La Bella Italia

Wow. Don’t even know where to start, but rest assured that this is not going to be summarized quickly. The only reason that I still feel comfortable using the term “summarize” is because it will actually take less than three weeks to write and/or read this. (I debated breaking it up into multiple posts, but then I felt like that would be too much work. So...sorry.)

Maybe.

Well, after a lot of soul-searching, Special K and I decided to go to Italy. We realize that we were both kind of on empty and needed to do something about it, and Italy seemed like a great way to make a change, albeit a temporary one. So after scrambling to get a ton of work done that had been neglected in our dash up to Richmond to be with his mom, we stumbled onto a plane and were on our way. As we were checking in and all those other things, I was desperately trying to whore out the fact that it was our honeymoon in hopes of an upgrade, but I was told by the stern Lufthansa flight attendant that “ze flight is fooll…” Well FINE. Then it turns out that we were seated in the Economy Plus section of the plane, which I must attribute to the woman who processed the date change on our tickets months ago and when I mentioned it would be our honeymoon casually offered to assign us seats. So thank you, whoever you were.

After a long-ish layover in Frankfurt, we boarded our plane to Florence and were flying over the Alps, which is still the coolest looking thing, because those are some BIG ASS MOUNTAINS. They just reach right up to your airplane, it’s amazing. (I believe I made the same observation on the way to Yemen the first time. This trip was better all the way around.)

We arrived in Florence to be greeted by my parents and went to go find our rental car. Long story short for those of you wondering why my parents were there when it was our honeymoon: the trip to Italy was planned, first with just me and them, long before Special K and I got engaged. Then he planned to come with us. Hooray! Then we got engaged. DOUBLE hooray! And then, finally, we realized that a trip to Italy and a separate honeymoon was just greedy. And unrealistic. So we decided that a honeymoon in Italy would be pretty rockin’, and then my parents were mortified that they would be with us on our honeymoon. But it all worked out well.

We headed down the A1 Autostrada toward Castello di Montalto, the place where we were staying in Tuscany, and I was staring at the scenery, thinking to myself “well damn, it really does look the way it does in movies”. The cypress trees, the red-roofed houses, the gently sloping green hillsides, growing grapes and some impossibly fluffy looking grass/grain that we never identified. It was just so bucolic, I could spit. But I didn’t, because that wouldn’t have been classy.

Ciao.

We arrived at Montalto, which you get to by driving down a long gravel road through the woods, past some of their own vineyards. As you emerge from the woods, you see the castle standing in front of you, as it has done for the last 600 years or so (maybe more), surrounded by all that green, and it’s just breathtaking. I thought to myself that there just couldn’t be any way that it could suck. (Fortunately, I was right.)

We drove down and parked our car, and made our way up into the courtyard, and saw Giovanni, the count whose family estate this is, watering some plants underneath a massive curtain of wisteria. The air was thick with the smell of flowers, and some bees were lazily buzzing around the vines. He turned to say hello as we approached, and their young German Shepherd, Leo, observed us casually, getting up to amble over and inspect us. I think he could still smell my traumatized kitties who had been lovingly deposited at the vet for boarding in our absence, and he was preternaturally fascinated with the legs of my jeans. Fortunately it wasn’t that kind of sniffing that some dogs do that makes you think “geez Buddy – buy me a drink first…” We were given our keys and we headed up into our apartment, which was located in the tower directly over the castle gate. We hauled our suitcases upstairs, and I was reminded that people really did used to be a lot shorter, as I smacked my head on the ceiling while carrying my suitcase up the tiny, curving staircase. I was much better about looking for it the rest of the week.

We unpacked and dozed for a bit, then went down the road to dinner at a restaurant we came to know well called Il Bivvaco. Not sure what that means (my mom knew, what with having been fluent in Italian at one point), but the food was good, so I have no complaints. In Italy, you generally have two courses, a pasta course and a meat course. In the US, where we have sadly become accustomed to Cheesecake Factory-type portion sizes which are so huge that an appetizer-sized quesadilla could probably feed a small village in Africa, this concept is a little different – but the portion sizes are smaller, so you don’t end up leaving the table feeling like you should star in the next Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. I believe that I got some kind of pumpkin tortelloni filled with…something yummy, and then a small veal cutlet. It was still a lot of food, since this place did tend to be a bit more generous with the serving sizes by Italian standards, but it was darn good. We waddled back to our apartment after our large dinner, and I think I was out cold within five minutes. This happened a few times, actually – occasionally when Special K and I were in the middle of talking about something, about which I felt terrible. It wasn’t that I wasn’t interested in what he had to say to me. It’s that I couldn’t physically make my eyelids stay open. Wouldn’t happen. I tried. Really.

We woke up the next morning, thoroughly convinced that we were going to be unambitious and just wander around the castle grounds, going for walks and such. However, we ended up going to a couple of small hill towns nearby, which were beautiful and made for a peaceful morning, and then spent the afternoon wandering around the grounds, taking pictures, and exploring. While steering clear of the vipers that can call the old stone walls home. That would put quite the damper on the experience. We capped off our day with another dinner at Il Bivvaco, where they were happy to see us again.

