We did look out at the bikes this morning, just to make sure that someone didn’t climb up the three floors of old uneven stairs and take them off the very small balcony that’s just outside our apartment and whisk them away without us noticing.
Other than that, they had a well deserved break, as did we. Well, maybe not deserved, but it was nice to sleep in and generally do a whole lot of nothing other than wander about, sweat, and look at stuff.
Oh, in between I did catch up on the journal which is no small feat when the lure of ‘nothing’ is beckoning.
So, just some general sight seeing in this very beautiful old town. It was another hot one today, and it’s just starting to verge on being uncomfortably crowded, at least to these two slight agrophobes.
Tomorrow’s our last day of cycling when we return to our starting point in Somma Lombardo. This is the first circular tour we’ve done since 2012 and it’s quite nice. No anxiety about getting bikes or transport sorted and we’re back in somewhat familiar territory, but that’s tomorrow.
Keeping this short again … more colour in the picture captions.
Read on!
Very interesting, but still very good, morning coffee at The Palace (a very ‘coffee’ coffee place). This is what I thought would be a regular doppio macchiato. It was much more than that!
A ham & cheese toastie for K (Scot’s roots coming out there … it sounded much more fancy in Italian) and a great Bresaola arugula and pecorino focaccia for me. We were ‘breakfasting’ Italian style, both in food and in time .. it was about 10 am before we rolled out to get this
Our stroll up to the top of the hill and the 21 or so ‘temples’ situated at Chesa del Sacro Monte di Orta … a UNESCO site, we encountered a lot of odd, to us, displays that were centuries old and depicting various seemly religious scenes. To us it had a bit of a vaudeville look (no offence to any religious folks)
These were almost full size figures doing something that looked important. All the six or so temples (of the 21 in total) that we had a look at had similar ‘displays’
I’ve always been struck by the amount of violence and general ‘flailing about’ that is depicted in these religious artworks. You've got to wonder what the purpose was (or maybe still is?)
OMG - literally outside the door to our apartment … Stelvio Guy, closely related to Sprinter Van Guy from Splugen. There’s a reason this is a PEDESTRIAN zone with large signs indicating such at each end of this road!
A very good dinner at Ai du Santi sitting outside in the main square on a perfect June evening. Both K and I started with a zucchini and cheese tart with a beet purée
Wouldn’t it be nice, by the Beach Boys … but really Brain Wilson, in memoriam.
Good night from Orta San Giulio. Last ‘night’ of the cycling trip … and the start of our detox program … we missed the ‘toast of the day’ over a nice bottle of Ribolla at dinner
Lyle McLeodTo Karin KaarsooNot quite fat fingers for this one, more like dyslexic ones. Now that you’ve pointed it out though, I kinda like it. Do you think Mike Love’s nickname was Pinky? That would have been cool, then they could have been the inspiration for the cartoon. Reply to this comment 2 days ago
