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Liguria and the Piedmont, May 2018

Friday May 18 2018
Woke up to bright sunshine for the first time in a week! Sunny and warm, 71F. Sunny all day.

Our last full day in Levanto. Breakfast at the cafe just before you get to the train station again. This is the only one that has wholewheat (integrale) cornetto and their coffee is good. There was a long lineup for tickets in the train station. We bought the Cinque Terre + Train passes again. We were on the train to the Cinque Terre by 10:30. We arrived in Monterosso and found another cafe for a second breakfast, sitting at a table outside in the piazza. Okay, now we were ready.

We joined the stream of people walking towards the start of the trail. They can't all be doing the trail!! They were.

For the past few years, since the big mudslides, the first two legs of the Cinque Terre trail have been closed - Riomaggiore to Manarola to Corneglia. This week the thrid leg, Corneglia to Vernazza, was closed for maintenance. That leaves one leg of the Cinque Terre trail open. Vernazza to Monterosso.

They really need to make this trail one way. And to get the other legs open.

It was a two hour walk, starting with a very steep climb mostly up concrete or rock stairs, for over 45 minutes. The climb we did a few days ago, from Corneglia up, was much easier even though it went to a higher level. That trail was more gradual. We were nose-to-tail going up the steps. There were also people coming down. It was a zoo. Part way up, two guys were playing music beside the trail, looking for donations. I didn't see them get any as we all huffed and puffed our way up. There were many Americans, but also Italian and French and etc. Many young Americans. But lots of oldies like us too. No one could go fast because there was not room to pass. The slow pace made it not so hard to keep going.

Once at the top there were parts of the trail so narrow, on stone ledges beside stone walls, that oncoming people could not pass, so a bottleneck would occur. It was like being in a traffic jam! At one point there was a very large man, who in his younger and thinner years must have been a good hiker, walking very slowly and causing a backup. A few younger people raced past us and him. Finally he stepped aside and we all got to pass. That is what this hike was like.

The trail is basically up-up-up, flat for about 30 minutes, then down-down-down. We did the trail 15 and 16 years ago (we walked the whole Cinque Terre trail in one go one time, split over two days another time) and it was crowded then, but not as bad as this.

At a few points on the flat bit we were not surrounded by people. But then the downhill pushed us all together again. We could keep a good enough pace and there were places to step aside to enjoy the view and take photos and it really wasn't that bad.

We arrived in Vernazza at 1pm, perfect time to find an outside table at one of the many restaurants around the harbor, but most restaurants were full, or almost full. The main street is lined with food shops - street food (fried everything in a cone, like you get in Naples), foccacaria, panini, gelato, etc. - and crowded with people eating, looking for food. Steve turned to me and said "get me out of here" so we headed up to the train station (the restaurants away from the water were not as crowded), caught in the next train (they run frequently), and were back in the apartment by 2pm. It was so calm walking through Levanto - no crowds, just a town heading into siesta. I made us a nice lunch.

The day was too gorgeous to ignore, so in the later afternoon we did another walk on the pedestrian/bike trail to Bonassola for gelato. In the last several years we have had gelato only once on a trip. This was my third gelato in 12 days!! Steve's second, but he is always better at showing restraint.

Dinner at home and now we are packing up. We don't have to leave until 11am tomorrow, so I don't feel rushed. We will be able to have our last Barolino trip. Then it is north to the Piedmont!

When this trip is over I am going to put together my thoughts comparing our stay in Levanto to our two recent stays on the Amalfi Coast.










 
I suppose it's to be expected with 3 of 4 coastal routes out, but the sense of being on a conveyor belt was still evident over a decade ago, and then in (IIRC) May, so far from the worst of it.

Back then the uphill hikes were deserted, so I suppose the closures have at least encouraged more people to explore them. However it just feels like a good walking destination has become too popular for its own good. Having buskers en-route sounds like it's 'jumped the shark'.
 
Sunny and almost hot this morning in Levanto. We had our last breakfast at Barolino, strolled along the sea and then left town.

