10/12
Today we had to go to Milan (about a 3 hour drive) where we would overnight to take our flight in the morning to Bordeaux. We decided to take a short detour to visit the city of Carrara, only about 30-40 minutes away, to get a view of the mountains of marble. Carrara is a pleasant town and we walked through a large public park where pretty much every man made structure was made of marble.
We could see the mountains with their white faces of marble in the distance and after an hour or so we left to head out to Milan.
The route was all autostrada so should have been easy peasy. The first hang up was a detour from one autostrada to the next which was the route to Milan. Not too much of a problem, the detour road was still an autostrada and we would enter the one to Milan at a different entrance. Then, the s**t hit the fan when we arrived at the entrance and found that traffic was backed up for miles due to an earlier accident with no reasonable expectation of things getting better. We stopped at a gas station to buy an Italy map and talked to the attendant who told us another way to get to Milan. Unfortunately, the new route was significantly longer and took us through Milan at commute time. Total travel time: 6 hours, lots of stress.
We returned the car and they thankfully declared it without damage despite the several new dents that we provided and gratefully checked into the Sheraton at the airport and even more gratefully went to dinner and to have a bit of wine....OK , maybe more than a bit. Dinner was risotto Milanese for me....delicious...and radicchio gnocchi with gorgonzola for Dick. The gnocchi sauce was almost chocolate looking and he said it was unique and delicious. We had a side of grilled vegetables that included something called charcoal potatoes, potatoes mashed with charcoal which of course made them black, strange looking but surprisingly very tasty. The remains of our bottle of Chianti went up to our room to provide us a nightcap.
Today we had to go to Milan (about a 3 hour drive) where we would overnight to take our flight in the morning to Bordeaux. We decided to take a short detour to visit the city of Carrara, only about 30-40 minutes away, to get a view of the mountains of marble. Carrara is a pleasant town and we walked through a large public park where pretty much every man made structure was made of marble.
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| And everywhere on the outskirts are businesses selling marble |
We returned the car and they thankfully declared it without damage despite the several new dents that we provided and gratefully checked into the Sheraton at the airport and even more gratefully went to dinner and to have a bit of wine....OK , maybe more than a bit. Dinner was risotto Milanese for me....delicious...and radicchio gnocchi with gorgonzola for Dick. The gnocchi sauce was almost chocolate looking and he said it was unique and delicious. We had a side of grilled vegetables that included something called charcoal potatoes, potatoes mashed with charcoal which of course made them black, strange looking but surprisingly very tasty. The remains of our bottle of Chianti went up to our room to provide us a nightcap.
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