This Woman Was Here

We had a leisurely morning in our apartment in Varenna. Our next door neighbor, Rina (short for Caterina), a sweet woman in her 70’s, brought a workman by to fix a broken latch on a window and apparently fell for JP, who was bare chested and shaving in the bathroom. Before we left, she brought him ‘un regalo’, a photo of the house with her address on the back and asked him to write her.

We took the ferry to Bellagio where we were met by Monica, the host for our second apartment. She drove us to the apartment, considerably more than 5 minutes from downtown, but in a lovely garden in a quiet neighborhood. We were all starved so we went out looking for a restaurant. We passed an 11^th century church and the tiny port of Lopia where we found a lovely restaurant under an arbor.

We were seated and offered glasses of proseco and had one of the best meals we’ve eaten so far—risotto with white truffles, spaghetti with lake fish, and meat ravioli. We ordered a bottle of proseco and enjoyed the moment.

The restaurant was next to the entrance to Villa Melzi, so we wandered the beautiful gardens in weather that was, unfortunately, far too hot.The villa dates from the Napoleonic era.

The house is not open to the public, but the gardens are lovely, with enormous trees, an oriental garden, grottoes, and statues.

Chapel

When we got back to the apartment, we all had to shower to cool down. The boys napped while Steve and I adventured out to find the supermarket Monica described and came back with provisions for our stay—more wine and beer, white truffle oil, chicken cordon blue, chicken wings, assorted mushrooms, bread, cheese, eggs, juice, espresso—all for a grand total of 56 E, less than we pay for a typical lunch. Dinner was delicious and we decided to venture into town for gelato. We took the advice of past guests who had written advice in a guest book and took the inner road rather than the main road. It was a narrow lane bordered by walls and houses, which had probably been in use for a thousand years. The walk, which took 25 minutes, was one of the highlights of the trip. I’ve never felt so much like I was walking through the middle ages.