It was an easy 3 hour drive, nearly all the way on autostrada, to our next stop in San Damiano near Asti. Lots of tunnels along the coast and even north of Genoa. Once we got into the Piedmont no more tunnels. We reached San Damiano just after two and found a nice place for lunch, Madama La Barbera, on the main piazza. The food was fantastic. We shared an asparagus antipasto, I had the best ravioli with ricotta and spinach that I’ve ever had, Steve had linguine with shrimp. We sat outside in the almost empty piazza.

The house we rented is in a smaller village a few miles away. We met Toni Hilton there and got settled in. I know Toni from the SlowTrav days but this was our first time meeting in person. The house is lovely! Beautiful views over rolling hills. We did not see the Alps because it was hazy.

We went back to San Damiano when the shops were open and got groceries. A big storm came in and by the time we got home the lightening was flashing, the thunder booming and the rain started. It lasted about an hour. Dinner at home and I am looking forward to not climbing up a hill tomorrow.





 
Give Toni a big hug from me!
Would love to see photos of the house, we rented it before its renovation. San Damiano had a good Monday market with the small shops actually open in the morning, very lively. Check to see when the Castello at Govone is open for tours, (my memory is on Sundays) it is a cool place that is now used as the town hall. Most weekends some castello or other is open, , many privately owned. Castelli Aperti

Good bakery in Govone, too. La Rosa in San Martino Alfieri had good pizza. Cafe Roma in Castigliole was a great enoteca for lunch, although the menu may be too meaty for you. Another lovely restaurant in Calosso (sweet town to walk around), Crota d'Calos
Have fun!
 
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Sitting at Edinburgh airport en route to Sicily reading your TR. So enjoyable. I hope we find a few nice walks in Sicily.
Your last hike reminded me of Madeira and why I didn't enjoy the walks there.
Airports are good places to knit. I'm 1/3 of the way through Boneyard shawl. Bought yarn n Edinburgh. Naturally.
 
Sunday May 20 2018

Woke up to fog covering our view. It hung around for the whole morning, then cleared. It was warm but not really sunny, which was perfect because we wanted to do nothing. We spent the day at the house, reading, listening to podcasts and knitting, cooking, eating, napping. Those were my activities but Steve’s were similar.

Around 6pm we did a walk around the village. Two restaurants, a pizza place that we didn’t find but I located on the map, a cafe, small supermarket, pharmacy, doctors office, bank, post office. All the essentials. Everything closed except one restaurant and probably the pizza place.

The house is a converted barn that used to be a vacation rental, but was sold and remodelled recently. Fabulous kitchen and bathrooms. It is not really a rental, but may turn into one. It has outstanding views, a large garden full of trees, bushes and flowers. Even a small swimming pool (too early for that). Since it is a private home I won’t post any photos of it.




 
Monday May 21 2018

Overcast this morning and looked like rain. The sun came out around 1pm, then clouds, then sunshine at 4pm. High of 65F but it felt muggy and warmer.

While we were sitting on the terrace this morning having coffee two little dogs came up through the garden and to us. I am no fan of dogs but I kind of like little ones. They strutted around, spent a bit of time, then continued on their way. I whatsapped a photo to Toni who said they were regular visitors. There are several cats too, but none that will come to us. And I regularly hear a cuckoo bird.

We went into Asti this morning. Many things were closed - some shops, most museums. We visited the tourist office. Most of their hiking info is now online. They did have one last set of hiking maps for our area and gave them to us for free.

We spent a couple of hours walking around town looking at the towers and churches. Our house is only 20 minutes from Asti. On the way out the GPS took us thru pretty villages. On the way back it took us on the main highway.

Lunch at home and then we didn’t feel like doing much because it looked like a storm was coming in. The farmers fire canons that send shockwaves into the clouds when a storm approaches to prevent hail. They were going off all around us every minute or so for 30 minutes!

I sat outside and caught up on podcasts and knitting. The garden is beautiful and that view. It is nice to have slow days so we can enjoy the location.

We drove out to San Damiano around 6pm and did some shopping. We did a second trip to the pastry shop! They make good pastries and those breadsticks - grissini. The pastries were wrapped up beautifully,

I am writing this at 9pm and the rain has started. It is pouring down, but no hail.






