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The day before I left for Italy (now six months in the rearview mirror) my friend Sean from Seattle told me he was planning on coming to visit me. On March 6th our planning came together and we met in the Geneva airport to start our Spring Break adventure together. The plan was to take the bus to Courchevel and meet up with Olivia for a few days of snowboarding and partying, Brit style, burn Sean's snowboard and then take the train to Italy for a week of sightseeing in Bologna, Venice and Rome.
This was my second trip to Courchevel to visit Olivia and I was excited to be going back, to see her and to be in the mountains again. Irrespective of anything, Courchevel is an amazing town and offers a fantastic experience, but it is a distant second to the wonders Chamonix offers.
For me, getting to Courchevel is a pretty easy, multi-modal adventure if not slightly convoluted. It begins with the ritualistic descent of the four flights of stairs in my apartment while hauling a snowboard and bags loaded with the requisite gear. This is almost enough to get me to stay home. But after reaching the street and lugging everything through the middle of town to the bus stop there is no turning back. It’s a short bus ride (the ride is short, the bus is regular length) to the train station, a six hour train to Milan with an hour lay-over there and another six hour train to Geneva. The scenery on this leg is phenomenal including the last hour following the shores of Lake Geneva. If I took the overnight train out of Ancona the sun will just be coming up as we reach the shores of the lake and the water will sparkle and the mountains pulse. Arriving in Geneva I take a city bus from the train station to the airport and then climb aboard the bus to Moutiers where I transfer to a shuttle van for the last leg to Courchevel and a badly needed pot of fondue and beer. See? Easy.
For trips of this distance I usually book the Eurostar trains in Italy. They cost a bit more, but tend to be newer, in better condition and more comfortable. Your ticket gets you a reserved seat on a fast train that makes few stops and each car has a storage area for luggage. The Intercity and Regionale trains are great alternatives for inexpensive, local trips but stop everywhere along their routes and don’t offer much in the way of rider accommodations. They just get you there, usually on time. For the Milan to Geneva leg I always hope to get a Swiss train because they are immaculate and the seats come with outlets for charging Ipods and laptops. I usually over-pack a lunch and snacks for the trip and my backpack looks a bit like one of those clown cars as sandwiches, fruit, cookies, chocolate, juice boxes, chips and candy comes tumbling out. I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised, but you can get a decent café from the snack cart although you pay stadium prices for it.
Leaving Sean and Spring Break behind for just a moment, the best part about my first trip to Courchevel was meeting Olivia in front of Rocky’s Bar (it’s where everyone is unloaded upon arriving in town) and before even taking my luggage to the room we were having a Kronenbourg and chatting away like we were still in Chamonix rather than not having seen each other for five months. For the rest of the story, follow this link for her description of the visit and check-out this one for photos.
Now back to Sean and our trip (sorry Sean). If you’ve followed this blog at all, you’ve already seen loads of pictures from Courchevel, Bologna, Venice, and Rome and read my impressions of them. And if you haven’t, look them up.
While the Johnny Come Latelys are doing their homework, rather than drag the rest of you through old news again, I’ve posted a short slide show here (short for me anyway) of some pictures and I’ll just mention a few of my highlights from the trip.
- The Excel spreadsheet I made to plan our trip.
- Meeting Sean in Geneva. We’d both traveled long distances from disparate cities but to meet-up in the Geneva airport was as natural as could be.
- Watching Sean adjust to the European, and especially, Italian pace of life. There really is a difference and it was fun to see him settle into it.
- The pizza we ate our second night in Bologna. We chanced upon the restaurant while looking for another one and liked the look of it. The pizza stretched four inches off the plate it was served on and was the best I’ve had in Italy so far. I have the restaurant’s card and will take you there if you visit but I’m not revealing anything else.
- Learning a new term for the French: Cheese Eaters.
- Reliving the moments when I first saw Venice through Sean as I watched him walk out the train station and catch his first glimpse of the city.
- Having our train to Rome delayed three hours because an unexploded bomb from WWII was being removed from near the Rome Termini station.
- Walking in the Villa Borghese park in Rome. It was a lot like Forest Park in Portland except with more rollerbladers and 400 year old statues.
