The Adventure Trip

Last week we went camping for a few days and we met a family while we were hiking. We started talking to them and the littlest boy announced, "we're on our epic trip!" His father explained that each year when the kids get out of school, they do a camping trip for a few days, to a different spot. We told them that we do the same, every spring, and the little boy said, "And do you call it the epic trip too?!" But we call ours the adventure trip! We pick a starting point, camp there for a few days and then continue on to wherever we feel like....here are a few pictures from this year's Adventure Trip:

Roman Food Tour

Yesterday I shared a few pictures from our time in Rome last week, but the best thing that we did while we were there was....a food tour! We went with a company called The Roman Foodie (the sister company of The Roman Guy, a popular tour operator in Rome).

The first time that Ryan and I went to Rome together, two years ago, we crammed everything into three days: the Colosseum, the Roman Forum, the Pantheon, St. Peter's and the Vatican museum, the Borghese Gallery....and then we needed a vacation from our vacation. This time we were excited to try something a little different and to appreciate Rome through its food.

We did the Trastevere Locals Food Tour which was fun for us because we stayed in Trastevere this trip and it was fun to explore our neighborhood in greater depth. There were six stops on the tour: we started at a cheese shop where we tried all different kinds of cheese including Pecorino, Parmesan, a cheese made with saffron that was bright yellow (!), buffalo mozzarella and my personal favorite, Burrata. Burrata is type of mozzarella; when it's being made, they cut the mozzarella ball open and put smaller pieces of mozzarella and cream inside and then tie it up again. When you cut into it, it's the most creamy, delicious thing you can imagine. We learned that it's originally from the region of Puglia - where we were headed after Rome - so we were excited to be on the right track.

Then we headed to a tiny restaurant that primarily makes baccala. Baccala is cod fish - up north, in Cortina, we eat it creamed, with rice or polenta. So we were surprised to find that in Rome, rather than being a main course, it's a street food! It's one of the only foods that Italians take to go and eat while they walk. In Rome, they fry the baccala and it's eaten in paper napkins.

It was fun to wander around Trastevere, stopping at tiny places with delicious food - and the weather was great, so that was a plus!

My favorite stop was a place called TASTEvere (ha). It was a tiny cafe/shop selling and cooking with only local foods. Everything was so fresh - we tried various meats and cheeses, crostini topped with an arugula paste, cauliflower hummus and fresh raspberry and apple juices. If I lived in Rome, I would have gone there every day.

Then it was on to a popular neighborhood spot, Trattoria da Teo, for Roman pastas. But first! A fried artichoke - my favorite - so I got to have two during our stay in Rome. Then we tried the two famous pastas, Cacio e Pepe (which is just cheese and lots of black pepper) and Amatriciana. Both of these pastas are so simple which is typical of Roman dishes and Italian food in general. (And this article in the New York Times was fascinating about the secret to Roman pastas).

Appropriately so, we ended the tour with gelato. Ryan had a fantastic lemon/basil flavor which was so refreshing and would be perfect for a hot summer day (actually it was perfect after an evening of great food too!).

Ryan and I weren't sure if we were "tour" people, since we generally like to do our own thing, but this was a fun way to see Rome in a different - and delicious - light, and we were really glad that we tried it.

You can check out The Roman Foodie's website here (and The Roman Guy's here) - and if you're in Rome in need of a tour, think about this one!

And We're Off!

Tomorrow we're leaving for our big trip and we're so, so excited. Normally I hate this time of year with all the sorting and packing and storing and cleaning but this year it felt fun because we're going on a big adventure. We're taking four weeks (!!) and we're heading SOUTH. Here's our route:

Tomorrow morning we'll be taking the bus from Cortina to Venice where we'll hop on a train and make our way over to Cinque Terre. We're staying in Corniglia which is the middle of the five towns and is perched up on a cliff.

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From there we'll head to Rome for three nights. We're going to do a food tour and a day trip to Orvieto.

Then we're going to the eastern side of Italy, to Bari for a few nights. While in Bari, we'll do more day trips, including Alberobello, the caves, and Matera.

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Then back to the the west side, to a tiny town called Massa Lubrense where we'll stay for five nights. From there, we'll visit Pompeii and explore tiny towns like Positano and Ravello on the Amalfi Coast.

And THEN, we're taking the (overnight!) ferry to Sicily, where we'll stay for a week before flying back to Venice at the end of the month.

Please follow along! And if you have any suggestions about things to do/places to eat/what to see in any of these areas, feel free to share! (You can follow us on Twitter and Instagram too). xo

Wine Tasting

We've lived in Italy for two seasons now - IN the Veneto, AND only two hours away from the Sud Tirol - and we've never been wine tasting. Pathetic. We decided to fix that yesterday and drove to Bolzano with Stacy, Derek and Baby Gracie to taste some delicious wines from the Alto Adige-Sud Tirol region.

First we stopped at the Girlan winery and then made our way to St. Paul's for a little more. We tasted whites (Chardonnay, Biaca Riserva, Sauvignon) and reds (Pinot Noir, Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon, Lagrein - my favorite wine of all time) and a dessert wine, Rosenmuskateller (lots of German up there in Bolzano).

