More truffles and scary movies!

The Sunday before Halloween we went to the truffle festival in a town called Moncalvo. This town is so great with its hilly streets that are pedestrian only, the brick buildings and the medieval feel to the city. They even have a medieval festival in the fall which I wasn't able to go to this year- hopefully next year!



the breakfast room

We woke up to more fog that morning and it was worse than the day before. As you can see from the pictures, it was pretty thick and left visibility significantly less than normal. Again, it gave the feeling that we were in Sleepy Hollow. I kept waiting for the headless horseman to pop out at any time. 

a fountain at the B&B, there were huge goldfish in there!

beans over the parking spots at the B&B

We met up with Josh's co-worker Luigi for a drink before going to the festival. He has a house near Moncalvo, so he was there for the weekend and took a break from housework to see us. It was fun to meet him and his wife, and they were very nice!! Hopefully we can get to gether with them again. Luigi is a typical Italian- very happy, super nice and just light hearted. Italians have just a lighter air about them than the people back home. Maybe its just me, but they seem to be less serious about things. Maybe thats why it has taken over a year to get residency (and I still don't have it yet)... But seriously, Italians are very kind, generous people! I feel like I have a lot to learn from them.

we bought some roasted chestnuts,
they were so good!

the merchandise

more merchandise

After a great, romantic weekend of truffle hunting, we went home and enjoyed Halloween with our friends Andrea and Marina. We had dinner, and then the traditional scary movie night. Of course we had to watch Chainsaw Massacre... I hate that movie!! For those of you that don't know, I am not a fan of scary movies. They give me nightmares. Josh holds a traditional scary movie night every year and this year it was more low key, but at least he was able to keep the tradition going. Another tradition that started when I entered the picture is watching Spongebob after the movies so I don't get nightmares! So of course, we watched Spongebob and life was good again. It was another great weekend! So far we have traveled three out of four months in October... I'm starting to get a little tired!! Luckily November slows down for me so I can get caught up with everything at home.

the pumpkin we found in Piemonte and a HUGE butternut
squash we found at the same place.

A romantic weekend for some truffle hunting!

view from our room

The weekend right before Halloween Josh and I went down to the famous Piemonte region (Piedmont) to stay in a small medieval town called Moncalvo. We were lucky enough to get set up with a beautiful country chic room at a B&B within walking distance of the town. When we looked out of our room all you could see were fall colors and vineyards. It was so beautiful! The colors were peaking, and it was a little foggy the whole weekend. It seemed appropriate since it was almost Halloween and the fog made it feel like we were in Sleepy Hollow. I LOVE fall!! It's my favorite season.

Fall colors in the vines


We were lucky to be going to Moncalvo on that particular weekend. The famous truffle festivals were happening in the area so we had to experience them first hand. Truffles are extremely expensive and are found by using dogs or pigs trained to find them. They are essentially an underground mushroom and Piemonte is famous for them. Black truffles are very common so they are less expensive than the white. The only way I can describe the taste (for those of you who have never tried truffle) is that they taste like mushrooms on steroids. It’s a very potent mushroom flavor, not much truffle is needed in a meal. When cooking with truffle, it is usually used as an accent flavor or a garnish shaved over the final presentation. Although, one of my favorite dishes is Mezzaluna (half-moon pasta similar to ravioli) filled with ricotta and truffle, then covered with a white sauce and truffle shavings. OMG…. Its sooooo good!! It makes me hungry just thinking about it.

 

White and Black truffles

Black Truffles

 

we also found this marble Ferrari at the Alba Festival

We stopped by Alba to check out the truffle festival there and had the opportunity to try some wine and buy some truffle products. We really enjoyed it! This would be a fun event to attend with a group of friends. You can enjoy the vendors products while sipping on some wine, and even have some lunch. There are also vendors selling cheeses and meats- some people bought cheese and meat, along with some crackers, a bottle of wine and just had a little picnic at the festival.

a DELICIOUS halloween cookie- it matched the scenery

That same day we also drove around to some of the old hill towns in Piemonte including Neive (an adorable little town about 10 minutes from Alba), Barbaresco (they are also famous for making Barbaresco wine), and Barolo (famous for Barolo wine). After running around all day we were ready to sit in our B&B room and just relax, so we ordered a pizza and opened a bottle of wine we purchased that day. We hung out, ate pizza, drank wine, and played games. It was a great night! Is that a sign that we’re getting old…? J

a friendly cat we found in Neive



Neive



Neive

 



















Barbaresco

Barbaresco had some strange statues...

I like to mimic statues





a little foggy, but here is a view of Barolo from the top of the hill



Barolo



our view at night



A day in Freiburg, Germany

About a week and a half after Mike and Laura visited us, Josh had a meeting in Germany so we drove up there together to spend some time together. The same day that Mike and Laura left, Josh also flew to South Africa for work. He was gone for ten days meeting with doctors and sales reps in S. Africa and Mauritius. Needless to say, I was really lonely by myself in Milan! So, when Josh mentioned that we could drive up to Germany together (the day he returned to Milan) instead of spending two more days apart, I took him up on his offer.