- Climbing the 521 steps to the top of the dome in St. Peter’s and then catching the first glimpse of the views of Rome.
Pasqua (Easter) is a major holiday in Italy (I know, big surprise). People here are still amazed when I tell them that we don’t get time off for it in the US. They always ask a variation of, “What days do you get off for Easter?” I tell them, “Sunday.” Anyway, our office will be closed for a few days so some of us are going on a little trip as the custom in these parts. On Saturday afternoon we’re off to Cesena, home of the first public library in Europe, but also the club Vidia where the Gomma Gommas will be performing. After spending the night in Bologna with Valentina’s parents it’s road trip time as we (Valentina, Giordano, Miki, me) head west to Tuscany to visit the cities of Lucca and Pisa. We’ll of course see the tower in Pisa but there is also a cathedral that is supposed to be amazing. I’m most excited for Lucca. The old part of the city is still ringed by the medieval walls. They are 12 meters or so tall, 10 meters wide and about 5 kilometers around. The top has been converted into a park with walking and biking paths. We plan to hire bikes and hit the circuit. I should have a story about the trip ready by the 4th of July.
Almost since I arrived in Italy, Vayla and I have been talking about going snowboarding together. Until recently though, he's been busy studying for his ship captain's exam. Last Thursday he finally took the exam, and passed. He is now officially Captain Vayla and can drive (pilot, sail, maneuver?) any boat up to 20 meters in length anywhere in the world. Except off the coast of Somalia. There are pirates there. With the test out of the way and the weekend free, we planned a trip for Saturday.
As incredibly poncy as this sounds, this was the first one day snowboarding trip I'd taken in Europe. Everything else has been multi-day stays at various resorts. It felt familiar to be packing gear for just a day, meeting at seven, stopping for a quick breakfast along the way and changing in the parking lot. Could have been Meadows except instead of the Johnsons or Heinrichs or Ash I was with Vayla. The cronies may have changed but the scenery was similar. With new snow recharging the area on Thursday and Friday and relatively mild weather Saturday this timing was fortuitous and the day fantastic.
Frontignano is a little resort near the little town of Ussita in the Apennine Mountains (not spelled like it sounds but spelled like it looks) about 130 kilometers and 2 hours from Ancona. It's a bit bigger than Skibowl and a little smaller than Meadows. It has one quad, two singles (which I'd never seen before) and a few other doubles.
As fun as it looks.
The overall terrain is relatively intermediate with some offerings of good steepness and tree sections. For a day area it's plenty entertaining, the crowds are small and relaxed, the tickets are cheap and they have a sandwich at lunch that was amazing - big slices of crusty bread toasted over a coal fire with fresh grilled sausage from the same fire and thick slices of cheese slowly melting over the top, all made to order. The Bombardino I had for the mid-afternoon was lethal and delicious.
More please.
Slip sliding away.
Just another day hanging out in Italy.
Gratuitous Scenery Shots
Heads-up that this will be my last post for a few days because tomorrow morning early I board the train for Courchevel, France to visit this vision in pink:
I can't say how excited I am to see her even though she'll probably kill me for posting this picture. It's worth it. I just hope I can keep up with her.
Warning on ticket: Please do not touch or harm the natural environment in any way. Use of cameras or flashes is strictly prohibited.
Ummm, Valentina took the pictures inside the caves. She's the criminal. I would have taken my own, but moments before boarding the bus to the caves, my camera developed (GET IT!?!?) a conscience and refused to work so I had to rely on her to illegally document this natural wonder.
The Frasassi Grotte are some of Italy's largest and most famous caves and are located in the municipality of Genga, which is located in the province of Ancona, which is located in the region of Marche and to drive there from here is about 66 kilometers and takes about an hour. I went there last Sunday, the 7th, with Valentina and Giordano where we met Simona (who we work with) and her ragazzo Simone. The sciencey stuff: discovered and explored by a group of Ancona speleologists between 1948 and 1971, the caves are rich in water and particularly well endowed with stalactites and stalagmites. Some of the stalactites, or is it stalagmites, the ones that go up not down, are over 20 meters in height and considering that they grow 2mm per year, in a good year, that's both impressive and a testament to patience and perseverance. For some other sciencey reason, perspective is distorted in the cave. The caverns are huge it would seem, in fact, the entire Duomo from Milan would fit in the largest, with room to spare. (Make impressed noises now, our tour group did.) One of the pointy things that was pointed out to us by our guide was apparently over 100 meters away and was over 2 meters tall even though when I put my hand in front of my eyes and held my fingers apart to measure it, it only looked to be about 2cm tall! We were all suitably impressed.
