Greetings from Castel Monastero in Tuscany!!! Buonasera...it's a very cool, but lovely evening here in the hills of Tuscany. We arrived here around 6p (11a, Omaha-time) tonight and are settling-in beautifully.
Some catching-up is necessary, as I am a couple of days of activities behind. Northern Italy was awesome, but busy, and each evening didn't end until about 10p, so I have spent very little time keeping up. I have managed to label all of the photos Leah and I have been taking, as if I don't do it as I travel, it will never get done and I will not remember all of the details I want to remember.
Ok...so let's return to Wednesday, the 12th, back in Pozzengo. Around 930a, Giorgio, Mark, Carol, Leah and I stuffed ourselves into the Alfa Romeo (really, it was so small and tight, but we got a system down over time that worked fairly well) for a trip to Turino. Giorgio said it would take 'about 45' minutes, which in Italian time, means about an hour or so, which is the maximum amount of time any of us can stand to be in Giorgio's AR before becoming horribly uncomfortable. Everyone was such a good sport about the lack of space and we all made-do, but we laughed a lot about it all.
So, buzzing along the countryside we went, and made our way toward the Alps and into Turino. The giant Fiat factory is there and they apparently are making a come-back, especially here in Italy. They also own the 'football' team here in Turino, which is jokingly called the Old Ladies of Turin.
Driving along we made it to the parking garage and then we started walking. Giorgio warned us the day before that we would do a lot of walking during this day and he scoots along quite quickly for a 63 year old man. I again am going to let the pictures do the talking, as they are much more interesting than reading what I write.
Let me say that Turino was fantastic and such an unexpected gold-mine of architecture, ruins and of Italian royal history. Just a touch of history...the Savoys who originated in France had a cousin who was Italian and the French and Italian cousins did not get along very well. So they fought (a lot) and the Italian cousin basically won independence for Italy from the French part of the family. So, in Turino was where the Savoys had their royal home and from here they controlled Italy. There was one King, Vittorio Emanuele, that is called 'The Good King' and he was the only king to unite all of Italy in its long history.
Ok...here's the photos...
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| Sculpture in the courtyard of the University Administration building |
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| Outside wall of the Opera House |
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| Famous sculpture/wall by Matrioianni at the Opera House...Leah was definitely familiar with this one. |
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| Tribute to Christopher Columbus...at the bottom you can see a little gold speck and that's where passers-by 'flick' the pinkie finger of Columbus, which will help us return to Turino in the future. |
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| The King's concubine's palace...not bad for the girlfriend, eh? |
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| Cathedral ceiling dome |
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| Copy of the Shroud of Turin...original is in a vault in a different church (we saw that too), but this is an exact replica. |
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| This is negative of the Shroud...the front side. Can seen a outline of a body, arms, legs and a face. |
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| The back side view... |
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| This is what the face looks like taken from the negative made from the original Shroud of Turin. |
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Mussolini's architectural influence in Turino. Apparently, this is all that's left of his time in Italy.
So we scampered back to the car so we could exit the city before traffic got too bad. On our way, Mark mentioned to Carol that he was going to take an Aleve because his neck was hurting due to the squished-ness of being in the car. He apparently had a 'little baggie of blue pills' in his pocket from the airplane ride (which included a couple of Ambien ~ sleeping pills ~ but none of the 'other blue pills'), so he pulled out the 2 he thought were Aleve and took them right before we got into the car. Well, we were driving maybe 10 minutes and he was sound asleep to the point that Carol was holding his chin/head because he was so asleep. I had no idea what was happening and Carol seemed a bit perplexed as well, but given our pace that day and Mark/Carol are in their late 50s, I thought he might just be tired. So, she continued to hold his head/chin for the remainder of the car ride and just before we returned to the 5 Chimneys, she said to him that he needed to wake up and he popped awake and said, "Wow...that was a fast trip back!!" Well, he went right to their room and fell immediately back to sleep. A couple of hours later he came down for dinner, a bit groggy, and told us he mistakenly took an entire Ambien instead of an Aleve. He said normally when he takes Ambien to sleep on an airplane, he only takes 1/4 of a pill...today he took a whole one. We all had a great laugh about it all and about his 'baggie of little blue pills.' He was fine and certainly slept well that night!!
Thursday, the 13th, is our last day in the Piedmont and the day Carol and Mark leave for Lake Como. We'll see what's in store for Leah and I tomorrow.
xoxo Stacy
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