An entry in the TFS Travel Journal
Nice leisurely morning for the full house, especially nice to see Adam studying out in the garden. We walked over and saw John and Virginia’s lovely little studio, in case any of us have to run away from home. We then drove to Spoleto, Italy with Wendy doing a masterful job along the twisty mountain road and then the absurdly narrow, angular streets of the town.
And quite the charming, very old town Spoleto is. We walked all about, including out across the ponte del torres, a remarkable multi-arched aquafer spanning a large gorge and with a height of 256 meters at one point. We enjoyed wonderful views of the 13th century castle, but couldn’t quite figure out how to get into it (if indeed it was open to the public anyway) so we instead walked to the duomo, which was closed for renovations.
It was, by then, lunchtime, so we headed off across town. Got a little lost, but finally persevered (and enjoyed the new and different parts of the stone city we got to walk through) and were rewarded with a great meal! Began with appetizers family style: bruschetta, pate crostini, a pastry of cod and asparagus, and a spectacular white truffle and melted cheese crostini. Primos were penne pomodoro for Wendy, a really tasty seafood risotto for Karen, and Adam and Milton shared the white truffle risotto, which can probably never be much better. Entrees were veal for Adam and for Karen, succulent duck w/red wine sauce for Wendy, and a black truffle omelette for Milton. (a good vehicle for enjoying the truffles, and quite good especially since they just don’t have a lot of egg dishes here) We had a nice Umbrian red wine, and a few local dessert specialties, including a tasty coffee flavored panacotta.
We then did a much better job of reading our map, and walked up the steep street/sidewalk back to the duomo and to our car, which despite our efforts, had not received a ticket. Off to Deruta, the ceramic capital of Italy and possibly the world. We had only a few hours, so we only got to about 40% of the innumerable shops, although for the most part they all have pretty similar offerings. So many astonishing and beautiful creations, which we enjoyed absorbing until we’d reached our limit. As they were closing up at 7:00, we headed off to Perugia, Italy to attempt to join the famous pre-dinner stroll and to do some grocery shopping.
Since nothing in Italy is direct or easy, by the time we parked and walked to anywhere near the center, stores were closing, so we looked around, did our marketing and walked back to the car. We didn’t take the exact same route back, however, and so didn’t exactly find our car. Some collective (more or less) direction finding, though, finally delivered us to the Omega, and we packed up and left.
Driving out wasn’t too bad, and we were back on the E45 in time to get our first Italian downpour. Made it through the wet blackness, trudged up the cobblestones to the Casa, and enjoyed a molto bene Italian buffet of the salamis and cheeses we’d bought earlier.