There isn't much else that can be said about the caves that the photos don't say better. Actually, there is a lot more that can be said because the guide that was included in the cost of our 15 Euro ticket (along with the bus transfer to the caves) didn't stop talking during the nearly 3 hours we were on the tour. Like everything here, why use a few words when lots and lots will do? His constant narration may have been informative, but the incredible natural beauty said everything far better than he ever could and many times I wished he would have just been quiet and let us take in the surroundings and listen to the drip of the water slowly forming and growing the stalactites and stalagmites. Fortunately for me, he spoke in Italian so I could occasionally tune him out and take it all in. Unfortunately for her, Simona speaks Italian (go figure, along with English and Japanese) and had to listen and nearly lost her mind.
Simona
Valentina also speaks Italian (along with French, English, Spanish, German, Turkish, Farsi, Hindi and Esperanto [I exaggerate somewhat]) and was in heaven. She didn't leave the guide's side and asked very insightful, and frequent, questions. They bonded. There is however, more that can be said about the afternoon, post spelunking.
After the 3 hour tour, a 3 hour tour(!), we went to lunch. Finally! Giordano, who had been to the caves before and knew about this restaurant, had made reservations for us and had promised we were in for something special. The restaurant is called La Torre, is quite small, and is wildly popular in the summer with tourists but in winter was mostly empty except for our party of five and a few tables of residents from the town. Their specialty is cinghialle (wild boar) and tartufo. They were happy to welcome us and the meal was special.
Mmmm, lunch.
Both ingredients feature prominently on their menu, except there was no actual menu, just a few dishes of the day recited by the waitress/bartender/attentive mother. Everything was served family style on platters and single portions were easily big enough to share with everyone. Our first course was three kinds of pasta - ravioli stuffed with truffles with a truffle and butter sauce, triangles (like ravioli, but with three sides and so the logical name) stuffed with boar with the same truffle sauce, and pappardelle al cinghialle which was the best thing I've eaten since I've been here. The pasta was handmade and the sugo was tender, rich and devastatingly unhealthy. Before bringing the second course, our new mother made sure we'd had enough and offered to bring more. I think our refusal for extra made her worried. For our second course we had roasted potatoes, roasted boar, and a platter of grilled meats with lamb chops, pork skewers, boar ribs and boar sausage. It was primal and delicious. Dessert was homemade tiramisu and the meal finished with coffee and digestifs which was locally made and bottled grappa flavored with holly or some other tree branch.
On the left, the infamous (or more than famous) grappa. How do they get the branch in the bottle?
They left the bottle on the table so that we could feel free to drink however much we "needed" to ensure we would digest our meal properly. Apparently we "needed" a lot but we all digested well. Afterwards we took a walk through the town to clear our heads before driving back to Ancona.
The road back to Ancona
San Vittore alle Chiuse. Nice apses!
Downtown Genga
The spelunkers, digesting and discussing caves, cold and our place in the universe.
Happy Birthday Sarah Roth-Rosevear!
Happy Birthday Jeffrey Scott Lewis!
Happy Velentine's Day all you lovers.
What happens when you take five Italians, one American and drive 500 kilometers to the north of Italy? “White Days”, that’s what!
The Boys of "White Days"
A month or so after I arrived in Ancona I met a guy named Stefano through our mutual friend Massi and we happened to start talking about my snowboarding trip to Chamonix earlier in the year. He mentioned his family had a house in the Dolomites and would be happy to invite me out sometime. I didn’t think much of it until a couple weeks ago when an email arrived inviting me to “White Days”, a guy’s ski weekend scheduled for the last weekend in January. Time to zip-up the puffy coat, strap on the board, shred the pow-pow and hit some sweet jumps.