The next morning, we headed out for San Gimigniano, an ancient walled city that used to have over 70 towers, giving it an impressive skyline at one time. Not all of the towers are still standing, but you can’t help but notice it as you drive past. It’s a beautiful hill down, and we explored the cathedral and the city streets. Most of these really old Italian towns don’t allow cars, although residents can get special permits. We had our first gelato, which I was nervous about due to my lactose intolerance, and I am DELIGHTED to say that my lactose intolerance has waned a little bit. Don’t know what brought it on in the first place, and I have even less of an idea as to what might have made it subside, but I’m not complaining, because gelato (which is NOT ice cream) was so very g-o-o-d. We wandered around a bit and bought a couple of small paintings from a painter who dabbled in physics as a hobby (???) and who was delightful to talk to. I also bought some cheap sunglasses because the sun was blazing, which made for some lovely warm days, but the nights kept their nice chill.

We made our way back to the car and back down the hill, and grabbed some lunch at an obliging roadside eating establishment. We then spent the afternoon at the hot springs at Rapalano. It’s a sulfur spring, but once you get over the generally mild, sometimes moderate, smell of sulfur, it is just SO COOL to be soaking in a pool of warm mineral water, looking out over the Tuscan countryside in the brilliant sunshine. There is nothing that sucks about that, I can assure you. There was a series of pools that started with the hot spring itself, which was in a more enclosed building and flowed out into pools at different levels that got progressively cooler, although they were all still nice and warm. All of the muscle aches that come from too many hours on an airplane started to fade, and it was just fun to people watch.

Although not all Italian women are skinny and hot, their confidence can sometimes provide that illusion. I felt tremendously pasty (and Special K turns bronze just by thinking about sunlight. Well, not entirely, but it feels that way), but after about 5 minutes, I was too busy enjoying myself. We saw a family there, who we saw later that night, sunburned as all get-out playing with their adorable little boy. The dad had to have been, however, the hairiest person I have ever seen in my life. The dude was practically wearing a sweater. But he had decided to wax his back, which meant that he had a perfectly smooth back, with the fur starting up again on either side of his armpits, and continuing down all sides of his arms, going up his neck, and all the way down his chest. It was quite the site to behold.

After leaving us there to our own devices (which involved a lot of sitting around and saying “ahh….”), my parents came to get us, and we were off to have tea with our hosts at Montalto. We heard all about the history of the castle, its role in the wars between Florence and Siena, and later how Allied troops hid there and the castle was overrun by German soldiers who were looking for them. All kinds of interesting things centering on this one place. Then we went out onto the balcony, also blanketed in wisteria, and looked out across rolling green hills, as far as you could see. I think I could handle having that view to look at, ya know? The only drawback was that there were many bees buzzing around, and I’m allergic. Although I’m not allergic to honey bees, just hornets, wasps, and yellowjackets – and even if I was, the decimation of bee populations all over the US is becoming a huge problem, so we should probably be nicer to them. But perhaps I’d best geek out about that some other time.

The next morning we set off for Siena. It was only about a 20 minute drive from Montalto, and we were there much sooner than I thought we’d be. We parked on the west side of town, a town with very little vehicular traffic in the city proper, and walked down some stone roads to get to the Piazza del Campo, the main square. In the Piazza del Campo you’ll find the Palazzo Publico and the Torre del Mangia, a large tower that goes about 450 feet up in the air. I am not good with heights. I don’t know when it started, and I certainly don’t know why, but I’m not good with heights.

However, I didn’t know when I’d next be in Siena, and I decided that I was going to climb that stinkin’ tower, because you only live once.

By the time Special K, my dad, and I all made it to the top (mom elected to stay below as she is even worse with heights), I wasn’t exhausted, but I was breathing heavily. And owing to a poor decision not to shed my cardigan, I was, as they say, sweating like a whore in church. However, I made it up there, we got some great pictures, and then K and my dad went up to the top of the bell tower, which is all kinds of open balconies and stuff. I made it to the top of the tower and felt like my legs were going to buckle out of wooziness, so that felt like enough for me. We made our way down, and I have to admit to feeling proud that I did it – the odds were not in my favor as I sat at the base of the tower, looking straight up, saying “that’s a big effing tower…”

We toured around the rest of Siena, looking at an old baptistery that is around the corner from the Duomo, and the Duomo itself. It’s a truly amazing site, to see the mosaic floors, the artwork gracing the walls and ceilings from great Italian artists. If you were an artist in those days, it was to your advantage to like portraying Madonna and the Bambino, because there didn’t seem to be a lot of demand for paintings that didn’t portray Mary, Jesus, or one of the saints or apostles. I don’t think there was much of a market for dogs playing poker.

We grabbed lunch and walked around a little more, taking in some of the sights, and eventually making our way over to another cathedral for a walking tour of Siena. The tour was actually quite interesting, although we didn’t stay for all of it. He told us about the Palio, a famous horse race through the Campo that still takes place every year. The competitors are part of different Contrade (kind of like a cross between a clan and a city ward), with ten of the seventeen Contrade represented in the race. He also told us about St. Catherine of Siena, who was so loved by the Sienese that after she was buried elsewhere, they begged to have part of her remains laid to rest in Siena. So they dug her up, cut off her head, and have it hanging, framed, in a cathedral in Siena. If that’s love and devotion, I can do without, my friends.

