home of the 1954 winter olympic games.
i woke up to a sticky and stiff left knee- a souvenir of one of my less than controled falls yesterday. i took the stairs to and from breakfast to loosen it up before i had to sit in the car all day. breakfast was the same as yesterday- chris said this may be the last real breakfast we have while we are in italy so i made sure to enjoy it. we went back up to the room to pack- keeping all the dirty clothes in the duffle so we could find a lavandaria in roma- i remember seeing a few on the first day during our "find a bancomat- QUICK!" adventure. on the way down with our bags i realized that all the hotels we stayed at so far (at least ones with lifts) NONE of the lifts would have fit our entire family- even without luggage. the lifts here have a maximum capacity of about 5 people, with no room for bags. we are now in the car-
chris wants to take a peek at the west coast so he asked me to map out a path. this is the route i mapped out using the complimentary map in the glove compartment- a4 per padova, a13 per bologna, 64 per pistoia, alora(which means "then", "whatever", "anyway") a11 ovest to pisa. i guess we'll see the tower that leans- or so we've heard. get a chance to check out the west coast, then head south towards roma on any road- because that's what all roads should do here, right? when we get to roma we'll check in, return the car at the airport, and then come back to the hotel and maybe map out our plan for tomorrow.
the tower was neat. i took a few pictures and eavesdropped on a tour guide giving his spiel. at rosemary trattoria- pizzeria between teh parcheggio and the tower we stopped for a bite. i rodered lasagna al forno but the waitress who spoke little engloish and i who spoke little italian got into some difficulty. the owner/business man came over and pointed to the menu item i was pointed to and said, "for people who cannot eat farina." got it. not gluten. i can't remember the word- it began with a "c". there was an asterisk by it saying that it began as a frozen item and they reheated it. so i definitely wanted the real lasagna al forno and not the gluten free stuff.
chris had cuattro salume pizze which looked to have been cooked in a brick ovewn and smelled delicious. we both commented on how food always came to the table PIPING hot- i mean dangerous hot. i think i have burned my tongue at least once a day since arrival. i'm just NOT used to eating HOT food. typically i am the last to eat so it's rather lukewarm by then.
also- when i listend to the rick steve's podcast on italian cuisine he mentioned that espresso was often used as a palate cleanser. i also think frizzante is a good option. it's what i use since caffeine has such a lasting effect on me. s. pellegrino has the fizzing- palate cleansing- effect without all the heavy syrup that soda has to offer. i make it a point to swish around some before trying a bite of something different than what i had been eating. chris and i order different things so we can samply as much variety as we can.
more words- chiuso/closed, aperto/open, diversione/detour, scuola/school. i remember passing a white passenger van in firenze that said "scuola calcio"- that sounded like a school i'd love to have gone to!
after eating we headed south from pisa along the coast- on ss1- kind of equivalent to the pacific coast highway. i kind of wished we hadn't eaten in pisa because there were some clifftop ristorantes overlooking the mediterranean that looked beautiful- even if the food wasn't worth it(which i doubt) the view alone would have been worth it.
we pulled into roma and after driving around a bit we found our hotel. our room had this neat electricity saving device by the door. all the electricity of the room would only turn on if we had our room key plugged into it. and propped on one of the pillows was a tiny box of essential oil blends formulated for more efficient and deeper sleep. one oil blend was a spray you use on the pillows and the other was a roll on that you could apply to any pulse taking spots. we hooked up to the internet and skyped with the girls who are happily staying at christina's house.
after skyping we headed to teh lobby ristorante/buffet. i filled a piati with all the antipasti they were serving- which was alot. i wanted to try all of it- including the baby octopus. it didn't taste salty or fishy- like i thought it would taste- but tasted more like chicken mixed with squid.
wine is more expensive here at the hotel. we headed out for a walk after dinner and got lost. it rained, thundered, and lightninged- my leather mary janes were soaked through- bleeding all over my feet.
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