Stefano and Dan
For the drive, we go north through Bologna (remember the arcades?), on through Brescia, turn right and head 40 or so kilometers into the Alps. The last part of the drive follows roads so narrow they give goats the creeps. On your way you’ll pass turns for the Gavia and Mortirolo passes. The Gavia is one of the most famous climbs of the Giro d'Italia. The Mortirolo is considered by many to be the toughest climb in Italy and on the list of the hardest climbs in all the Grand Tours. I admit I geeked out a bit when I saw the signs, especially knowing that on Saturday, 29 May, the second to last day of the Giro, Stage 20 will be following much of the same route as it races up the Gavia, through Ponte di Legno and on to the finish in Tonale. Road building philosophy seems to dictate going through, not around the mountains. The tunnels are endless. It’s not very Zen, but it is very efficient. Past village after village, each one smaller and a bit more charming than the last until you think you’re lost and driving in circles and you would swear you just saw that house and cobbled street minutes ago. And then you’ve arrived.
The village looks like a cliché to be honest but an Italian one, not Austrian or Swiss and takes its name from the bridge (Ponte) in the center of town. It's a nice enough little bridge that leads to the main piazza and church. As you cross, you see the birth of the Oglio river through the joining of the Frigidolfo and Narcanello streams. The Oglio eventually makes its way to the Po River and then the Adriatic Sea. In terms of size, the town feels a bit bigger than Government Camp but more developed and done in the style of Rustic Alps instead of Pioneer Pacific Northwest. There are the requisite souvenir and clothing shops for the tourists and butchers, bakers and candle-stick makers for the locals.
For you nerds, let me tell you a bit about the ski area. It’s really two areas in one, Ponte di Legno and Tonale separated by a ridge of mountains but joined by a 15 minute cable-car ride or an impressive 11 kilometer ski track. Together they make up a pretty big ski area. It is almost all above the tree line piste skiing. The runs are all quite long which encourages that particular European trait of stopping every 100 meters or so to gather and discuss life, turns, melancholy and fashion (or something like that). One piste is called "The Wall" (although that might just be Stefano’s personal name for it) and is supposedly one of the steepest on-piste runs in Italy at 62 degrees or something.
Dan shreds "The Shute" just below "The Wall"
Stefano Sending It
Saturday, Sunday and Monday followed a familiar routine. Greet the sun around 8 and eat a breakfast of fresh pastry and bread from the bakery, get dressed and be on the lifts by about 9. It was cold (down to -16 on Monday) but bluebird (a new expression for the Italians, along with the concept of a Butterface) with no wind and no new snow. Perfect for the on-piste skiing which they love but less than ideal for me and my hope for lots of fresh powder and off-piste shenanigans.
Where's the nearest piste?
Our first night there we checked out the pizza and club scene, both disappointing. The beers in one liter mugs were not. On our second night we went to Cà del Re, a restaurant chosen by Stefano and that he has been visiting for years. The building and interiors were hand-made from stone and wood and the contrast with the white linens, cutlery and crystal was stark, forming a great setting for the meal that followed. Dinner was informed by suggestions from the chef and a few special made dishes: a bottle of red wine from the region, bruschetta with tomatoes and anchovies, tagliatelle with chestnuts and shaved radicchio, stuffed gnocci, steak fillet, venison with polenta and more porcinis, chestnut torte with chocolate sauce, cremalatte con mousse di fragole, winter fruit in a warm chocolate soup, grappa. It was a fantastic dinner that in this case supported the on-going boasting I constantly hear from my Italian friends regarding the superiority of Italian cuisine. We returned to Ancona late Monday afternoon and in the setting sun saw Lake Iseo surrounded by the glowing Alps, a fitting backdrop for a long weekend of snowboarding with five new friends.
The past two weeks in Italian lessons I’ve been learning the passato (past tense). It's just like French and makes sense but takes a bit of thinking to figure out the right combination of verbs and endings and of course most of the most common verbs are irregular so they don’t follow the standard conjugation rules and have to be memorized. This week I started learning all the exceptions to the rules. But now at least I can not speak in the present and the past.
Up next we take illegal photographs in the caves of Frasassi and eat wild boar in Genga.