The evening ended with us heading back to Montalto for a nap and then another delicious dinner at Il Bivvaco. They soon began to recognize us and we’d be greeted with broad smiles and “it’s nice to see you again!” when we’d stop there for dinner. Very “everyone knows your name”, but not in a creepy way. Mostly because they didn’t know our names.

The next day we got up early for our trek to Florence. Part of the reason for getting up early was that we wanted to avoid the crowds as much as possible, and with the super popular parts of Florence, as well as Venice and Siena and I’m sure Rome as well, getting there early is the best way to attempt to ensure that. We found a parking lot near the center of the city, but it was closed because we were there on a holiday, and it wasn’t going to open for a couple more hours. My mom saw a man in a truck nearby and went out to ask him if he could help us figure out how to get into this particular parking lot. She said “we would like to park here as it is very difficult to find parking in Firenze (Florence)”, to which he replied, blue eyes sparkling, “no madam, it is not difficult to find parking in Firenze. It’s impossible. Let me help you.” He then went up to the intercom, at the other end of which was allegedly an attendant, and said something to the effect of “there’s a bunch of English tourists here who want to get in – open the gate!” and the gate creaked open. Miracle, we had found our parking spot!

We walked into the city and across the Ponte Vecchio, where all the gold merchants have historically had their shops, and kept moving toward the Palazzo Vecchio, past the massive line for the Uffizi gallery that had already stacked up by 8:30 am. The Palazzo Vecchio is very beautiful, and the artwork in each room is fascinating and meticulous and it all tells a story. We went into a main room that’s used for public speeches and such, and the walls are lined with huge paintings that portray one continuous battle scene. It’s thought that there is actually a work by Leonardo da Vinci buried under one of these paintings and they have been given permission to see if the entire thing is hiding an original da Vinci work. It’s a huge risk for them to undertake this, as there will be no way to replace the painting if it turns out that there’s nothing under there worth looking at. The room has marble sculptures around the perimeter, many depicting the trials of Hercules, including some very unorthodox wrestling positions. (As my mother said “I’m quite sure that violates Robert’s Rules of Order…”)

We wove our way through the streets after admiring many more sculptures and paintings, including a replica of the David, and found ourselves outside the doors of the Medici chapel. In stark contrast to the mob outside the Duomo and baptistery with the ornate doors, there were relatively few people who decided to stop by this imposing testament to the collective Medici ego. And it’s quite the ego, let me tell you. The inside, although partially hidden behind quite a bit of scaffolding as they repair and clean parts of it, is stunning. Black, green, and red marble everywhere, massive altars where their remains are kept, their names carved and filled in with gold. These are not people for whom the word humility carried a lot of meaning. If they didn’t think that they were God, I’m quite sure they thought themselves on par.

We walked down a street crowded with vendors on either side, all selling fake Dolce and Gabbana belts with massive shiny buckles and “genuine Italian leather” coats, purses, wallets, and whatever else you could think of. These items were likely real leather, and in all likelihood were from Italy (although one never knows), but they were also designed to appeal to the tourists (“Hey look, a real Italian leather wallet for only 70 Euros!”), so we steered clear. We found a nice side street and had a lovely lunch, while figuring out if there was anything else we wanted to do in Florence that day. We walked around more, went to the Duomo and saw the doors to the baptistery (quite famous doors, apparently), and then walked back up the main drag in the general direction of our car. We stopped by a gelateria for gelato, and my dad was happy to find that the sugar-free gelato he found in San Gimigniano was not just a fluke, there was more to be had in Florence. The sun was getting high in the sky and the crowds were getting more and more prevalent, so we decided that we’d best head out of town before it got suffocating.

We headed out to a small hill town called Montalcino, which was supposed to have lots of lovely pottery, and certainly made for a beautiful drive from Florence. Again with the rolling green hills and the red clay rooftops and the bucolic splendor. It never really got old, though. I could have taken the same picture fifty times and probably never noticed because I would see something different each time. We arrived at the lovely hilltop town of Montalcino, and as we strolled through the streets, we noticed plenty of wine shops (with plenty of lovely Tuscan wine), but no major pottery shops to speak of. I think my parents felt bad about it, but we weren’t particularly bothered, although I did want some kind of Tuscan pottery to bring home with us. We still got to take a lovely and peaceful walk through a beautiful place, and there’s not too much about that that’s bad. Plus, we got a nice bottle of wine to share, so it really worked out well for all concerned.

We wound our way back to Montalto, and Special K and I made dinner that night. (Il Bivvaco was closed, you see…) We got some fresh bread from the baker delivered to the castle, my parents had purchased some eggs and salami, so we made omelets and had slices of cheese and salami on fresh bread. Along with more wine. Wine was definitely a staple of our existence there!

