cathedral is very impressive….especially with the Adriatic Sea as background.

Let me digress and talk about Trani. Trani has a very unique layout….the port is almost completely enclosed and there are restaurant and shops on one side of the harbor. The cathedral is on the end of one side of the harbor, along with a number of government buildings; the same side is also is home to the fishing fleet. On the other side of the harbor is a new hotel and one of the nicest public parks in all of Italy….beautifully kept, attractively planted with pathways, benches, a playground and three sides that are directly on the water. The “centro storico” is crammed in between the cathedral, the waterfront and the modern town with narrow streets and attractive white buildings. The very appealing modern town starts at the end of the harbor and stretches for blocks inland. And to the southeast, there is a long stretch where the road out of town hugs the waterfront and is lined with hotels and apartments.

Here is the link to a Google map showing Trani’s harbor and “centro storico”.

Trani also has a historic Jewish connection. It was a center of Jewish learning and up to the 12 century, there were about 200 families and four synagogues. When we visited here seven years ago, two of the churches in the “centro” were identified as having formerly been synagogues. I had read that two of the churches had been deconsecrated and that there were plans to restore them as historic synagogues and Jewish centers…even though no Jews are left in Trani. I had also read about a restaurant that served Mediterranean-style food with an emphasis on Jewish recipes. I wanted to return to Trani to see how these plans were coming along as well as because we had liked Trani so much.

In any case, the plans have not progressed too far although there is construction going on at the Scolanova and there is a Jewish star on the top of building. And the restaurant is no longer serving “Jewish” food on a regular basis…only when there is a Jewish event in town.

Even so, Trani is a very appealing destination…:)

We spend some time in the public park, walking around and sitting looking at the water…on this Thursday morning, it is quite busy with mothers and children, old men sitting on benches, joggers, tourists and students. It is still as beautiful and pleasant as we had remembered….a very good respite from the “hard work” of sightseeing.

We have a quick lunch at one of the bars on the harbor and then get in the car to explore the countryside above Trani. The expedition is fraught with touristic mishaps however. Our first stop is at Cannae, the sight of a battle where Hannibal crushed the Roman legions during one of the Punic Wars. However, when we arrive the site and the museum are both closed….another “in restauro” experience. We make a short detour to the town of Canosa di Puglia but the historic sites there don’t seem particularly striking to us and the town is not very attractive either.

The most interesting thing about our expedition is seeing the fields stretching out as far as the eye can see filled with either olive groves or vineyards or both. Once in a while, there is a small peach orchard….but it is not hard to believe that Puglia produces most of Italy’s olive oil and alot of wine. The cultivation goes on for miles as we climb onto the plateau called La Murgia. Once on the plateau, the topography changes dramatically…this appears to be wheat country and there is not a olive tree or grape vine to be seen. One other interesting part of the expedition is our drive through Minervino Murgia…this hill town seems to appear abruptly out of the plateau and looks like a sheer face of houses just rising in front of us.

We drive to the top of the town and head back down to Trani on a different road…but one that is just as heavily cultivated as the one we drove up on.

One last stop before we head back to Trani…..Barletta, another port town on the Adriatic about 10 miles northwest of Trani. We take a short stroll through the “centro storico” and pop in to the duomo. But even at 5 pm, many of the shops are still not open so the town is very quiet. We do drive past one of the town’s tourist attractions, the Colossus of Barletta–a 20 foot high statue of a Roman general (no one is quite sure who it is) that is located right in the middle of the sidewalk of a busy street.

Dinner is at da Miana, the restaurant that was written up as serving “Jewish food”. At 8:15 pm, we are the first customers (in fact, only one other table is occupied by the time we leave at 10 pm). The host is very charming and, since we are the only customers, spends a lot of time with us. We have the da Miano special antipasto…three hot dishes–a red mullet in a sauce under a piece of pastry, fried shrimp in a crust of almonds (a bit too heavy on the almonds) and terrine with anchovies. Very inventive dishes and very good……No pasta tonight; instead a delicately prepared “fritto misto” for me and an excellent tagliata–steak cooked rare garnished with parmigiano-reggiano for Diana.

We have a pleasant stroll back to the hotel through the quiet streets of the old town. Tomorrow we explore Bari, the largest city in Puglia and a town with a “reputation”.

Day 6: Benevento-Trani

This morning we pack up and check out for our drive to Trani in Puglia.

