MY Town Friday – Black and Orange

Today the air was warm and heavy with the promise of rainy season.  The trees and grasses are brown after nearly a month without a drop of rain.  This is a good topic for the month of October – Halloween and Fall colors in the northern hemisphere.  Not a really good topic / or colors for this time of year in Nova Friburgo – really not good colors for anytime of year around here.  The colors for here are reds, yellow, pink and purples.   

But in the true spirit of our Shoot-out, I searched through my flowers archives and found these photos that had both Black and Orange …. disclaimer - neither one of the first two was taken in Friburgo – one was a new-year’s eve photo taken up into a tree in Macae, and the other out in front of a restaurant in Sicily, yes Italy and neither is even the right time of year.   The last one is a caqui (persimmon) on one of our trees in the garden – taken around June as the leaves finally turn to fall colors here in the tropics. 

As the day ends .

This photo is of the sunset our last day in Frascati but it works for expressing my last days here in Italy as well.  A beautiful three weeks.  Full of color, texture, tastes and experiences. 

I still feel so full that I don’t know if I will be able to do justice to just one more story about food but I will try.  Today Mira (Camillo’s sister Mirrella) suggested that she drive us to a small town outside of Rome called Monterotondo, (round mountain), for lunch in a little restaurant that she had found by accident.  It was to be about an hours drive, it took over two – I am pretty sure she got lost while trying to find this restaurant on purpose.

It was worth the drive – the little “La Locanda di bacco” offered food of the day, no menu, a wine list with prices from  8 to 150 Euro and a family atmosphere.  A perfect end to our effort to find ‘Italia Profunda’  [Piazza della Libeta 9/11 – tel 06 906 22366]
I chose Fettuccini con Tartufi and Mira had gnocchi with Parmesan Crocanti – To top off the whole experience I had a ‘frutta di Bosco’.  Only pictures will tell the whole story. 


See you next week back in Rio.

The Road traveled -

Tomorrow will be our last day in Italy.  Today Paulo and Lenira will leave for the airport for an early morning flight on Saturday – we leave on Sunday mid-day, flying to Paris then to Rio.  We have seen so many little towns, and driven through many more.  We have eaten very good food and some not worth the calories – we have enjoyed many of the local wines eaten with the local flavors. 
I started out taking nearly 400 photos a day, then around 300, into the 200s and the last two days I’ve not taken any.  I haven’t even looked at them all – just pulling a few here and there to spotlight on my header or to insert into the few posts I have managed to write. 
At about 10 towns, they all seemed to look alike but I still managed to find one small thing of beauty in each.  One moment of happiness at seeing something exceptionally beautiful.  I thought today I would make a list of places and show you one photo from each place…. well maybe not each place but will try for the major stops...  A summery of the drive through Italy.

Verona, northern Italy
Lago Garda
Arezzo
Anghiari
Cortona
Lucca
San Gimignano
Volterra
Siena
Montalcino
Montepulcano
Assisi
Civita

For now this is as far as I can take you.  I got this far and realized I’ve not yet download my photos from Frascati and Rome Area.  There are not many because being here is like being at home – like I’ve seen everything before.  I will write some thoughts about Rome soon. After we’ve returned to Friburgo perhaps.

Good Morning from ASSISI

The hotel room is still dark and quiet, Camillo is just stirring and I am ready to go down for breakfast.  It is astonishing that I can even consider being hungry but I am and I really need my cup of coffee to get going in the right direction. 

The schedule that I posted on Sunday has been changed – modified – to meet the needs of our travel companions, Paulo and Lenira.  They want to see Pompeii – so we have given up Gubbio and will travel today into Roma and on Wednesday they will go to Pompeii.  We will stay in Rome with Camillo’s sister.  It is a good trade off. they get to see more and we get to rest and visit.

Here we are in our final week in Italy and I am going to backtrack again to Arezzo.  We have seen so much, so many small towns, each with something really special to talk about that I don’t want to go out of the Arezzo area until I have given you all a good overview of the area.   

For example, one afternoon while in Arezzo we  drove about 30km to see Anghiari – we had lunch, walked around for several hours, then drove back to Arezzo.  This town is definitely worth seeing – the view of the local countryside is spectacular and we (I) had a superior lunch.  I will give the details of the lunch and then just show you photos of the town and area.

     LUNCH in the Alighiero Ristorante: we ask for a mixed antipasto highlighting tastes from the area.   Silvia, the German owner since 1991, made us individual plates which included (in small portions thank goodness) Tomato / Bread soup, Radicchio / liver salad, Crostini (toasted bread) with liver pate, ham (etc.) selection, Ricotta with Tartuffi sauce.  I am so bad at taking notes so I don’t have down what everyone else ate but I chose an Orange Salad made with arugula/fennel/small orange wedges and parmesan cheese – and to top it off, no one else wanted to share a desert so Silvia made me a small portion of a dark chocolate mousse.  For me a perfect end to a perfect lunch. (no picture – I just ate the whole thing – Silvia assured me that it was not fattening. ;-))

           

(Just found a bootleg internet connection so I could post – written on Monday morning. Spent 2 days in Frascati, buying bread and roast pork, sweet olives, and fruit for a picnic at Tuscolo.  tonight one of Mirella’s famous dinner parties, and on Sunday we return to Rio.)

Third Week: Italia Profunda

Mo	MONTALCINO/GUBBIO	See "Medieval Tuscany and Umbria" Assisi
Tu	GUBBIO
We	GUBBIO - Bagnoregio - Orvieto  - ROMA
Th	Grottaferrata (Camillo’s hometown)	Picnic in Tuscolo - Visit Nemi-Castel Gandolfo etc.
Fr
Sa	ROMA
Su	ROMA/RIO AF 9845 Leaving at 15:30 arrive Rio Monday 9/20 at 05:20