We slept in the next morning,which is a relative term – I think Special K could sleep longer if left to his own devices, but I’m a naturally early riser unless contending with serious sleep deprivation. And even then, I’m unlikely to sleep past 10 – normally I’m up on my own by 7 or 8. We left around 11 am to head to a town called Monteriggioni, to have lunch at Il Pozzo. Monteriggioni is a teeny little hilltop town, there’s really not much to it. It’s lovely and it’s got some old and interesting buildings, but like I said, it is small. However, lunch at Il Pozzo was good. Tortellini with truffle sauce, sausage-stuffed quail, and a fresh strawberry tart. Plus a bottle of bubbly to celebrate the fact that all four of us have birthdays within five weeks of each other. Special K had some fresh pesto over pici (a large spaghetti-type of pasta) and a heavenly-looking piece of steak. Nothing about that meal sucked. Everything they serve there comes, in one way or the other, from their farm, where they grow the produce and raise the animals. There’s something to be said about eating food in close proximity to where it came from. Something we certainly forget in a world where we get raspberries from thousands of miles away because we just have to have them in the winter. (I’m as guilty as the next person of not really thinking about where my food comes from, to be honest.)

After that, we headed into Chianti and drove up the Chianti Giana, which winds through all the major towns in Chianti. It’s a beautiful region, and is obviously known for its wine. We had a tour and a wine tasting scheduled at Castello Vicchiomaggio, located outside of Greve. We arrived there on time, and wandered a bit as our obliging tour guide waited for a few more people to join us. After a few more minutes, he told us to follow him and cheerfully climbed into his Fiat Panda and lurched up the hill into the vineyard. We stopped at a few places along the way, and he told us about the different grapes they were growing there, the conditions they liked, the ages of the vines, and all these interesting things that are really relevant to winemaking, but that would never occur to me. I didn’t know you could have 40 year old vines. I didn’t know that each of them needs to be picked at a different time. And I didn’t know that they commonly have rosebushes there to act as the vineyard equivalent of the canary in the coal mine.

We got up to the main estate, where they also have guest rooms, a restaurant, and a balcony with an infinity pool that looks out over the hills of the vineyard. He led us into the places where they press the grapes and do the first fermentation and all that stuff – very large, shiny steel drums with spigots and temperature gauges – looks very high-tech, until you see the hand-written cardboard signs hanging from each spigot, telling you what’s in each tank. We walked around to their cantina, which just means cellar or something like that in Italian, and he was explaining the different types of wood barrels that they use for aging different wines. The average life of each barrel, what the woods will contribute to the wine, all these things.

At this point, a few people came in, and he admonished them lightheartedly for being late. They crisply informed him that they were told to wait somewhere else and were only just able to find the tour. He said “well, I am happy that it was not my mistake! We have just started, come…”

We looked around the estate a little more, which is an old castle was built in medieval times and added onto in the Renaissance, and has a breathtaking view of the valley. We chatted with some of our fellow tourists, took some lovely pictures, and headed back down to the tasting room. Our tour guide was very generous with his pours of wine, and I have to say – for choosing a place essentially by dumb luck, we did really well. The wine was great, each of us bought several bottles, and they were all pretty reasonably priced. So now I know what to look for in terms of symbols of quality for wine from the Chianti region, I know what an IGT is, and we have our very own bottle of a 1993 Super Tuscan (it did not come with a cape and a theme song) sitting downstairs, waiting for us to uncork it and serve it with a nice steak. When describing what each wine would be good with, he mentioned that a particular wine would be really good with bistecca fiorentina, which is essentially a bone-in steak, cut very, very thick. But they were illegal to serve for a while because of “the disease of the crazy cows”. Heh.

We decided to drive down to Siena for an evening in the Piazza del Campo, watching the sun set and enjoying an overpriced meal. My dad and I were taking turns scurrying around the Campo taking pictures, leading Special K to have “Anything You Can Do, I Can Do Better” running through his head. I think I took somewhere in the neighborhood of 700 pictures in our two weeks in Italy, and my dad weighed in at about 1000 pictures. We are not dissimilar, in many ways. This is a cause of some amusement for friends and family…

On our last day in Tuscany, we decided to head into Umbria, a neighboring province, in the morning, and head back in the afternoon through Cortona and Arezzo. Our first destination was Gubbio in Umbria, which is far less bucolic and pastoral than Tuscany, but very lovely in its own way. It’s another old hill town located on the side of Mount Ingino, distinguished by its presence as a major city in pre-Roman times, and by a race they hold every year, the Corsa dei Ceri. I think Wikipedia describes it well, so here ya go:

“Three teams, devoted to San Ubaldo (the patron saint of Gubbio), San. Giorgio, and San. Antonio, run through throngs of cheering supporters (clad in the distinctive colours of yellow, blue and black, with white trousers and red belts and neckbands), up much of the mountain from the main square in front of the Palazzo dei Consoli to the basilica of San Ubaldo, each team carrying a statue of their saint mounted on a wooden octagonal prism, similar to an hour-glass shape 4 meters tall and weighing about 280 kilograms.”

This is not a race for the faint of heart. It would be a blast to see, but in our day wandering around the Palazzo Consoli we were not lucky enough to stumble upon it. Pity. We did, however, find a lovely little pottery shop and were able to find a couple little goodies for ourselves and others. After that, it was back down Mt. Ingino and into the car, off to Cortona, by way of Il Panino, a restaurant that my parents had eaten in several years ago and found to be delightful.

After a couple of mistaken attempts, we did, indeed, find the restaurant and settled into our seats in great anticipation. I ordered a pasta with mushrooms and truffle oil for my main, and my mom, Special K and I all spotted aignello on the menu, which is lamb. I enjoy lamb, Mom is a big fan, and Special K also enjoys it, so we all decided to get it. Our first course was fantastic – the mushrooms were finely chopped with a nice, delicate flavor imparted from the truffle oil. Everyone else reported being similarly pleased, and we were all excited to see what came out next.