We decide to take a roundabout route on local roads and make stops in Troia and Lucera in northern Puglia on our way. The road out of Benevento is lined with factories and commercial enterprises but the landscape soon becomes more agricultural as well as scenic as we gradually climb higher and higher. The road curves along the contours of the ridges and the views over the countryside are very pretty; there are many towns scattered on the slopes of the surrounding hills. But just as soon as we cross the provincial border into Avellino province, the landscape changes and the scenery becomes significantly more striking….the hills are steeper, the vistas are broader and the mountains are more heavily wooded. There are fewer signs of civilizations visible from the road. We have come upon yet another beautiful part of Italy.

We decide to stop for a coffee and stroll around in Ariano Irpino, which is a good sized hill town perched on top of a steep hill. The town is very prosperous looking and the houses and other buildings are almost all freshly painted. On this Sunday morning, the stores are closed but the piazzas are full of people–mostly men–standing around talking or having coffees in bars. We walk around, admire the facade of the Duomo

and continue on our way.

The drive is very pleasant with the scenery continuing to be very impressive. When we get closer to the Puglia border, many of the hills are crested with large power generating windmills which are becoming more common in many areas of Italy.

Crossing over into Puglia, the topography changes quickly and the terrain becomes flatter with gently rolling hills but the more striking difference is the color….the landscape looks completely parched–white and arid. (We learn later that it has rained only a few times in the last six months.) These fields seem not to be irrigated and it’s a bit strange to see some fields of olive trees and grapes growing in such dry conditions.

We stop in Troia just before 1 pm. Troia is an attractive small town that has a well known cathedral dating from the 11th century. We hurry down the main street–which is crowded with people strolling back and forth….maybe after church and before Sunday dinner. We slip into the cathedral just before it is scheduled to close–a mass is ending–and get a quick look at the very spare, very appealing Romanesque interior. The exterior is nicely decorated with fanciful carvings and a beautiful rose window.

It is now lunch time and the guidebook recommends one restaurant in Troia…..D’Avolas…where we decide to eat. We have a terrific lunch…the family that runs the restaurant is very welcoming and the food is very good. We have their “typical” antipasto–various stuffed vegetables beautifully prepared and some delicious fried bread. The pastas are also very good–baked “paccheri” with tomatoes and cheese for Diana and a local pasta specialty–ciacatelli–prepared with swiss chard and a good amount of garlic. We even drink a half-liter of red wine and when they offer us their local orange liqueur-”crema d’arancia”–we like it so much that we buy a bottle. Handshakes all around when we leave……another wonderful restaurant experience.

The expedition to Lucera is less successful…it is no problem getting there…the road is now as flat and straight as it had been hilly and curvy in Avellino. But Lucera is not car friendly and we are unable to pierce the center of town. After trying unsuccessfully several times to find parking near the main square, we give up and head on to Trani.

We had been to Trani before so we are pretty confident about finding our way to our hotel….but we don’t reckon with the extensive street repairs and the Sunday afternoon traffic restrictions. Neither of the GPS systems nor Diana are much help as we are able to get within sight of the hotel without being able to access it. On the third try, we succeed by coming in from the other side of town and fighting our way through the crowds of Sunday visitors strolling along the port.

We check in to the Hotel Regia, an 18th century palazzo, which is located right on the waterfront directly in back of the cathedral and just outside the “centro storico”. Our room is very large and looks out over both the cathedral and the Adriatic - a wonderful view.

After getting settled, we join the crowds of weekend visitors walking along the harbor and through the old town. For dinner, my first choice is closed on Sunday so we pick a restaurant called Ristorante la Giudea (it is located on Via la Giudea). [More on Jewish Trani in the next report.] We are the only customers and we get the undivided attention of the proprietor, who advises us to ignore the menu and recites the specials of the day. For starters, Diana has a salmon dish cooked in a light tomato sauce with almonds and I have stuffed mussels. Both dishes are unusual and both are quite good. For the pasta course, he recommends a “risotto” dish with shrimp that turns out be rice with shrimp, minced vegetables and spices but no cheese…very good but not what one thinks of as a risotto. I have a plate of pappardelle with clams, shrimp and mussels…very tasty. We drink a local Trani white wine–another easy to drink Italian white.

It is only a few steps back to the hotel through the very pretty streets of the old town.

Tomorrow we plan to explore Trani.