 
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Tuesday May 22 2018

Rain, all day! Not heavy, just a drizzle. This makes three days of rain here and I have been happy to take a break from walking. The weather changes tomorrow and is forecast to be sunny and getting warmer for our last three days.

This morning we drove up to visit with Toni Hilton. I have known her online since the early SlowTrav days. She used to own several vacation rentals in this area but now has just one that she rents on Sabbatical.com for longer stays. I wanted to see the house in case we decide to do a longer stay some day. We met at a cafe in her village where a cute tabby cat joined us (and left behind a lot of cat hair). We went up to the house and visited with her current tenants, a couple from Australia who are spending 6 months there.

After that we followed Toni in her car through the gorgeous countryside to a small town with a small restaurant that she knows. I can't remember the name of the town or restaurant! I'll have to ask Toni. It had about 6 tables and no menu. Happily there was a vegetarian option. Steve and I had gnocchi with pesto and it was the gnocchi I have ever had. Very light. Toni had some breaded meat thing that she liked. We also had breaded vegetables, costa - which translates to stalk. It was the stalk from chard I think. Excellent.

We said goodbye to Toni and drive about 30 minutes west to the Abbey of Santa Maria di Vezzolano. It is in an isolated location, miles down narrow roads. In the parking lot were two other cars and a large tour bus. A large group of high school students were having a tour.

This abbey is beautiful. It reminded me of Sant'Antimo in Tuscany, and Monte Oliveto for the frescoes. Everything is 12th, 13th or 14th century. The church is simple and beautiful with striped ceilings. The cloister is small but perfect. A few 14th century frescoes remain. Two of them featured the story of The Three Living and The Three Dead, where the dead tell the living not to be so proud. One of the two had text which was translated - The three living say “Oh, what a terrible and wondrous thing”. The three dead say “Why do you make yourself proud, poor creatures? Think about what you are now! What we are, you will be too. There is nothing you can do.”

We left there around 4:30pm. These were perfect activites for a very wet day.

It was about an hour's drive home and I drove the BMW (Steve has been doing most of the driving, but I take the wheel when I am not needed for complicated navigation). I now get why people like expensive cars. In the US we always had Toyotas and in the UK we have a VW - pretty basic. There should be a button in a BMW rental that connects you straight to a dealer in your area.









 
Wednesday May 23 2018

We woke up to fog yet again, but it was warm fog and it lifted by 11am. Today was sun and clouds and warmer, 71F, but felt muggy. There are a few mosquitoes around the house but I did not notice any when we were out and about today.

We drove south about 30 minutes to the small wine town of Barolo. We planned to do a hike from there. I found a good one on the web - winepassitaly.it - going from Barolo to Moneforte to Novello to Barolo. The description does not say how long it is, but on my planning thread someone posted the times for me. We walked up to the castle and spoke to the tourist office woman about the hike. They have a map for sale for hikes from Barolo (€7) and I didn't buy it because she said the trail was well marked. I should have bought it. She told us how to get to the start and we confidently strode off, going in the wrong direction for 15 minutes. We figured it out, retraced our steps and got started.

Since it has been raining for the last three days we have been here, and probably longer, the trail was wet, but not as seriously muddy as we get on trails in the UK. We had our walking poles, one pole each. @Ian Sutton said we would like this hike because it goes through woods as well as vineyards and he was right. The walk was mostly uphill to Monforte and took about 1hr30min.

We started out climbing through forests, then out into the vineyards. Walking through vineyards was different than I had imagined. I thought the trails would go along the edge of the vineyard but instead they go right through the middle on tracks used by their tractors. We had beautiful views back to Barolo below us and La Morra on a hill. There were many other hill towns around. Everywhere you looked - hill towns, castles, and endless vineyards.

It was cloudy and muggy, but the sun came out at times and then it was less muggy but hot. We headed into woods again, then came out on a road just before Monforte. We stopped there and had our sandwiches. We decided to not walk into Monforte and to not do the circular walk but just walk back the way we came. My foot was hurting and we had already been walking for two hours.

