BACK AT IL MOLINO BUT FOUND MEMORIES OF ARCE AND CASTROCIELO

 Memories that will live within us forever were made on our trip to Arce and Castrocielo.  Here you see the pool and the mountains in the background at Villa Euchelia.  It is a beautiful place with only 7 rooms and beautiful gardens.  It is kind of off the beaten track but in a great setting with mountain and farm views.  AnnaMarie, our host and owner of the hotel, did everything in her power to make our stay memorable.  We had the best meal in Italy right there at Villa Euchelia.  It was a five star meal.  It cost 30 Euros each and was served  "soup to nuts".  It started with baccala and potato appetizer, then a home made pasta in a mushroom sauce,  next was a chicken rolade on a special sauce,  then an indescribable dessert that had yellow custard with pieces of phyllo dough that was crusty.  Wine during the meal and espresso followed.  Need I say more.  By the way, IL Molino does not have a bathroom scale.  Thank God.

This is a picture of the front to the hotel.  That person standing next to the junk car, oops in mean rental Fiat, is Brenda.  The building was built in the 1600's and completely restored by AnnaMarie and her husband.  AnnaMarie loves what she does and it really shows.  When we were leaving she gave us a bottle of wine as a gift.  Believe me I am a red wine drinker and this wine is the best I have ever tasted.  I doubt if I can get it home, but I am surely going to look for it.

 This is the center of Castrocielo.  As you can see it is a " bustling metropolis ".  In front of the town hall is the polizia locale car.  Behind is another car that probably belonged the men in the "bar" where you see the yellow plastic chairs.  By the way, bar in Italy means a place where they serve espresso and cappuccino and sweet pastries.  Men sit there all day playing cards, maybe scobe,  and drinking espresso and sambucca.  To the best of my knowledge hard liquor is not served there.  Even in restaurants hard liquor is just incidental.  I haven't had a vodka martini since I left home. I really don't want to mislead you, because I buy vodka at the coop, grocery store, and have it at home.  It's best vodka I have ever had and only cost 7 Euros for a bottle that is a little less than a 750ml.  It's called Keglevich.  If you see it buy it and I will be over for a drink.

Here is a picture from Arce of the mountains in the distance that project above the clouds. I took this right next to the church you saw in the last blog.  While there we also went to Rocca di Arce.  Rocca means rock. It is a hill, I would say mountain, town above Arce.  I drove a switch back road to the top and , believe me, you don't want to drive off the edge. It was white knuckles all the way up.  It is so high up that your ears start to pop.  People actually live up there.  It's nice if you are a bird.

So here we are back in Arce.  Here is a common sight in this part of Italy and probably all over this beautiful country.  Here you can get a mellon for 3 Euros.  That's about $4.00 American.  If you think you pay a lot of money for fruits and vegetables at home, try coming here.  If you want anything bring a lot of money.  If it wasn't for the exchange rate it would be great.  We went for groceries on Sunday at the coop in Camucia. That's the biggest town near us.  We bought a lot of food to last us maybe a week.  Just one bottle of wine and very little cleaning products and it cost 110Euros.  Those Euros cost me $154.00 in American dollars.

This is a small part of the abby of Montecassino in Cassino, Italy.  This was a side trip from Castrocielo and Arce.  This abby is in operation today, but was destroyed many times by different invaders to Italy.. The abby was founded in 529AD by St Benedict  The last people who destroyed it was the Americans during World War II because it was the German regional headquarters.  We held it siege for 6 months, then destroyed it in May of 1944.  Once again it was rebuild to its present beauty.  These stairs lead to the great chapel.  I don't know how many monks are there today but it is a large edifice.

This is the chapel.  I think it speaks for itself. If we had all the gold in that chapel, all of us can live comfortably for the rest of our lives. I have many more pictures that I can share with you when we get home.

So here we are. Our last day in Castrocielo and we spot a "farmers market" in town on our way out.  This is the meat truck.  He had every kind of Italian meat you could think of.  The problem was that he, nor anyone else there, could speak any English.  I mean NONE.  It was fun.  We all had a great time trying to understand one another.  Everybody was trying to help us.  We all had a lot of laughs. We ended up with Salomi, Prosciutto, Focaccia, and fresh picked olives both green and black.  We found out that the eating olives come from the southern part of Italy and the olive oil olives come from
                                                                                    Tuscany and north.

 Oh My God, where do you start.  Just look at all those fresh vegetables.  Needless to say we filled a few bags.

We got back to IL MOLINO just in time for Pino and Caroline to leave for Sicily and their next tour.  This tour will last for 3 weeks.  This was our dinner that night.  We had what was left of Brenda's special Tuscan bread soup.  You can see the assortment of meats and cheese in the plate at the center, all from the meat truck.  That's the Focaccia on the cutting board with fresh tomatoes and lettuce.  Of course that bottle next to the flowers, which by the way were picked in the yard, is of course olive oil.  As usual, more calories were consumed that night.  Oh well, when in Rome.....

It's almost 10:00PM here now and just around 4:00PM your time, and it's time for my nightly glass of Vin Santo and a nice fresh biscotti.  I really enjoy doing this blog, I hope you enjoy it too.

I didn't tell you about getting lost in Cassino and having to go to the bathroom.  I really believe that people in Italy do not use bathrooms.  I'm so sorry for killing that tree in the park, but when nature calls you have to do something or it could be quite embarrassing.  That's a story for another blog.  Ciao for now.