Day 5: Benevento

The sun is out and it is quite warm as we set out for the center of Benevento in the car.

We are going first to the Museo di Sannio, which is housed in a building in back of the Church of Santa Sofia at the top of the Corso Garibaldi. I have a strategy in mind to get us closer to our destination by parking on the street as close to the museum as we can get. The big obstacle to my plan is the small number of breaks in the city walls that allow access into the center. So although we park quite close to the museum, it is still a bit of a walk to the nearest “porta”.

In any case, we do make it to the museum….and we are very glad that we did. The museum is a treasure trove of Greek and Roman artifacts from Benevento’s golden age and the holdings are enhanced by the splendid displays throughout the museum. One room in particular has a big glass roof and an exposed industrial skeleton that appears to be three stories high….the various statues and carvings are beautifully mounted and lit by the sunlight pouring into the room.

In addition to sculptures of gods and people, there are wonderful birds and animals

some very expressive busts

and many other wonderful pieces including a massive sculpture of the Emperor Trajan and some great bas reliefs.

On the second floor of the museum, they have a nice collection of more “modern” art……we particularly like the works by Renaissance painter Donato Piperno, some distinctive 18th century furniture nicely displayed and several paintings by a 20th century Benevento artist named Nicola Ciletti.

Our enjoyment of our time in the museum is enhanced by the lack of other visitors, allowing us to take our time and not have to maneuver for views of the holdings. The Museo di Sannio is one the best small provincial museums we have visited in Italy….Diana says that the only thing it lacks is a gift shop.

Before leaving the museum, we spend some time in the lovely cloister of the church where additional pieces are displayed. The columns of the cloister are especially attractive with graceful lines and fantastic carvings of animals.

Our next stop is the Duomo which is located at the bottom of the Corso Garibaldi in the busy commercial section of the historic center. We are now pretty experienced with the traffic patterns in Benevento and by patiently following the tortuous one way street arrangement, we end up right in front of the Duomo. There is a parking lot right next door and, with the help of the “unofficial custodian”, we pull right into a space and give him 2 euros to “watch the car”.

However, when we walk around the Duomo looking for the entrance, we realize that the building is closed for extensive renovations–”in restauro”. Now we have two churches to visit when we next come back to Benevento. We take a short stroll through through the old quarter of town–called the “Triggio” but, as it is getting close to lunchtime, we decide to head south towards the city of Avellino and find a place to eat enroute. According to the Slow Food Guide, there is a recommended restaurant just 12 kilometers south of town so we input “Ceppaloni” into the GPS and start out. As we approach Ceppaloni, the GPS and Diana have a disagreement about the directions…..I follow the GPS and we end up heading in the opposite direction. After about ten minutes of climbing a narrow, curvy road, it becomes obvious that the GPS was wrong and Diana using an old fashioned map was right, so we reverse direction and finally the GPS finds the right road.

The restaurant–La Rete–is actually located in a “suburb” of Ceppaloni and we keep climbing higher and higher above the town. Finally, when we are about to give up hope, Diana sees the sign and after one more wrong turn, we pull into the parking lot.

La Rete turns out to be a casually elegant Italian country restaurant…a place that is a destination for weekend meals in the countryside. There are a number of family groups eating there and children have a playground outside to run around in while the adults continue to eat and drink. It has a pan-Italian menu (no particularly local dishes) and the waiters are dressed in white shirts, black ties and black aprons….but the host is wearing jeans and a sweater and needs a shave.

We have a wonderful meal and a good time….we drink a local red (Aglianico) from Ceppaloni which is dark red but surprisingly mellow. They start us off with a glass of prosecco and some tastes of delicious grilled sausage. We both have the house antipasto…hearty prosciutto, fried vegetables, a heavenly, very light ricotta cheese. Diana’s ravioli with gorgonzola was pretty good and my very creamy polenta topped with a meaty ragu was excellent. For dessert, Diana has an excellent ricotta tart with walnuts and I have the panna cotta, which tastes fine but the texture is a bit off. But the shortcomings in the meal are more than made up by the ambience.

After lunch, we continue on to Avellino…the drive is very pleasant and the scenery quite nice. We make a couple of circuits around the center of Avellino but the town doesn’t really grab us so we decide to head back to Benevento. We are still feeling the effects of lunch so we go back to the room and rest. We decide that dinner is not in the cards tonight so I go out for a stroll in the neighborhood, which I find quiet lively on this Saturday evening. We end up just eating some fruit and try to watch a movie on the computer before giving in and going to bed.