Going back was much faster and mostly downhill. It was a bit slippy in the woods because of the mud but we managed. We saw a few other people on the trail, but not many. At the end of the hike we had been walking for 3 hours, about 6.5 miles.

It was 3pm now and we walked around Barolo, then drove up, up, up to La Morra. Coming into the town it reminded me of Montalcino (in Tuscany) sitting high on a hill. We walked around La Morra and it was smaller than it looked from a distance. A few restaurants, a few cafes, a few shops - mostly wine shops. We stopped at an excellent enotecca, Gallo Wine Gallery, and bought a lot of local things (but no wine) - truffles in butter, truffles with porcini, dried truffles, roasted hazelnuts, hazelnuts in chocolate, Mostarda dolce d'Uva. Fun things to take home.

The SatNav took us on narrow roads on miles and miles through the vineyards but we finally got to a main road and drove home.

Dinner at home tonight. We still cannot see the alps from our terrace. We should be able to see them when it is clear.





 
A useful wine shop that - not especially cheap, but a very wide range, so a place to find the difficult to find (we came out with a bottle of Travaglini's Il Sogno, which we'd been unable to buy at the (Gattinara-based) winery earlier in the holiday. It's a nebbiolo but made more in the style of a Sforzato/sfursat (or amarone). About time we opened it.

The photos don't look too bad for mud, though it doesn't need much to feel like those walking shoes/boots have been transformed into platform heels. Then throw in some steep hills and you're right it can get a little tricky! The thing about walking through the vines is wonderful isn't it, really giving a sense of place. The joy of shared vineyard ownership, precluding fences and guard dogs! We enjoyed on year's walking in the region so much, I got some wine glasses engraved with the names of some of the vineyards we walked through. A good reminder of a lovely experience.

Regards
Ian
 
The photos don't look too bad for mud, though it doesn't need much to feel like those walking shoes/boots have been transformed into platform heels.

It was very light mud, nothing like we get in Dorset in the winter. I was worried about slipping on it while walking uphill and downhill in the woods, but we were okay.
 
Thursday May 24 2018

Woke up to strong sunshine. Still no snow covered mountains in our view! We walking to the local cafe and on the other side of town we saw the mountains! Our place does not face north. :) We saw big mountains way off in the distance. Not fancy our local bar, but excellent coffee!

We drove about 50 minutes east to Acqui Terme. This is the only place we’ve been before in the Piedmont, spending one night in the Baur B&B on our way from Switzerland to central Italy over 10 years ago. On that visit we did not go into the town.

Acqui Terme is a lovely town. We parked in the center and went to the tourist office to ask about local hikes. She pointed a couple out to us and gave us a booklet describing them. We had a good walk around town. I love the fountain with the slightly sulfurous hot water pouring out. This hot spring is the reason the Romans settled here. I plunged my hand into the water and quickly pulled it out. It is really hot! I didn’t drink any but I put some on my hands and face. I have a new scar from a runin with an overly enthusiastic skin doctor, so maybe the water will help that disappear.

We sat outside at a nice cafe and had another excellent coffee. We’ve been having breakfast at home because there is a Nespresso machine and a lot of pods, but I miss real coffee.

We drove to the outskirts of town to see the remains of the Roman Aqueduct. Four arches (one recently reconstructed) and a few stumps. Plus several more stumps in another field. Excellent.

We did an easy, short walk on a pedestrian/bike path along the river. We could have done a 3 hour circular walk up into the hills but decided it was too hot and we were feeling lazy. We had a picnic with some focaccia things we bought in town.

I drove the beemer home since we probably won’t get one, but I will be less snarky about people who drive them now.

It is not crowded here. If we see a town that looks interesting we drive right through the center. There is never a problem with parking. There are tourists around but it is not overwhelming. The area reminds me of Chianti but with more castles, more hilltowns. I can see why people love it. It is a little too wine and meat centric for me, but most places are. Next time I would like to stay closer to Cuneo.

