Italy road trip part 7 - More food and getting our Oil results!

Today is our last day in Italy before we head home. To start off the day we have our apertivo in Bevagna with Marco. We headed over to his shop and he started shaving off different kinds of meats and pecorino cheese for us.

Inside the Butcher Shop

Another inside look

Yeah meat is everywhere in this store!

All the Pecorino cheese you could want!

Marco hard at work!

He also shaved off some head cheese as well. I ate as much as I could but knowing what  it is I really couldn't eat much. Head cheese is not what you think. It's not even cheese. It is basically the fat and leftover parts of the pig that aren't used. Marco combines it with citrus, garlic, and nutmeg and then cooks it together to create that big blob called head cheese. It doesn't taste bad at all it's very good, but you just can't think about what you may or may not be eating.

The Head Cheese...looks taste huh??

After some meat and cheese purchases we went to Perugia to spend some more time walking around the city during the day. We did a little shopping but mostly walked around the city. We had to be back at La Rogaia for dinner and we would find out the results of our olive picking.

Annette made us a traditional italian meal and Wolfgang gave out the olive oil. We ended up with 2 liters per person!!! We were all very excited! We all took turns filling our tins of oil and then sat down to dinner. First was a bruschetta with olive tapenade and a bruschetta with chopped up tomatoes. Then came lentil soup which was so good. The main course was pork loin and fried potatoes that were the best potatoes ever!!! Then for dessert Panna cotta with apples on top. The dinner was amazing.

Mike getting his oil

Bryan with his oil tin

Adam getting Oil

And finally me!

After dinner Adam made the bad decision of asking Wolfgang about the Tango lessons they offer so Wolfgang forces Adam to tango around the room with him...multiple times. I almost cried I laughed so hard. Then Wolfgang and Annette showed us how it's really done.

Adam and Wolfgang dancing the Tango hehehe!

Wolfgang throwing Annette around the floor a little!

After dancing it was back to the apartment to pack and head to bed. We had an 8 hour drive home ahead of us the next day!

This was probably one of the most unique vacations I have ever been on, but in saying that It was so much fun and we got to see a ton of Italy. I am now officially a huge fan of working holiday's and Italy but that's a given!!

Italy road trip part 6 - Assisi, wine tasting, and the best steak of our life!

This morning was a slow morning. We took our time getting ready and then took off for Assisi. We took a couple of wrong turns and ended up on some back roads. but they had an amazing view of the city so we pulled off to the side and walked through a field to take pictures. Hopefully the Farmer of this land either didn't mind us being on his land or wasn't paying attention =)

Assisi, Italy

We headed up to Assisi and walked through town to St. Francis Church where St. Francis is buried. The church was beautiful and very colorful. It looked almost Moroccan inside.

St. Francis Church

We ate lunch there which frankly wasn't that good and in a very gaudy and touristy place, but when a whole town is built on tourism you eat where you can. Before leaving town we stopped by this coffee bar because we were freezing and needed some caffeine to keep us moving today. While we were drinking our espresso we saw some winding stairs heading into a basement and were trying to peek down and see what it was. The barrista girl told us to go ahead down so of course we definitely headed into the darkness. It ended up being a tunnel that takes you to a cantina!!! Unfortunately there were no lights so we couldn't see to get all the way to the cantina but we had fun playing in the cave anyways!!

Adam in the Cave..I used the flash on the camera to light our way..didn't work too well, just blinded all of us!

Next we took off from Assisi and headed to Montefalco to go wine tasting. The first winery that we tried apparently takes reservations and they were not pleased that we were there. So we started driving around and trying to follow signs to the cantina's. We eventually figured out that cantina's are in people's homes. As we were looking a young heavily pierced guy was leaving and pulled up to see what we were looking for. When we said cantina he had us follow him on his dirt bike down a long dirt road and through and olive farm to a house. None of these people speak english so he told them we were looking for a cantina and the lady took us into a small 10x10 room that had ton of wine in it. We kinda thought we might be murdered by someone at this point. Instead, she poured us a couple different kinds to taste. We felt bad for making her drop her domestic duties to feed us wine so we all bought a bottle and then got the heck out of dodge!

The very small cantina room!

We drove back to the main part of town and stopped at this huge winery called Arnaldo Caprai. We saw cars so we figured it was open. It was and completely dead so we got the full attention of Emily the wine connoisseur. She is originally from the US so talking to her was awesome. We tasted some different kinds of wine and olive oil that they sell at the winery. Emily also was nice enough to call ahead and make reservations for us at a restaurant in a small town called Bevagna. We also convinced her to meet us there for dinner and hangout with us. You can tell we all really miss americans =)

Outside at Arnaldo Caprai

The wine tasting room

The restaurant is called Scottadito and is owned by a local butcher, Marco. Emily ordered for all of us since she spoke the most italian...and in this town hardly anyone speaks english. We all got Steak Florentine per due. Which means steak for two...each couple shared together which was good because those steaks were huge.
Marco was really hamming it up for us. Anytime he saw Adam with the camera he would hold up the meat and cleaver for the picture.

Marco and one of our steaks!

Adam and Marco the butcher

A leg of meat just hanging in the kitchen

Halfway through the steak..don't worry Adam and I put it down..it just took awhile.

