I'm at N 45.887016, E 12.000211
Fri, May 9. Hopped out of bed at 6am in order to get an early start into Italy. After breakfast I was on the road by 7:30. It was cloudy and some showers were in the air, so I was mulling whether to take the highway or back road up the Brenner pass. In the end, I decided to stay off the Autobahn and wake myself up with a few curves. Make that lots of curves. The first 15 miles up the Brennerstrasse are nothing but twisties. Yeehaw. No time for day dreaming, just settle in and go. It occurred to me that motorcycling on a road like that, driving on a track and cooking at a high level have similar attributes - focus and adrenalin. The world is blocked out, you're in the moment.
I haven't even hit the great passes yet and I'm already loving it. You need to definitely stay within your limits and lots of warning signs remind you of that. Crashing is not something you want to do on any day, but here you have the added twist that you will then fall off a mountain... Not recommended.
So after I crossed the Brenner I hopped on the Autostrada and started descending into Italy. It's really quite astonishing, in that you drive downhill for 100km, all the way to Bolzano. The temps rose probably about 20 deg from maybe 45 deg at the top, so I had to stop a couple of times to peel off layers.
All was not smooth however. As you leave the Brenner highway there are toll booths. I remembered that I had my wallet packed, so I decided to quickly pull off into a rest stop. There, I found out that that you just get a ticket and pay when you exit. Sigh, wasted stop. Fine, off we go. Wait, how do I get out of here? And surely I can get on the right road through this exit.... NOT. Back on the highway to Austria. NOOOOOOOOOO. Trying not to get totally pissed and simply enjoy the scenery - again. Next exit 10 miles, peel off ride down the local road. 20 min later, back where I started. Fine, onwards, don't dwell on it. The rest was smooth sailing and I rolled into Valdo by 12:20. 275 km. I was beat.
Valdobbiadene is Prosecco country. Vines as far as the eye can see.
The Riva de Milan, is what is referred to as agrotourisme. A farm, with a restaurant and rooms attached. The main business used to be growing and making Prosecco, but over the years they built a separate building of guest rooms and the restaurant is heavily visited by locals as well as tourists.
I was welcomed by the proprietor who asked if I wanted some Prosecco 5 seconds after he handed me the key. Why yes, what an excellent question. I dumped my stuff in the room, took a quick shower and settled down outside with a bottle and glass. Heaven. What could be better? A short while later a plate of salume showed up! Never assume that things cannot improve, even if they already seem perfect!
About an hour later, my parents arrived and we drove to Ca Salina, the preferred Prosecco supplier, to meet the rest of the group. He has a very nice table up on the hill where the seven of polished off a few bottles of Prosecco and some salume - are we seeing a pattern yet?
The purpose of the trip for the rest of the group is to buy Prosecco for the year, so the two strapping young lads of the group drive down with a flatbed van, which can take 93 cases. It's popular...
Back to the Riva for a nap and then later dinner with lots of - yep - Prosecco, salume, gnocci with ragout, salad, filet. As happend last time, I hit Prosecco saturation half way through and had to switch to red wine. Not really specialty of the house, but great nonetheless. Some dolce and grappa to finish everything off. Nice.
No comments:
Post a Comment