Tomorrow we leave Benevento for Puglia…..

Day 4: Benevento

The morning starts out overcast and cool as we leave the hotel and get in the car for a driving tour of Benevento.

Much of Benevento’s “centro storico” is closed to traffic and many of the streets outside the center have restrictions–either for bus lanes or a one way pattern. This makes what seems to be a simple drive much more problematic. Our first destination is the Ponte Leproso, a bridge built by the Romans over the Sabato River which until very recently had been carrying car traffic. We wander around the center for a while, stopping to look at the Bue Apis–a stone statue of a cow that was housed in the local Egyptian temple of Isis. We find the Ponte Leproso and it is quite impressive for a 2,0o0 year old structure. We walk across and admire the stone work and the pavement design; the view of the hills surrounding Benevento is quite striking.

Next stop is the Roman theater that is still used for theater and cocerts. We walk around on the stage and climb to the upper levels. We are the only people here.

The grounds are strewn with pieces of columns, old inscriptions, mask carvings and animals…apparently just waiting to be put back in place.

At the bakery next door, we buy a delicious loaf of flaky focaccia with an herb flavoring to tide us over until lunch. We then make a grand tour of Benevento by car climbing up the hill to the top of the town, circling the public gardens, cruising around some of the newer residential areas and office buildings before pulling into the large public parking lot close to the “centro storico”. We make our way up through the back streets until we reach the main drag, Corso Garibaldi.

We continue walking past Trajan’s Arch to the Church of Santa Sofia at the top of street.

Santa Sofia is said to have a unique six sided floor plan and interesting decorations inside but unfortunately for us, it is closed for restorations…”in restauro”.

It’s now time for lunch and as we head down the hill on a back side street, we come face to face with a small trattoria–the Trattoria Il Cinghiale–that has an appealing (and very reasonably-priced) menu displayed outside. We are the only customers for lunch but we have an excellent meal, cooked and served by the young woman who is the proprietor. Diana has a plate of the fantastic local mozzarella and prosciutto while I have a “caprese” salad that was made in heaven….tasty tomatoes, the fantastic mozzarella, wonderful olive oil. Diana has a pasta dish made with fresh tomatoes and basil which was as good as it was simple and my pasta with sausage and porcini mushroom was outstanding. No wine and no room for seconds or dessert…..but we talk seriously of trying to come back for another meal. Bill for the meal was Euro 23.00 (about $34.00 US)–a true bargain.

Later in the afternoon, we get in the car and take a drive in the country…we plan to head for Avellino but take the wrong road and end up driving to the north and east through a very pleasant rolling landscape. The first town we hit, Pietrelcina, turns out to be the home town of Padre Pio, who has an enthusiastic world wide following. Many Catholics expect him to become a saint and he’s revered as such. The town has turned into a major pilgrimage destination and there is a large visitors center, a museum, his childhood home is open for visiting and there are many hotels, restaurants and gift shops. The town looks to be very prosperous due to all the visitors.

As we continue on our way, the landscape becomes increasingly hilly and dramatic and we are struck by the intensive agricultural activity. We see tobacco growing in the fields–some plants already harvested, others with leaves still on the plants. There are countless tobacco sheds with the leaves hung to dry…it turns out that the Benevento area is a major tobacco market. In addition to olive trees and vineyards, there are extensive fields of bright red tomatoes, some being harvested as we drive past. Other fields are planted with hot and bell peppers and we see apple, orange and pomegranate trees with fruit heavy on the branches. And there are sheep, goats, cattle, pigs and chickens….it is quite an agricultural show set in the scenic countryside.

When dinnertime rolls around, we are not ready for a full meal so we decide to have pizza…since we are not far from Naples, we figure it will be pretty good. We get in the car and, depending on the GPS, navigate our way to da Rodolfo, in a residential neighborhood a couple of miles away. Somehow the GPS and Benevento don’t always work well together but, after a bit of a struggle, we end up on the right street and find the pizzeria. The pizza hits the spot and we make it back to the hotel without difficulty.

Tomorrow we plan to visit the Museo di Sannio and Benevento’s Duomo.