Well, what came out next was not exactly what we thought it would be. They set a small bowl in front of me, and I took one look at it and knew that it wasn’t lamb. Well, it wasn’t lamb meat, at any rate. I have never been one for organ meats, and one bite confirmed that we were, indeed, eating assorted lamb bits – likely livers and kidneys. Mom and Special K had similar reactions, realizing that we’d made quite a mistake, as none of us were fans of liver/kidneys/what have you. Dad, by now, was protesting that he really liked liver, and would be happy to trade with one of us. Mom kept exclaiming that the sauce was wonderful, as she ate around the bits. Special K was doggedly trying to make his way through by putting it on bread and eating it that way. I took a few more bites and I caved – I traded with my dad for his veal. As he was about to finish polishing off my bowl, Mom folded and switched out her bowl with his, leaving him with a new, nearly full bowl of lamb bits to tackle, as she nibbled on more bread and continued to proclaim the virtues of the sauce.

It was at this point that K was informed that he was on his own, because two bowls of lamb livers was about as much as my dad could handle for a day. K continued, one bite at a time, until he came upon something that didn’t quite look like an internal organ. In fact, there was a small hole at one end that made it look very much like it came from a boy lamb. And that, ladies and gentlemen, was where he checked out. He ordered some strong espresso to clear his palate and we snarfed a lovely tiramisu, and still couldn’t get that imagine out of his head, even though we were all quite sure that it wasn’t what it looked like. So yeah – everything else there was wonderful, and had any of us, besides my dad, been fans of organ meats, that would have been lovely, too. But we weren’t, so it wasn’t. More’s the pity. When K and I went to get the check for lunch, my mom grabbed it from our hands and said “no, no – we don’t want you to pay for this, this was a mistake!”

And we set off for Cortona.

For any of you who have seen the movie “Under the Tuscan Sun”, it was set and filmed in Cortona, at least partially. Since I happen to enjoy the movie, I thought it might be fun to see where it was filmed. I wound our way up the hillside and I found a parking space for our car. We walked from there to the center of town and found the gellateria that my parents had been remembering since they were there four years ago, and even better, my dad found one next door that had sugar-free gelato. Oh, so happy. We found a lovely little pottery shop and got a few more tidbits, essentially checking all but two people off our list, then set off to walk around the town. Cortona is so steep and hilly that it makes San Francisco look as though it belongs in the cornfields of Illinois. It was beautiful, but it was quite the workout to get up and down and around all these old streets. We wound our way up and down and around the town, finishing up by sitting and enjoying the scenery in a local park, by the fountain. And then, it was on to Arezzo, our last stop of the day.

Well, we never actually made it into the historic part of Arezzo, because signs pointing you to the ancient city will point you the wrong way down one way streets, or will disappear at inopportune moments, leaving you quite on your own to guess as to how to find the mysterious center of the city. We didn’t play at this for too long before heading for Montalto, and cursing Arezzo forevermore. I’m sure it’s a lovely place, really I am. But it could stand to be a little more flippin’ user-friendly. Sheesh.

Saturday morning, we got up early to head to Aviano to see my friend Abigail for a few days. The drive went smoothly until we got to Bologna, whereupon we slowed down considerably. In fact, we moved about three kilometers in an hour and a half. Thus, we began to curse Bologna, too. Again – I’m sure that it’s a lovely place, but I challenge you to enjoy a place that you’ve never been to that has subjected you to needless frustration and irritation. For no good reason (there was no accident, no construction, just millions of slow people.) However, I have to admit that since this was, perhaps, the worst part of the trip, we didn’t do too badly.

We eventually made it up to Fontanafredda to my friend Abigail’s house. I don’t even know how long she must have been sitting around thinking “good Lord, when are they freaking getting here???”, but she was very gracious about it all. We arrived, and Mom and Dad were off to their destination in another part of the Dolomites, the mountain range at the foot of which we found ourselves.

I fully admit that I know we don’t have real “mountains” in the east. Most people think of them as “bumps”, more than mountains. And when you’re at the foot of the “baby Alps”, you do tend to have a bit o’ perspective. We went driving up to a ski area, Piancavallo, the next day and from there took a short hike up to a lovely improvised picnic spot, from which we could look over to the east and see a dry river bed, the name of which escapes me at present. We were unable to see much of Fontanafredda and the surrounding area directly, as there was another peak in front of us, but the view was nonetheless fantastic. Ella, Abigail’s adorable 2 year-old daughter, is a very verbal little kid, amazingly articulate for a child her age, actually. She’s also into self narration, and would, for example, go tearing into the living room after her bath time and exclaim “ELLA’S NAKED!!!”, much to the delight of Mom, Dad, and Special K and I. As I was helping her down and back up a steep part of a hill, she exuberantly yelled “ELLA’S CLIMBING!!!”

If you ever want to renew your appreciation for little miracles, just spend a day with a child like Ella, and she’ll remind you of JUST HOW COOL every little thing is. It’s awesome. She can also rock a gelato mustache like it’s nobody’s business.