After we gorged ourselves with dinner, Marco came out and hung out at our table. Emily was our translator for the night and helped Marco explain to us how he gets the cuts of meat and the process he goes through. It was so fun and we ended up opening and closing this restaurant down that night. At the end of the night Marco invited us to his butcher shop the next day for an apertivo of meats and cheeses. Emily explained to us that in Italy if someone invites you it is a huge insult not to show up. Therefore, we were in...and looking forward to more delicious meat.

Italy Road Trip part 5 - Florence for the day!

We all got up early today and got on the road to Florence. Adam was driving our stick shift car so we know we were taking our own lives into our hands hahahaha. He's a very very good driver but re-adjusting himself to stick shift on the side of a hill made us all concerned for a bit.

All of us having lunch before we started walking all over the city

We parked outside of the city limits, because you aren't allowed to drive into the city unless your car is registered. We walked in and headed to the middle of the city. We started off at Galerie de Accademia to see Michaelangelo's David. It was probably one of the largest statues I have ever seen and it was amazing.

The statue on the left is a replica of David

After we headed towards the Duomo Santa Maria. We snapped a few pictures outside and in then got in line to make the trek to the top of the Duomo. It is 414 steps up one way. To divert the up and down traffic they move you along the top border inside the dome, it is really freaky! We were tired and a bit sweaty by the time we got to the top but it was worth it for the view. It's the highest point in Florence we were told. You could see the entire city and part of the countryside.

The Basilica di Santa Maria

The basilica di Santa Maria again

The top portion of the dome

Walking into the basilica

Looking down as you are walking around the top of the dome...only halfway up

There we all are walking around the top of the dome

Florence from the top of the Dome...it's gorgeous!

Me and Florence

The Tower by the front of the Basilica

More of the landscape of Florence

We saw another cathedral from the top of the Basilica but didn't have time to venture over and see it

Heading down

Then came the trek down. Parts of the stairwells were for up and down traffic so some jams happened but we made it out and rewarded ourselves with Gelato!!

We then walked over to the famous Ponte Vecchio bridge. It houses many jewelry shops built right into the bridge. It is the oldest bridge in Florence surviving wars and floods. The jewelry was a bit out of our price range but it was very cool to window shop.

The Ponte Vecchio bridge

The jewelry shops lining the streets

Picture perfect moment on the bridge

Next, Adam and Mike were on the hunt for Leather messenger bags. Florence is known for their leather goods and it has the best leather market. The street was lined with all sorts of dealers wanting to make a deal with you. Both boys got great bags that look amazing. After shopping we sat down to regroup and decided to drive to Siena for dinner. I mean Why not drive to siena for dinner if you can??

The streets of siena..very much deserted

More on the streets of Siena

The main piazza in Siena

Another view of the piazza

Siena is another town that is pretty small with not a lot going on. There were people walking the streets and a few eating here and there, but for the most part quiet. We found a restaurant that had great pizza and pasta...we get nothing else in italy hahaha. Then drove the rest of the way home after a very very long day of walking and sight seeing.

Italy road Trip part 4 - Seeing our hard work pay off

Today was going to be a weird day. Adam had a phone conference for most of the day so we decided to get out of his hair for a little while so he could concentrate. The 4 of us headed into Passignano to try and find a wireless cafe. After parking and finding nothing we went to the train station for better luck. It was a single room with a bar and a couple casino machines. Then there were also a couple computers you could use..but that's about it.

About an hour and a half later we head back to the parking lot only to realize we were blocked in. We had one glimmer of hope, there was a large break between a car and a tree that we thought we could get our SUV through. We were almost through and just had a problem with a few inches and our bumper. Then an older italian gentleman walked over and told us to pick up the little car and move it. I thought this was a joke. Then he directed all of us to sections of the little fiat looking car and we picked up the end of that car and moved it a good foot. We were in the clear and laughing our butts off that we just picked up and moved a car in italy!!

Adam was still on his phone call when we got back so we had to head to the olive mill press with out him. Wolfgang led the caravan to the mill where we would press our olives and see our olive oil. We watched all the machines work from dumping in to sucking twigs and leaves to washing and then the cold pressing. We also saw the brown gunk and water extrapolated out and the pure green oil come out.

These are our olives and the next picture is Wolfgang throwing the baskets into the bin.

This is phase one, the big basket above is dumped into the blue bin

Phase 2, the twigs and leaves are sucked out through the bottom of the bin

Then the olives go up through the yellow tube and are cleaned

You can see all the guck coming off of the olives

The olives are pressed and the first round of pulp and leftover olive bits are contained in this pan

Then all thats left is the bright green olive oil, pure and organic

We headed back to the apartment to clean up and get Adam. Then we headed to Castiglione del Lago for dinner that night. We were told of a great pizza place there at the Cantina Pizzeria. The pizza's were fantastic and of course dinner wouldn't be complete with Adam not getting something weird...Wild Boar. It was pretty tasty though.

The lovely pizza oven

the sleepy town

My pizza mushroom and ham...delicious

Adam's dinner Wild Boar...also delicious!

The town was pretty quite, it was also up on a hill and pretty much closed down in the low tourist season. So we walked from one end to the other and froze, then drove back to our apartment for our fabulous fireplace and books.