Day 3: Nettuno-Benevento

The weather is sunny, warm and a bit misty as we check out of the hotel. Before heading to Molise, we drive back to Anzio to visit the British war cemetery and the Museo di Sbarco.

There are two British war cemeteries in Anzio and we go to the smaller one, just outside of town. After a bit of directional confusion, we find the cemetery right next to the Anzio town cemetery.

The cemetery is small compared to the American cemetery in Nettuno and the rows of tombstones have beautiful plantings. The gravestones include more information about the person buried–including his age and, in most cases, a quotation from a poem or a short message from the family, as well as the carved regimental insignia and crosses. For whatever reason, the emotional wallop is intensified and it is impossible not to be moved while walking through the rows of headstones.

The Museo di Sbarco is located in one very crowded room in the Villa Adele, which is built on the site of an old Roman villa and is the building that served as headquarters for the Allied generals after the landings in Anzio and Nettuno.

We have to circle the block twice before parking Italian style, up on a sidewalk. The museum’s holdings include a haphazard collection of old military uniforms (dressed on mannequins), weapons and other military paraphenalia–canteens, compasses, medical kits, a motorcycle, etc. There are newspaper clippings posted on the walls with stories that describe the landings and the subsequent battle against the Germans in the area, as well books that deal with the subject. In addition, there are photos of the soldiers and sailors and pictures from the various visits of dignitaries and politicians who have come to Anzio to commemorate the battles. And there are many photographs showing the landings and the effects of the bombing and the fighting.

It’s all a bit much to take in but it does give you a sense of the scale and the difficulty of the landing and the letters from and stories about individual soldiers give a personal dimension to the history. We are struck by the number of German visitors in the museum.

We spend a few minutes in the Archaelogical Museum also housed in the Villa Adele. Since there were many villas from Roman times in the Anzio area, they have recovered a lot of treasure from these houses. The highlight of the collection is an intricate mosaic fountain from the garden of one of the local villas. We make one last stop in Anzio…at an “alimentari” to pick up sandwiches for lunch.

As we are leaving to get on the road to Molise, we get a phone call from Giovanni, one of the organizers of the olive oil weekend in Molise, telling us that the other organizer’s mother has died and the event has been called off. So we take our lunch to a bench on a boardwalk overlooking the water and discuss where we should go for the next three days.

We decide to go to Benevento, a provincial town in Campania about an hour east of Naples. The town has a lot of Roman history and is the ancestral home of many Italian-Americans. We suspect that we will also find a lot of mozzarella di bufala there.

En route, we make a brief stop in Latina, a provincial city that was built under Mussolini in the 1930s and is known as an attractive, planned modern city. The city has broad boulevards and tree lined streets and seems more open and spread out than most Italian cities. We drive around for about 15 minutes–just to get a feel for it–and then continue on to Benevento.

Arriving at Benevento around 5 pm, we find the Gran Hotel Italiano quite easily since we are using our two GPS systems. During the day, we have figured out how to work the built-in GPS in the Peugeot so we have double GPS capability. We even figure out how to insert a SIM card and use our phone through the car’s audio system…..very high- tech.

The hotel is an older building on the main tree-lined boulevard that leads from the train station to the historic center. The desk clerk takes a liking to us–he always is looking for a chance to practice his English–and when I give him my Zurer Travel business card, he and the hotel manager upgrade us to a suite. He introduces us to his manager–Sgr. Italiano, who gives us a nice picture book about Benevento and the surrounding area. He tells us that he hopes that we can send more tourists to Benevento in the future. The desk clerk even asks us to look over the English translation of the dinner menu and we make several corrections (which are changed on the menu by dinner time.)

Once we unpack and get settled, we set out for the “centro storico” which is about a half mile from the hotel. The main street of Benevento’s “centro” is a broad pedestrian-only street–the Corso Garibaldi–with the Duomo and the main business district at the bottom and the government center and the Church of Santa Sofia at the top. We stroll up the avenue passing some of the historic landmarks as we walk……an Egyptian obelisk (in Roman times, Benevento was quite taken with the Egyptian goddess Isis)

and the spectacular Arch of Trajan from the 1st century A.D. which commemorates the victory over the Dacians (modern day Romania) and is in wonderful condition.

The arch stands at the spot where the Appian Way passed through Benevento en route from Rome to Brindisi.

We walk back to the hotel as dusk falls and decide to eat dinner in the hotel restaurant rather then head out again in the evening. The fixed price menu looked very appealing as well as economical (Euro 18.50 for a full course meal).

