Our guided tour of Italy has now concluded and we have now set out on our own.
We found ourselves up and ready early enough to catch a 7:00 tour bus ride to the airport. Hertz was to open about 15 minutes after we found their counter so it was a short wait until we were heading out of the airport, pointed toward Torino in our Fiat 500 (Cinquecento).
A easy adjustment to driving in Italy is to begin in the countryside on a quiet Sunday morning. We stayed off of the Autostrade for quite a few kilometers and only had to avoid bicyclists and gaze at the charming countryside. Once we did finally join the toll road it was a pretty quick trip to our destination.
First stop was at the Museo Nazionale Dell'Automobile (The National Automobile Museum). Again, we arrived a few minutes before it opened.
The museum has a beautiful display of the history of the car with an emphases of the contributions by the Italians. Well worth seeing.
A little lunch at a most unusual Ristorante Pizzeria run by a Chinese family. It was however patronized by locals so we thought we would give it a try. Caprese salad and a mushroom and octopus in a light sauce. (Obviously we didn't understand the menu so we thought we'd just give "whatever" a try…). Both were quite good. Janet even enjoyed both!
We arrived at our hotel for the night, in the mid-afternoon. After checking in, I was able to catch the last half of the F1 race in Austria. Following that we just kicked back while I caught up on the blog. It has been so busy for the last week and a half, it feels great to slow down a little bit.
Hopefully the problems with internet access have been solved. We rented a Hotspot with the car so we should have access most anywhere we go.
The hotel that we are staying in does not have a restaurant but did have recommendations for some near by places. One highest on their list was Scannabue Ristorante. A short walk from our hotel. They open at 7:30PM for dinner (that are a late night bunch here!) so that's what we made reservations for.
While we were on our way to the restaurant, a little early anyway, we walked past a cute little bar (La Choza). Well, we didn't walk very far past until we decided a drink before dinner wouldn't be a bad thing.
Funky little place. Tom Waits was playing on the music system. Tequila and Rum bottles lined the walls. A friendly staff of 2, saw to our needs even as we butchered the Italian language.
Finally to our restaurant, we were at a loss as to what to order. Struggling to understand our waiter, we finally conveyed that we would like to try more local faire. Soon we were enjoying an excellent bottle of a local wine accompanied by a "sampler plate for 2".
An absolutely fabulous dinner that began with some steak tartare, then a dried Cod mixed with mashed potatoes on some sort of oil (truffle…?), soon raviolis (veal, rabbit and fish) topped with cheese and butter that had an aroma you wanted to put your face into. Finally braised veal cheek with mashed potatoes. The food may sound unusual but it was amazingly good. A perfect dinner to celebrate our anniversary.
We didn't see enough of Turino. They have a historic section with the chapels and piazza's like we have seen in many cities. The Shroud of Turin should be around here too. It was nice to have an easy day. We'll just have to see all of that next time.
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