Our days with Abigail and her family were great – I got to catch up with an old friend, and while there was still plenty of cool stuff to see and do, it was a little more unstructured. When one of your party has to take a nap every day, then you kind of need to plan “morning” activities, and “afternoon” activities. Which was fine, because Special K seemed to take a nap almost every day as well, so Ella was in good company. We went to some really pretty places that we wouldn’t have visited otherwise, like Pordonone and Secile, they introduced us to something called sgroppino, for which I will be eternally grateful, and were very warm and fun hosts.

A little aside about sgroppino. It is so deliciously yummy, I can’t fully describe it – it’s kind of like a milkshake made of lemon gelato, vodka, and Prosecco, which is Italian sparkling wine. It’s summer in a glass – but it’s critical to use lemon gelato, not sorbet, or it won’t have the proper creamy consistency that makes it what it is. So now we’re on the hunt for lemon gelato (freaking difficult to find), and I may need to resort to buying an ice cream maker.

No, I won’t.

Ella has a few favorite TV shows, one of which features something that is (unofficially?) called “The Clean Up Song”, and basically goes “Clean up, clean up, everybody clean up”, and other things along those lines. Self-explanatory. But useful when Abigail would like Ella to pick up her toys, because then it’s like a game. Brilliant. She’s also at that age where she can say a lot more in her head than she can articulate, which is fairly impressive, since she can articulate a lot. So all of these words will come rushing out as she struggles to form them at the same time, and while she’s got things like “ELLA’S WEARIN’ HER GREEN DRESS!!!” down pat, things like “Mister K” would come out a little more like “Mmmm…Mmmm….MISTER K, CAN YOU PLAY WITH MY SNEECHY BIRD WITH ME??” So, so cute and hilarious and all those things that will likely embarrass her to be told about in her teens and that she’ll laugh about as an adult. But I’ll stop talking about her as a teenager and adult, so that her mom doesn’t have a heart attack just thinking about it. (Something to cushion the blow? Imagining Tony’s reaction to her first boyfriend. That’s not a kid I envy…but MAN that will be entertaining. Especially because she thinks that her dad can stop thunder at will and make the lights in the house magically go on after a power out. That’s mostly because he waves his hands as Abigail flips the switch in the fuse box, but it’s still a nice trick.)

We spent K’s 30^th birthday with Abigail, Tony, and Ella, and picked up a delicious chocolate mousse and pear cake at a pasticceria in Pordonone. For some reason, Ella wasn’t all that interested in eating her pasta for dinner that night, so Abigail and Tony said “Ella, we have cake for Mister K’s birthday, but you have to finish your pasta first…”

She paused thoughtfully for a moment.

And then began to sing “All gone pasta!! Clean up, clean up, everybody clean up…”. I don’t know how parents don’t laugh at these things that are so funny, but they gently informed Ella that she needed to eat her pasta, not just remove it from her tray. This was something of a disappointment to her, despite the pasta being very tasty. But eventually we had cake and singing all around and it was well worth the wait.

The next morning, my parents came to pick us up and it was off to Venice! Venice is really unlike any other place on Earth, and although we would love to go back, at least we’ve been there once. Approaching the city on a water taxi on a gray morning like we had, with a little bit of rain misting, it kind of comes out of the fog, a city in the middle of the lagoon. It feels like for every minute of that 45-minute ride into and through the city, you go back in time ten years, and find yourself in a completely different world. It’s also *very* easy to get used to being in a city with no cars – it’s a small place, so you walk everywhere and it’s not that difficult, assuming that you are able-bodied. I would not want to come to Venice if I were physically disabled, and I would definitely not want to come to Venice with young, stroller-bound children. (Abigail’s experience backs up this thought!) But you find yourself walking through alleys that would seem like not the smartest place to be if they were in another large city, but since you’re in Venice, it’s almost all alleys that feed into large piazzas and then back into more alleys.

We wandered around a bit that first afternoon, making use for the first time of our raincoats, and exploring some little corners of the city. After a lovely dinner, we headed over to Piazza San Marco, one of the biggest draws in the city, home to the Basilica San Marco, the Palazzo Ducale, and a gorgeous view across the Grand Canal. The Piazza San Marco is a huge pain in the butt from about 11 am until 6 pm, because it is jammed with people – wall to wall. But the lovely thing about being there at night is that it’s a lot less crowded, and you can sit at a table at any number of cafes, listen to live music and enjoy an obscenely overpriced cocktail. It’s a unique and delightful experience, as was my European hot chocolate spiked with Bailey’s. (European hot chocolate is basically like melted chocolate in a glass.) I have to figure out how to make that at home.

No, I don’t.

The next day, K and I decided to take a tour out to the island of Murano, where they have been making glass for more than 500 years. Venetian glass is actually world-renowned for the craftsmanship and skill that goes into each piece, and you can go on tours of the glass factories, and then wander through the showrooms. We sat for a while and watched a few artisans working on a vase, which is a fascinating and painstaking process – they produce, on average, 3 – 4 vases per day in the particular style we were observing. And this takes a team of three people. In their showroom, we saw huge chandeliers that took more than 20 people a month to create. While some of them weren’t my style, all were very impressive in their artistry.

