Rating:
 (5.00) (1 Vote)
Sacra di San Michele, Near Torino, Italy
June 28, 2003
Pros:
Beautiful scenery through the mist.
Cons:
Road signs!!(or lack of)
Planned on an 8.00 am departure and got away at 9.00. Several wrong
turns at Borgomanero before we eventually made it on to the motorway.
Rain was building in intensity, and when we made the transition
to the Milano-Torino motorway, the rain became torrential and the
traffic heavy (particularly trucks). We battled our way to the outskirts
of Torino, and then I blew it. In my defense, can I say that I had
two things going against me.
One: the Italians like to mark their maps with route numbers that
don’t co-incide with those on their road signs. The A4 is
also the E64, and numerous others have dual numbers. To compound
the problem, they then signpost the turnoffs to the most insignificant
towns, not the major ones you can readily identify on your map.
Two: they need to demolish the current motorway system around Torino
and start again. Have a look at a map. There are sections where
they have two motorways running side by side, and in order to circuit
Torino, you have to transfer from one to another. They don’t
make a big deal about it, just put up smallish signs saying “tangenziale”.
Get that? They don’t even give it a “capital letter”.
I actually stopped at the last Autogrilade before entering Torino
for an espresso and to check the map on how to make the transition.
We pulled out of the driveway, and immediatly (within 100 metres)
confronted with a “tangenziale” sign and four towns
and route numbers exiting to the right. The route ahead was listed
as A4, so it had to be the right way!!!!!! It was, right through
the centre of Torino. We saw some of the ugliest, dirtiest sections
of Torino. We got to see Motown traffic in one way streets and absolutely
minimum signage. We contended with buses and trams, and for the
first three kilometres or so, were absolutely amazed that not only
were cars double parked, but down the middle of the road, straddling
the double white lines, were parked cars. Those sitting out by themselves
had their hazard lights flashing, but for many sections, there were
just dozens of cars parked as if against the curb. It had to have
cost us over an hour, as we threaded our way through the city and
out through the prettiest wooded towns on the far outskirts.
I behaved disgracefully to Ches right through Torino, and given
that she had actually wanted to take the “tangenziale”
off ramp an hour or so earlier, she didn’t deserve it. By
this stage I was totally unreasonable when we took the wrong street
through Avigliana and avoided entering the motorway to the tunnel
into France. I literally turned back at the roundabout, and made
it back up through town and on the right road to Sacra di San Michele.
We wended our way up the mountain and arrived at the car park just
before 1.00 pm. Four hours for what only took 2 1/4 hours to return
home.
Two things then occured to me (well three, if you including the
fact that I had behaved like a bastard).
One: The monastery was closed for lunch and re-opening at 3.00 pm.
Two: Even if we left immediatly, we couldn’t drive to Aosta
for lunch. We had planned on lunch at a Ristorante Buon Recordo.
Just to add some more uncertainty to the day, visability was around
20 metres with thick cloud engulfing the mountain.
I had noticed a sign for a restaurant at a small settlement halfway
up the mountain, and there was one in the hotel at the carpark.
Ches needed a “pit stop”, so went in to the hotel. I
chatted to a guy in the carpark. Apart from a tourist bus, with
no tourists, he was the onhly one there. Wouldn’t you know,
he had red number plates as well, and called out “where are
you from?” in a distinctive Kiwi accent. We chatted for ten
minutes. In his sixties, and having lost his wife ten years ago,
he travels alone for three months every year. Has sons scattered
around the world (one in Edinborough where he will eventually arrive
in six weeks or so), all into yachting. He was eating lunch out
of the boot of his car. Had no idea where he would end up tonight,
just drives wherever the whim takes him.
Ches reported no one in the hotel restaurant, so we headed back
down the mountain to Ristorante San Francesco at Di Castile Leone.
A community rather than a village. Some buildings restored and well
maintained, others occupied by very eldrly and poor people, and
in a state of collapse. The restaurant has a photograph on the wall,
of the restaurant in the late 1800’s. No other type of business
was evident, and it didn’t even have paved streets, just dirt
lanes between the houses. We parked in a fenced car park, and entered
the restaurant to find we were the only diners. The walls were decorated
with massive framed jigsaw puzzles-palaces and ancient maps of the
world.
We enjoyed a quiet two hour lunch, electing for the degustation
menu.
The Antipasto came in two stages:
First, a plate of proscuito, spek (mainly fat but delicious) and
dried meat.
Second, a plate of grilled eggpland and zuchini (both topped with
herbs), anchovies (in a sauce of either pesto or spinach), a slice
of cheese with goosbery jam, and marinated raw porchini.
Next, a pasta platter: spinach and ricotta ravioli topped with ground
hazelnuts in olive oil, spinach ravioli, and fettucini with a porcini
and rich tomato sauce.
A large bowl of polenta, and bowls of porcini and tomatoes and venison
in a rich mushroom sauce.
Finally Dolci. What dolci!!! panne cotti with strawberry coulis,
tiramasu dusted with shaved chocolate and cocoa powder and slivered
almonds and a rich chocolate blaumange.
Tea and espresso were almost too much.
When we presented the owner/chef with a koala, on paying our bill,
he became all excited. He had not a single word of English. Well,
a couple. “Australia?”. We all managed to mime and gesticulate
and utter single words. “Sydney”, “Leichardt”,
“Visiting Family”, “Marconi Club”, “Three
Years Ago”. He had been to within a kilometre of where we
live.
We drove back up to the Chiusa San Michele car park. Vissability
was still only some metres. I was so dissapointed. We walked the
800 metres up the path to Chiusa San Michele. A ruined church, with
only one wall and three gaping windows sitting on a grass nole.
Even from 20 metres, it was just a misty apparition. We walked around
it, taking photographs that we hoped would show more than we could
actually see. I turned around to walk the final 800 metres up the
path to the Sacra di San Michele, and without the word of a lie
or even a little exageration, the clouds parted and the sun pierced
through to reveal this magnificent monastary purched way above us
on its rocky crag. It had to have been scripted.
David Dale had listed Sacra di San Michele among his 10 absolutely
must see in Italy list. There is a photograph in Medici’s
“Italy the Beautiful Cookbook”, and I’m sure I
have seen a couple of other photographs somewhere. Always shown
sitting on its rocky peak with snow capped mountains behind it,
and occasionally from a distance which reveals that the plains around
the mountain are jam packed with factories. I had thought I would
have to photograph a post card to capture the image for my website.
Not necessary now. I must have taken fifty or so. Lots of brooding
shots with the clouds shrouding its towers, the sculptured columns
from 1100, amazing doors to the church at the top, every angle,
colour and B&W shots.
On the way back down the mountain we passed Di Castle Leone, and
a kilometer further on slowed on a bend to avoid a “peasant”
(the only appropriate description given his appearance and clothing)
and three very large goats. He was hand feeding the goats, and in
his other hand had an empty plastic bottle. He caught sight of Ches
and called through her open window, “senora! fresco?”
We probably should have accepted his offer just to witness him milk
a goat into a water bottle.
The return journey is always easier, and in this case, we safely
assumed that everything would be signposted “Milan”,
and it was. Such was the linkage between the two motorways on the
eastern side of Torino, we doubt if we ever could have negotiated
it on our way in. We had a relatively easy trip home and arrived
back at Orta San Giulio just in time for a massive electrical storm
accompanied by hail. Later we heard that the storm raised the lake’s
water level by 50cm and that the hail just south was very heavy.
So, we still haven’t been to Aosta and have an excuse to return
to Italy again in a few years time. |
