Tuesday 8 November 2011
"Hey Nicole, want to take a day-long drive to go see two more old Italian towns, stop four times to try again to get that elusive bottle of camping gas and the proper adaptor after we first run some errands in town? -- or sleep in and enjoy this beautiful villa, all to yourself, doing what ever you want to do?" You guessed it.
So Dian and Charles took Nicole's boots in to be stretched by the Spanish shoe guy in nearby Tavernelle, and also deposited some money in their new Italian bank account and got Dian signed on too (thanks, Francesca!). They took off first for nearby Perugia, the big capital town of the area, hoping to see some sights but focused on first finding the right camping gas store. Let's make this painful story short: four places to try, no success, and the last stop James GPS Bond led them to was some tiny place that looked like it hadn't been open in decades and was right in the middle of the Old Town, which meant narrower and tinier streets where they were squeezing between cars and stone walls with centimeters of clearance (more gray hairs), and possibly a big fat ticket because you're not allowed to drive in there without a permit ("They took your picture, I'm afraid." a couple strolling their baby informed us). By the time Dian and Charles got out we had no taste for another moment in Perugia.
So on to Gubbio, where they did enjoy strolling the town, peeking in churches, having a couple of cheap but good espressos and a pizza that was great, then off for home, but one more treat. Looking for the turn-off to Piegaro and our home on the hill, Dian signaled when she spotted the place she had seen before that said "olive oil for sale," and they pulled in to what looked like the driveway alongside a house.
It was, but behind the house was the whole operation, the real deal: local farmers in trucks dropping their harvests off, a young woman forklifting the mounds of green fruit back to an open area with a hole that emptied onto a belt that transported the olives up to an enclosed area and into a large open vat with two very large metal wheels circling constantly, to crush the just-picked olives into very fresh olive oil. So fresh that when Charles and Dian got their two liter can, the woman filled it from one of the large standing vats that had just been filled and stuck a label on it. It don't get no better (or fresher) than that.
"Hey Nicole, want to take a day-long drive to go see two more old Italian towns, stop four times to try again to get that elusive bottle of camping gas and the proper adaptor after we first run some errands in town? -- or sleep in and enjoy this beautiful villa, all to yourself, doing what ever you want to do?" You guessed it.
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| Photos by Charles |
So Dian and Charles took Nicole's boots in to be stretched by the Spanish shoe guy in nearby Tavernelle, and also deposited some money in their new Italian bank account and got Dian signed on too (thanks, Francesca!). They took off first for nearby Perugia, the big capital town of the area, hoping to see some sights but focused on first finding the right camping gas store. Let's make this painful story short: four places to try, no success, and the last stop James GPS Bond led them to was some tiny place that looked like it hadn't been open in decades and was right in the middle of the Old Town, which meant narrower and tinier streets where they were squeezing between cars and stone walls with centimeters of clearance (more gray hairs), and possibly a big fat ticket because you're not allowed to drive in there without a permit ("They took your picture, I'm afraid." a couple strolling their baby informed us). By the time Dian and Charles got out we had no taste for another moment in Perugia.So on to Gubbio, where they did enjoy strolling the town, peeking in churches, having a couple of cheap but good espressos and a pizza that was great, then off for home, but one more treat. Looking for the turn-off to Piegaro and our home on the hill, Dian signaled when she spotted the place she had seen before that said "olive oil for sale," and they pulled in to what looked like the driveway alongside a house.
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