For reasons that I don’t fully understand, I wanted a piece of Venetian glass from Murano. I just really wanted one – it’s just one of the things Venice is known for. However, those vases that take three people a third of a day to create? Well, they retail for upwards of 3000 Euros, which was a smidge out of our price range. We did, however, find a lovely piece of glass art for a small fraction of that – it’s a perfectly formed blue tulip with leaves, in the center of a perfectly round glass ball (well, it’s not perfectly round – the bottom is flat so that it doesn’t roll all over the place). We were chatting with one of the salesmen there, a lovely man who was solicitous without being annoying, and who was wearing some smokin’ plaid pants. (Only in Italy. Or on a golf course.) We were looking at one of the massive chandeliers, and he said that a piece like that, which probably cost around 30,000 Euros (just a guess), would be disassembled into pieces before being shipped anywhere, and should only be reassembled by a professional. I asked if the cost of airfare for the technician to come from Venice to reassemble it would be included in the price of the item, and he said “Signora, if you buy this, we will include anything you want.” I don’t think he was holding his breath, though.

We wandered around Murano for a bit longer and then headed for the vaporetto, which is the Venetian equivalent of the public bus. We hopped on and got off on the island of Cannareggio, which comprises the northern “arm” of Venice. We wandered over to a restaurant that came highly recommended and made a reservation for later in the week, and then took off to find our way around the city. We walked over the Rialto Bridge, which is another famous area of Venice next to the Rialto Market. Again, with the crowds and the people – but you have to expect at least some of that. It is Venice, after all. We walked past a shop that sold masks, and K really wanted one of those. I’d seen plenty that I thought were really cool and if Special K wanted a special mask, I was down with that.

This was before I knew that we’d spend an hour in the shop as he reviewed his options. Granted, there were a lot of options, but I think we looked at every mask in that store. Twice. Masks are made for tourists, but they’re also used during Carnivale, and we saw more than one person trying on the full outfit, a la that execrable movie, Eyes Wide Shut, with the long black cape, puffy shirt, and ornate mask. It’s not a look that I’m into, but hey – toe-may-toe, toe-mah-toe. Although there were several that we both liked, I wanted Special K to chose the mask, so we eventually purchased our mask and set off on our way once again, which was no particular way at all.

As we wandered throughout our days in Venice, we would stop liberally for gelato, because that’s what you should do when you’re in Italy. At least – that’s what I like to do in Italy. With all that walking we did, I needed something to keep up my strength, didn’t I?? Yes indeedy… As we were enjoying our not-first gelato of the day, we ran into my parents. That is how small Venice is. You see the same people over and over – it’s easier to notice when you already know them, but some do stand out regardless. We chatted amiably, exchanging stories about our days, and set off on our separate ways again, after having set a time to meet up for dinner.

Dinner that night was at a place called Ai Gondolieri, and although more expensive than I had expected, it was one of the best meals I think I had in Italy. We started with a pea soup that was clearly made with fresh peas and had some delicious crispy pancetta in it. That was followed by a perfectly done, melt-in-your-mouth steak served with white asparagus and some fantastic potato foam (the lightest whipped/mashed/whatever potatoes imaginable). It was a fantastic meal. Mom and Dad headed to a performance of The Four Seasons, and K and I headed back to Piazza San Marco, where we heard two different bands perform a medley from The Sound of Music, so I was treated to “The Lonely Goatherd” twice in one night.

That, my friends, is truly living.

We wandered back to our hotel on the island of Dorsoduro and collapsed into bed, amazed that we had only had one full day in Venice so far, and had already seen so many things that we thought we’d only get to read about. As we read each other to sleep (since K often took the second chapter, it wasn’t unheard of for me to fall asleep on him…), my head was buzzing with all the things we wanted to do the next day as well.

The next day dawned gray and rainy, but that, my friends, is what raincoats are for. We decided that today would be the best day to hit some of the tourist meccas that often require people to stand outside. Thanks to our trusty raincoats, we were not dissuaded by a little precipitation, and set off. Our first stop was the Accademia Galleries, home to the largest collection of Venetian art in the world. We got there right when it opened and had the entire museum practically to ourselves, which was wonderful. There were also some tremendously helpful cards in each room that told you the history of each painting or work that you were looking at. Our trip through the Accademia re-emphasized to me the power of the church in those days. If you didn’t want to paint Madonna et le Bambino (I realize that’s part French, part Italian. But I speak French, I don’t really speak Italian…), the pieta or something along those lines, you shouldn’t have expected to stay too busy.

We left the Accademia just as it was starting to get busy and trekked over to the Piazza San Marco, and fortunately only had to wait in line for 20 minutes to get inside. (20 minutes in the rain.) The basilica is amazing for several reasons, namely that all the “paintings” inside aren’t paintings at all, they’re mosaics. The most stunning, intricate mosaics I have ever seen – the thought of someone plastering the inside of the dome of the basilica with millions of teeny, tiny little tiles, all to form this amazing work of art just floored me – to see what people would do to honor God. We saw the Ca D’oro, a golden screen kept behind the main altar that is encrusted with thousands of gems as well as cloisonné panels that told stories from the Bible. Unfortunately, it’s one of those places where you can’t take pictures of any kind, so I have little to remember it by, but that’s okay – it’s not easily forgettable.