Dinner turns out to be quite good….a nice antipasto table with ham, cheese, vegetables, etc. My lentil soup is one of the best lentil soups I have ever had–tasty, well-cooked and a huge portion–and Diana’s lasagna is very good. We share the second courses–a chicken cooked in a white wine sauce that is very tasty and a large portion of wonderful local mozzarella di bufala that we share. The wine is a crisp and light local white from Solopaca–a town about 10 km west– that we enjoy very much. The meal is finished with a very good fruit salad–macedonia. We say goodnight to the manager and his wife who are also eating dinner in the dining room.

A very enjoyable meal–the service was also very friendly and solicitous–and all we need to do after we eat is get into the elevator and go to our room. Tomorrow we explore more of Benevento.

Day 2: Nettuno

We manage to sleep until after 8 am….this hopefully will take care of any latent jet lag. The weather is warm but overcast and a bit misty–it is hard to see the water past the boat harbor.

After breakfast at the hotel, we get in the car–we were upgraded to a Peugeot 407 station wagon which is very comfortable–and take a drive out of town searching for one of the attractions listed in the guide book…the Torre Astura. The tower is a remnant of the coastal defenses of the Middle Ages and is located in a harbor dating back to pre-Roman times. We find that Nettuno is a larger town than we first supposed as we drive through a long stretch of apartment buildings and stores that extend along the beach to the east of town. The stretch– the area is called Scacciapensieri–is dominated by a large condominium skyscaper–over 20 stories high–which seems quite out of place in this town.

The search for the Torre Astura breaks down a few miles out of town when the tourist directional signs disappear….but we do finally reach the tower–a stubby brick building set in the water inside a tourist camping site.

Back in town, we go to the Sicily-Rome American Cemetery. We have visited British cemeteries in Siracusa and Orvieto which we found beautiful and extremely moving. This cemetery is set on a large carefully manicured plot of land on the north edge of Nettuno. In the middle, there is a fountain, an expansive lawn and a memorial that includes a chapel, a garden, and room of maps detailing the campaign.

The gravestones are on either side with neatly lined up rows of crosses (as well as 122 stars of David, according to the brochure).

There are almost 8,000 soldiers buried here….it is much larger than the British cemeteries that we had visited. In addition, the walls of the chapel in the memorial has the list of names of 3,000 soldiers and sailors whose remains were never recovered.

The room with the maps details the military campaigns in the Anzio/ Nettuno landings as well as the entire Italian and European theater movements and they give a clear picture of how the invasion was carried out.

Walking along the paths and seeing the rows and rows of grave markers is a moving experience yet somehow it doesn’t pack the emotional wallop that we had experienced at the British cemeteries. We will visit the British cemetery in Anzio tomorrow.

We have lunch at sandwich place (piadina–a flat bread that is a specialty of Emilia-Romagna) in the “porto turistico” and then go back to the hotel for a rest. I take another scouting trip around Nettuno, past Neptune’s fountain, walking on the beach, under the massive Fortezza Sangallo and through the back streets of the town.

In the late afternoon, we drive to Anzio for a look around. We find a parking place right on the water and stroll down the promenade along the harbor. Anzio’s harbor is much more of a working port than Nettuno’s…we see a lot of fishing boats moored there and watch the crew members cleaning up the equipment.

We sit on a bench and have some excellent gelato before continuing into the center of town. Anzio’s center is a lively, attractive place with tree lined streets and piazzas filled at this hour with people sitting and socializing and children playing.

We check out some possible places to eat and then find the Museum of the Landings (Museo di Sbarco) where we plan to go tomorrow.

Back in Nettuno, we have no particular place in mind for dinner this evening so we choose a place while walking around town. We eat at the Osteria Vecchia Fontana, another pretty little family-run trattoria. Although there is no one eating there when we walk past, we are welcomed warmly by the father who is sitting at a table reading a newspaper. Once we sit down, the family springs into action. The mother brings us bread, one of the sons takes our drink orders. There is no menu and the mother tells us what is available. Even though only one other table of diners shows up during the evening, the place seems lively. The food is very good…we start with a delicious antipasto plate with ham, salami, cheese, etc. I have the paccheri (large tubes of pasta) with a sauce made from broccolo romanesco (which looks like a pointy cauliflower)

and sausage. Diana has a risotto made with pear and taleggio and we split an order of grilled sausage and roasted potatoes. We drink another nice local white….this one called “Cacchione” which is light, crisp and delicious. Everything was very good and the whole experience was the kind you wish to have more frequently. Handshakes all around when we leave and the mother asks us to wait for minute while she gets a present to give us….a picture of the old market square when the big Neptune fountain used to be located there.