Tonight we had pizza at a restaurant in town. It was recommended by @Amy who stayed in this same house a few years ago and Cristina (from expats) said her father recommends it. The pizza was great, but huge. Like 15 inches across. Thin crust. I even had a glass of white wine from this town. And dessert - lemon sorbet inside a lemon, like we’ve had in Positano. It was nice to walk out to the restaurant and walk back as the sun was setting.












 
The cafe where you had lunch with Toni may have been Cafe Fortuna in Murisengo. Michela the owner makes the most amazing gnocchi ever.

When we stayed in that house, I think we saw the mountains twice in our two weeks. As I recall, if you go out to the patio and look to the left, after the morning fog clears you may see them. Oh, and we had little doggy visitors too! Dachunds, as I recall.
 
You put your hand in the bubbling boiling hot spring fountain??

I agree about Piemonte being a little too meat centric. It was the one of the main reasons other places won out on most trips I planned.
 
Friday May 25 2018 - our last day

I am not an early riser but today I was out of bed by 7am and went out to the shop before Steve woke up. The shop doesn’t open until 8:30! I never pay attention to opening times, only closing. Bright sunshine and the promise of a hot day (80F).

We decided to do local things on our last day. We went into San Damiano and their small market was on. We got a few vegetables for dinner. They had roasted bell peppers (we got some). The fish stall was well supplied and Steve saw a sign saying they sold grilled fish, already cooked. We didn’t get any. Good looking cheese counter and meat counter. A lot of fruits and vegetables, many from southern Italy. Cherries are in season here - I’ve been picking them from a tree in the garden.

Coffee and cornetto at the cafe that roasts their own coffee. Bought our last grissini at the bakery (turmeric flavour and plain).

There was a hiking map for San Damiano in the house with routes shown but little description. We decided to give it a try. We drove out to the south east edge of town before the market and saw that the hiking route was on a road and didn’t look great. Instead we walked out from where we parked for the market to the south west edge and tried to follow the route. We saw some hiking signs for a different route and followed it for a bit, then realised it was going along a busy road so turned back and followed the map.

The hike was good. We walked for about 2 hours (just over 5 miles) using the map and doing only part of the recommended hike. It was getting hotter and we didn’t want to be out past 1pm. We walked some roads (not busy), followed a path through woods and fields of nut trees, with good views at one point. Back on roads, then into the woods again. There were some red and white trail markers, some markings on the road for other trails. At one point all markings stopped and my map made no sense so I resorted to my phone and google maps which pointed us in a good direction. Lanes again that turned into a dirt road through farms.

We stopped for a 10 minute conversation with a farmer who looked like he was setting up to spray insecticide on some nut trees. He spoke no English but Steve and he could talk, except when he went into dialect. To summarise, he is 53 and retires with pension in 3 years (is that possible?), there is no money in farming - he makes 1 Euro and it sells for 7 Euro, his two daughters have no interest in farming, one has traveled around the world and speaks English, the other works locally, he was surprised that we did not have children but then went on to tell us about his dog (1, named Ice) and cats (3), and we told him about our past cats, the current government is bad but the previous one was okay. Then we were on our way.

A bit more lane and road walking and we were back in town. We stopped in a cafe in the modern part of town and asked for cold coffees, no milk no sugar. We got shakeratos! Hot espresso into a shaker full of ice, several minutes of shaking, then poured with a thick head on it. He said it would have been thicker if he added sugar. All for 1 Euro each, the same price as an espresso.

Home to the cool house and a late lunch. We had intended to go out again around 5pm when everything opens but we were enjoying our lovely terrace in the shade so spent hours out there reading.

Dinner at home and we are packing up. Our 3 litre tin of olive oil takes up a bit of room! Early start tomorrow with a 2 hour drive to Milan Linate for a 2pm flight, then a 3 hour drive home.

I have been worried about my new hedge at home (planted in December). The weather has been mostly dry the past three weeks (I have two people looking after watering) while we have had a lot of rain in Italy!








 
there has been some rain over the last couple of days, and no really scorching temperatures, so plants should be surviving ok.

1 euro for those iced coffees is a wonderful price. Most generous.
 

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