From there, we emerged to find that it was still raining, but that the line in which we’d been standing had doubled in size. We headed toward the Grand Canal and turned right to walk a short distance and find Harry’s Bar. You may not expect to find a place called Harry’s Bar in the middle of Venice, but Earnest Hemingway may have been surprised as well – pleasantly so, it would seem, as it became one of his favorite haunts in Venice. K and I settled into a booth and perused the typically overpriced menu, and each got something hot to warm us up on that cool morning. We chatted about what we’d seen already, what we wanted to see still, and how amazing the trip had been thus far. After drying off a little we headed back out into the rain to meet my folks for lunch. We had a lovely lunch at a place around the corner from our hotel that also served sgroppino – because once you have it, you have to keep trying to find it. It’s a little crazy that way. Mom and Dad were also immediately appreciative of sgroppino’s finer points (like the fact that it is freaking delicious), and it made for a lovely cap to our meal.

We headed out to Santa Maria Della Salute after lunch, which is a very easily recognizable Venetian landmark that sits on the edge of the Grand Canal. It’s currently covered in scaffolding as they clean and restore it (how inconsiderate! Didn’t they know I’d be there on my honeymoon???), but it has a lovely, simple interior. From there we went to the Peggy Guggenheim collection, which was a big change of pace from the Madonnas and Bambinos, since it’s a modern art museum. In her life, Peggy Guggenheim made a huge contribution to the world of modern art by cultivating artists, and while I have to admit that I don’t always “get” modern art, I do enjoy it, and it was, as I said, a good visual palate cleanser.

Later that evening, after dinner, we headed for Mom and Dad’s last evening in Piazza San Marco, as they were leaving a day ahead of us. It was just as wonderful as the nights before, with the added bonus of a particularly exuberant clarinet player who was part musician, part mime, and part dancer. Special K and I got up to take a spin around the café during “The Way You Look Tonight”, and a wonderful time was had by all.

We decided, on good advice, to get up really early the next day to walk through the city, particularly to places like Piazza San Marco, to take pictures. First of all, the light is beautiful as the sun is rising, and second of all, no one is out there. So, under protest from our sleepy brains, we got up at 6 am and went out to the piazza. It was almost unrecognizable, filled only with street sweepers and a handful of other early morning photographers. There was a guy casually wandering around with his dog, a cheerful old yellow Lab, who was not on a leash, which is decidedly against the rules. The dog would dart around, chasing pigeons, and his owner seemed unconcerned. Finally, he decided that it was probably time to bring ol’ Sparky in, and he whistled and called his name. Like something out of a movie, the dog stopped what he was doing, and turned toward his master, and began to gallop in his direction. Unfortunately, he thundered past him, as he had become distracted by still more pigeons, which sent his owner running after him, shouting his name.

Heh.

We went back to the hotel for breakfast and to clean up, and then went back to the piazza, and were able to walk right into the Palazzo Ducale (Doge’s Palace) without waiting in any line (miracle!). The Doge was the chief magistrate of Venice and was a very influential type of guy, who has his own special gondola (I called it the Dogemobile), and eight lackeys who followed him around – Venetian “yes” men, if you will. The palace is an amazing work of art and architecture, fit for the Most Serene Republic of Venice. As we wound our way through it, it started to rain. Again. Dammit. Eventually we made our way inside and as we were exploring the different apartments and chambers, we got a glimpse outside, and the sun had re-emerged – hurrah! We also saw a painting by Titian that is purported to be the largest oil painting in the world with over 800 people and figures in it – truly stunning. It covers an entire wall of the main chamber in which the entire Venetian senate would meet. The ceilings are ornate, with gold leaf and oil paintings covering every surface. Unfortunately, no photography is allowed, but I tried to sneak a couple pictures of the ceiling – they were a little blurry (no flash and no tripod makes it tough), but you get the idea.

We emerged and spend the rest of the sunny and beautiful day wandering around parts of Venice that we hadn’t seen yet, taking in as much as possible on our last day. There was more than one gelato stop, I must admit, but I only got a small one each time. And with all that walking, we had to keep our strength up…sort of.

Our dinner that evening was at a delightful little restaurant called Vini di Gigio on Cannareggio, and Special K and I had decided that we would try as many remaining local specialties as possible before we left. So we stopped at a little café for Bellinis on our way to dinner, then had beef carpaccio and prosciutto and melon for our appetizers, followed by linguine with fresh clams, K had a braised veal shank (called stinko) and I had roasted lamb, and then we capped the night off with a glass of sgroppino each. It wasn’t the best sgroppino we had in Italy, but it was still sgroppino.

From there, it was off to Piazza San Marco for one final night sipping cocktails in front of a live orchestra in the fresh air, and then back to the hotel to get some sleep before our early morning departure for the US.

*sigh*

It was a wonderful and unforgettable experience, and we came home to some fantastic news, namely that K’s mom got a badly-needed liver transplant. (And the DC DMV agreed that the $200 they said I owed them was crap. A smaller victory, perhaps, but a victory nonetheless…)

So things are looking up.

And this entry is now so long that I don’t think anyone, except perhaps my mom and sister-in-law, because they luuurve me, will make it to the end. But that’s okay – I tend to operate under the assumption that I don’t really have an “audience”, per se, and I think it’s best that way. But if you’ve made it all the way through – I hope you enjoyed our trip to Italy!