Lately

Fall is in full swing

Lately we have been really BUSY.

Last Saturday I had a fun visit from Natalie, a friend from last year, who now lives in Alleghe - we went to all her old favorite places in town, and had some prosecco before going to the game. The next day Ryan and I were sitting, having a cappuccino, when I was approached by the woman who owns the cafe, asking me if I would teach her two children English. My new job starts this afternoon! The weather has been incredible, so we've been doing a lot of walking and sitting outside. And lots of cooking. I made spaghetti con vongole the other night from this recipe and it's delish. One of my other new activities is putting a cookbook together of all the things I love to make here (like this, yum). Ryan is back playing now, but we're still waiting on the third win!! We're doing lots of trip planning for Rome, if anyone else has suggestions. And....8 weeks later, I'm still trying to figure out when my Italian class starts! Bella vita!

Travel Time

It's getting to be that time of year again....we're only two weeks away from our mini-break! Once this next round of 9 games is over, Ryan gets a week off from games, a few days off from hockey in general, and we get to go on a little trip. We're assuming that since the team decided to start winning again, he'll get about 3 and a half days off, which is what we had last year. (Last year we went to Siena, Pisa, and Florence).

This year we're jetting (haha no, we're taking the slowest train imaginable) to....ROME!

Image via Google

Trip planning is in full swing, despite the fact that I have no idea actually how many days he will have off, and I probably won't have this information until two days before we leave because this is Italy.

If anyone has suggestions on where to eat, stay, and what to see during our 3 days, we would love to hear them!

Snowy

Seems to be a little bit snowy up in the mountains this morning....

Hockey Talk

This weekend, we took a trip to Brunico, home of the ferocious lupi. Ryan has a minor injury right now so he wasn't playing and we went together, which I generally make it a point not to do because Ryan offers lots of commentary during the games and I can never tell if he's talking to me personally or not. (Usually he isn't). Anyway, Brunico is always interesting for several reasons:

1. Their rink is open air. It's covered but it seems to only have 3 walls around it. You have to really bundle up. (On the plus side, I finally got use out of this hat that I've had for 5 years and never worn....I brought it with me this year specifically for trips to Brunico).

2. Everyone there is confused about what language to speak. For example, on Saturday, a man asked me a question in German, I responded in Italian and he thanked me in English. It really keeps you on your toes.
3. They get about 8 million fans (that's what it feels like compared to Cortina's 200). All 8 million of their fans smoke in the arena since it's sort of open air. You have to squint through the layer of smoke to see the game. Luckily I remembered not to wash my hair beforehand.

Once our lead was blown, I practiced my German by reading that huge sign in front of us

The most exciting part of the game was the first period when we were ahead 1-0. However - we missed most of the first period because there was a detour on the road on the way there. As in there was a detour sign pointing us off the road onto an exit, but then no other sign beyond that so we had to figure it out ourselves. Typical.

Anyway, the first round of games is officially finito, leaving Cortina at.......1 and 8!! The next round begins on Thursday, and here we go again. (This blog is very aptly titled).

The BIG W

Finally.

The Carbonara Challenge

Last year, when we moved to Cortina, my dad gave us a challenge: find the best carbonara in the town and take him to it when he came to visit. After searching for a few months and trying different versions at various restaurants (now that was fun), we found it at Cinque Torri, which is, incidentally, our favorite restaurant in town - and not only because of the carbonara. Challenge completed.

This year....he raised the stakes. Two nights ago, he sent me a picture of the homemade carbonara that he had made himself. I figured if he could do it in Massachusetts, I could certainly do it in Italy. (Although I should mention now that I did have a bad experience in my childhood that involved watching my mother making it one night and realizing that it was made with raw eggs which still freaks me out a little bit).

Anyway, here we go....

Yum.

Lago di Misurina

Today was a beautiful fall Columbus Day here in Cortina so we took a drive up to Lake Misurina. (We still celebrate American holidays, you know). We had been last year for the ice polo but obviously it's quite different when it's not frozen! Aside from ice polo, the lake was the site of the speed skating races during the 1956 Olympics - apparently they get more use out of it when it's frozen. We walked along the path all the way around the lake before heading back down to Cortina for a delicious lunch of pumpkin ravioli.

Happy Long Weekend

It's beginning to look a lot like fall here...the leaves are turning red and orange more and more with every walk I take!

Hope everyone back home has a nice, relaxing Columbus Day weekend - we'll be making soup, watching this movie since I finally finished the book (and may have been the last person in the world to do so), drinking Alto Adige wine from my trip to Bolzano, and speaking of....we'll either be trying to beat Bolzano tonight or trying to continue the epic losing streak that we're on. It's a toss up.

PS - Sometimes (usually when they're winning) I get asked how to keep track of the game scores. The website is here - enter at your own risk.

Bolzano

I wanted to share a few pictures of our trip to Bolzano yesterday! I went with my friend Stacy, who was a great tour guide - she and her husband lived there last year and then were very close by for two years before that, so she showed us the city in a completely different light. I'm a Bolzano convert now - I have to say that every time I visited the city last year, I was glad that we didn't live there full time, but yesterday, I didn't want to leave!

After doing a few errands (Bolzano is a much bigger city than Cortina with much lower prices) Stacy took us for a drive on the Strada del Vino, which winds through the vineyards of the Sudtirol/Alto Adige region. It was warm and sunny and breathtakingly beautiful. We stopped in the most charming towns along the road - Caldaro, Appiano and San Paolo, which is where Stacy lived last year. Everyone was out in the town square sunning themselves and drinking wine or fresh apple juice.

We found a winery and bought Lagrein, which is native to that region - and we tasted some grapes right off the vine!

There were also tons of apple orchards along the road, so we stopped at a little farm stand to buy huge bags of apples, grapes and homemade wine from a man named Georg. It was funny - we couldn't figure out which language he spoke! We tried both German and Italian and he didn't seem to understand either....but he was happy just to pick out wines for us without speaking.

Stacy's friend from home, who was also with us, had just been traveling in India for a month and she made a comment that in India, you feel as though the world is ending and there are so many problems in life, but then you go to the Alto Adige, and all is right and beautiful in the world again. She definitely had that right yesterday!

Happy October

Can't believe we've already been here for a month (plus 7 more)! The girls are headed off to Bolzano tomorrow for a day trip. We're going to do some sight seeing, shopping, and eat sushi (there are some things that we can't live without, but we did wait a whole month...). The boys will be staying at home to focus on winning. In the mean time, I'm brushing up on my German since that's the going language in Bolzano, so....Auf Wiedersehen!