The first major snow of the season in the Alps- it snowed the day before

I drove while Josh made conference calls for work.  This drives me crazy!! Because I can't talk to him, I can't talk to myself (insert joke here...), and I can't listen to the radio. It's just me, the car, the road and him talking about work... Thankfully he was only on conference calls for half of the five hour drive (not the whole way like with the drive the Florence and our previous trip to Germany). I've come to the realization that I don't enjoy traveling with him when he works in the car. It's SOOOO boring!!

Good morning! The view outside of our hotel room

mmm... Starbucks

When we arrived at our hotel, we checked in and decided to walk around town a bit before dinner. It was cold that night, but Freiburg is such a cute little town that we couldn't help but walk around to enjoy it. We had dinner at a cute little German restaurant and called it a night. The next day Josh was meeting with a Doctor all morning and into the afternoon. So I decided to enjoy some Starbucks (American coffee!! yay!), and walk around the town to check it out. Once Josh was done with his meeting, we drove back to Milan. Talk about a quick trip! But it was fun :)

the church

across from the church

a street market in the church square

I found Tootle's marbles!

street market

A great building on one of the squares.

A museum across the street from the hotel- there are lego men
on top of the building by the flags. I found that interesting.

A new era in Italy?

Wow! Last night I was at Marina and Andrea's house for dinner when the news came, no more Berlusconi!! Andrea's sister and her family were also there when the news broke. Immediately everyone at the dinner table started cheering and they said a cheers with their wine glasses to "Super Mario!" (Mario Monti is one of the front runners to become the next Prime Minister). Living in Italy I haven't met one person who has actually liked Berlusconi, they just put up with him because they had to. Will this be a whole new era in Italy? Let's hope so! It would be fantastic to get a great leader for Italy that can pull this country out of the economic crisis it is in, and someone that the people can have faith in.

I found a video on Yahoo Italia showing how the people were reacting in Rome. They were celebrating and chanting things to Berlusconi. Italians swear a lot!! At one point they started chanting "Shut up! Shut up! Go f*** yourself!" I also included a link to what CNN was reporting last night. What are your thoughts?

Reaction in Rome
CNN's report

There's a bathroom on the right!

On our final day in Tuscany we planned to meet up with "Uncle" Joe and spend the day with him. It was a great family reunion for Laura and Joe (as well as Bill the Hobo). Joe was Laura's brother in law and they were very close, but haven't seen each other in about 10 years. We met up with Joe in a small Tuscan town called Greve where he was trying to hide from us in the main square. In typical Joe fashion, he snuck up on us when we were waiting outside of wine shop for Josh. Anytime there is a wine shop, we lose Josh. It's like a moth to a flame, he can't resist!

There was a little fair in Greve when we arrived, this guy was
selling his paintings in original frames (IE: door frame, boxes, etc)

This butcher shop is very famous- it was HUGE!
Maccelleria Falorni

the rooster is the symbol of Chianti country

Joe led the way to a restaurant called Locanda Borgo Antico where we had lunch. The weather was perfect that day and the leaves were starting to change, it was a beautiful drive through the winding hills and vineyards. Joe drove with Mike and Laura, and Josh and I followed in the Opel. They introduced me to Bill when we arrived at the restaurant, and I have to admit that I just don't understand the obsession! Bill is a doll smoking a cigar that was a prominent figure in the Stone family when Joe was a part of it. He now resides with Joe in Tuscany and has adjusted to life in Italy very nicely. They treat him like part of the family... what did I marry into!? :)

Bill the Hobo and his new friend Cinghiale



Laura was wearing her new jeans/boots

We enjoyed some great stories from Joe- we learned about how he designed some of Prince and Apollonia's shoes from Purple Rain, and other fun stories about his brushes with fame while working at Ferragamo. We also enjoyed Mike's story about how he was on top of a pyramid in (Mexico?). While he was filming the skyline his camera panned over Bono standing right by him. It was a double take and he ended up talking to Bono on top of a pyramid! Unfortunately Bill wasn't able to share any similar stories; he was left in the car. The only brush with fame I have is selling some shoes to Torii Hunter and his wife when I worked at Steve Madden. Not as exciting as Joe and Mike's stories!

Mike telling the story of Bono

After lunch we drove by the house that Joe and Laura's sister Barb used to live in, then it was time for some Gelato at a fantastic place!! This shop was packed with a line out the door, and there were about 50 flavors of Gelato. The name of the place is Badiani and we ended the day with the best Gelato in Florence. Joe was a little teary eyed when we had to say goodbye, it was a fantastic reunion for him and he really enjoyed the chance to catch up with Laura and meet Mike.

We started to head back to Milan after saying goodbye to Joe. The car ride was really fun! One song that came on was "Bad Moon Rising" by CCR. Laura mentioned that every time they heard this song in the past, they thought that the lyrics were "there's a bathroom on the right!" Now every time I hear it, I think of that!! It really does sound like they say "there's a bathroom on the right!" Here's a link in case you don't know what I'm talking about:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BmEGm-mraE

They have really good spicey olive oil- it's sooooo good!!

A wonderful trip is coming to a close! Laura and Mike flew back to the US the next morning after some late night pizza from Pizzeria Spontini and the Pizza Nazi. They had to have it one more time. It was so great to have them visit Italy and we can't wait to see them again at the holidays! I have to admit, seeing them made me a little homesick because I miss all my friends and family so much!! I'm definitely looking forward to getting back to MN for the holidays!!! A little more than three weeks and I'll get to see my family again! :)