We stroll back to the hotel through a quiet Nettuno…tomorrow off to Molise.

Day 1: Nettuno

We arrive in Rome about an hour late…but the sun is shining and the temperature is in the mid-70s. The flight over was reasonably okay…I slept over the Atlantic and Diana slept from London to Rome.

No problems with the luggage and very soon we are in our Peugeot station wagon leaving the airport on our way south. Our first stop–Nettuno–is about an hour down the coast and we drive along the water, past the ruins of Ostia and along the beach for the first part of the trip and then through the pine woods that separate the road from the beachfront. There are a number of undistinguished resort towns along the way but as we approach Anzio, the landscape opens up to large well-tended agricultural estates. Anzio–the site of the Allied landings in World War II–is a big seaport town; there are pretty nice beaches before we hit the town and a large attractive harbor that we drive along as we continue on to Nettuno. Nettuno is just a mile or so beyond Anzio….we pass the medieval “borgo” and the lively modern town as we look for our hotel.

The Hotel Astura Palace is a six story modern building overlooking the harbor, which is jammed with sailboats. Our large 4th floor room has a small balcony with a great view over the waterfront.

After we get settled, we head out for our first gelato of the trip at the gelateria right next to the hotel…fragole and the tartest lemon for me; pistachio, crema and the darkest Perugina chocolate for Diana. The owner is charming and the gelato great…..

I am looking for the tourist office to get a map of town. We wander through the old city–the “borgo” and through the busy modern town; the streets are filled with people at 5 pm–shopping, strolling and sitting. I continue on to scout out more of the city–walking along the beach and through the “porto turistico” which is like a shopping mall set right on the harbor. In addition to fishing and nautical shops, there are lots of regular stores and services–banks, restaurants, a bookstore–as well as a promenade along the water right under the “borgo”.

I do find a map finally at the tourist office in the port and head back to the hotel as it begins to get dark. We decide to go for dinner before it gets too late. We go back to the main square in the old town

where we had seen a few attractive places. There are two places open– right next to each other. Their menus are similar and they both look fine but one of them has no customers at all. We choose the other one–Al Centro–and sit outside on this comfortable evening. We have a very good dinner–Diana has a risotto with shrimp and a fabulous roast spigola (bass) and I have my favorite dishes–spaghetti alle vongole and fried small local fish as well as a plate of cicoria. Dessert is an excellent crostata and a pretty good panna cotta. We ask the waiter for a recommendation for a local dry white and he brings us a bottle of Malvasia from Nettuno–which turns out to be wonderfully drinkable and–very surprisingly–only costs 5 euros. As a matter of fact, the whole meal is pretty reasonable–a lot of food–including a whole fish, for Euro 70.00 (about $100.00 US)

We enjoy our dinner very much but feel badly for the next door restaurant since no customers ever chose it and “our” restaurant continues to be busy with both Italians and visitors.

We are back at the hotel and asleep before 10 pm…and very happy to be back in Italy.

Jim and Diana

Map of Itinerary

You can download a pdf map or our trip here

Italy Itinerary 10/13/08 - 11/13/08

We are off again....we leave for a month in Italy. I plan to be writing my trip reports and--internet willing--be sending daily e-mails.

Jim and Diana
Italy Itinerary

Tuesday, October 14--Thursday, October 16: Nettuno Lazio

Thursday, October 16--Sunday, October 19: Colletorto Molise

Olive oil weekender

Sunday, October 19--Wednesday, October 22: Trani Puglia

Wednesday, October 22--Saturday, October 25: Matera Basilicata

Saturday, October 25--Monday, October 27: San Benedetto del Tronto (Le Marche)

Monday, October 27--Friday, October 31: Rome

Friday, October 31--Sunday, November 2: Chiocchio (Chianti)

Sunday, November 2--Wednesday, November 5: Florence

Wednesday, November 5--Sunday, November 9: Asti (Piedmont)

Sunday, November 9--Wednesday, November 12: Cremona (Lombardy)