We bought a few of our favorites to take home....adding to our already large load - oh well. We also got to eat dinner at a restaurant where you sit in huge wine barrels (awesome).

Next up: Munich tomorrow for Ryan's birthday!

Back to Normal

It's been a whirlwind of Christmas, New Years, visitors, birthdays and today we are finally settling back in to our normal routine. This past weekend, Ryan had a few days off so we took a little birthday trip to Lake Como. We stayed in Bellagio and it was so beautiful, relaxing, and quiet and was the perfect place to unwind after the past 3 weeks.

We went for a long walk, had a picnic by the lake, found the hotel that my parents stayed in 30 years ago during their honeymoon, drank prosecco while watching the sunset, had a delicious local pasta (both nights because it was so good) with sage and cabbage and cheese, played cards and took naps. It was the perfect weekend trip - here are a few pictures, if you'd like to see....

 Our hotel and the view from one of our windows.....the light there was so dreamy.

When we arrived, the woman who ran the hotel gave us a map and told us the only thing to do in January was to go for a long walk. So on Saturday we took the walk on the map, which led us down by the lake, up in the hills and into a few neighboring towns.

We had stopped at a salumeria beforehand and brought a picnic with us, which we ate by the lake....

It was quite cold so we had to go back to the room afterwards to snuggle up under blankets and take a nap, but we woke up to see the sun setting over the lake while having a glass of prosecco.

And then.......since no trip in Italy is complete without a visit to a church, we stopped in Milan on the way home on Sunday to see the Duomo, which was incredible, of course, and have lunch.

More Christmas Marketing

On Sunday we headed up to Bolzano for the day to visit the Christmas market there - Italy's biggest and best. Also with all the Christmas-marketing we do during this season, we've never actually been to one in Italy. I drove, so it took us several hours to get there instead of only two. But it was so worth it. We walked around and checked out all the stalls which sold millions of Christmas tree ornaments and sparkly decorations and mittens. We ate big pretzels with melted cheese and drank gluhwein and, when we got really cold after the sun went down at 4 pm, tried a Bombardino which is a hot rum drink native to the area, and which we don't get in Cortina since we're technically not part of the South Tyrol region. But - we have prosecco instead, so that's okay. It ended up being a very successful trip because we finally found a star for the top of our tree - and because we stopped for Chinese food on the way home (it was Sunday night after all....no better time for Chinese food)!

Christmas Market-ing in Lienz

Today we decided to get out of the country and go see a Christmas market that we haven't been to before. But the best part was - I drove. Ryan lured me into the car, telling me we were going to a CHRISTMAS MARKET (!!) and then he made me drive. All the way to Lienz, Austria. It was my first time driving a stick shift, except for around the parking lot of the rink where I learned - and we all made it home safe and sound.

Anyway. Lienz. It was freezing! On the way there, the temperature was -11 Celsius which is 12 degrees. 12! So we got there and we had to have some gluhwein or else we would have frozen. Also we decided that we are collecting mugs from various Christmas markets throughout Austria, Italy and Germany, so we needed a mug, of course. Then we ate this delicious baked potato with a garlic sour cream sauce and grilled onions and bacon on it. We don't have stuff like that in Cortina. We wandered around and bought an ornament for our tree and a delicious smelling Christmas candle, and then did some grocery shopping - in Austria, they have thrilling things like cumin and cayenne pepper, which you absolutely cannot find in Cortina.

Here's a few pictures from our day:

Munich!

On Wednesday and Thursday, we took a little girls trip to Munich. I've never been to Germany before - except the airport - so I was really excited. The weather was AWFUL - freezing and snowy and rainy....but we came prepared with rain boots, umbrellas and hats, so we still had fun walking around and seeing the sights, which was mainly....the Christmas market! Let the Christmas market season BEGIN! Their market had just opened, and was very popular, so we spent a lot of time there buying ornaments for our trees and drinking Gluhwein and eating pretzels and sausages with mustard. We also spent a lot of time in the German grocery stores, looking at all the things they don't have in Italy. We stocked up on German chocolate, beer and clementines (most of which you can probably buy in Cortina, but....), and practiced our German, which was very mediocre. Turns out that Munich is only four hours away from Cortina, so we'll be going back, maybe in the spring when it's not so cold and gray!

And a Few More....

Back by popular demand....here's a few more picture of our trip to Rome earlier this month.

The Victor Emmanuel monument, which was very close to our little hotel

Rainy streets in Trastevere, our first night

Great view of the Colosseum

Walking around the Forum....

More Forum

A beautiful ceiling in the Vatican Museum - which we saw a lot of

A map from the "map room" in the Vatican Museum....we were trying to look for Cortina!

Even MORE walls and ceilings!

A view of Piazza del Popolo

A little duck pond in the Borghese Gardens

Hope everyone has a great weekend! Ryan has a tough game on Saturday night against Brunico - they're #1 - but we won on Thursday so we might be making a come back....