Week 8: Return to the hills

Sunday:

I think this was the first sunny Sunday we have had all summer. It normally rains. I went to church discovered that the trains I normally get back are cancelled due to the summer timetable so I had the option of waiting two hours after church finished for the next train or leave early...I left early. Alessandra picked me up and then we went to see Fede and Stefano race in a motorcross competition. Though actually none of them ended up racing because it soo began raining heavily and the pitch was too dangerous to drive on. 

Monday:
More homework with Fede much to his disgust. Though we managed to get through quite a lot of pages. Played some board games too.

Tuesday:
More homework and board games. We also went to Voghera to the huge supermarket with shops and went shopping. I bought some flat shoes from H and M. They are peach with scallopped edges, very nice. I saw some Vans in footlocker but decided against them, Bea bought some black Nike Air Force. Which are apparently the height of fashion but as Alessandra said they look like orthopedic shoes.

Wednesday:

In the morning Alessandra and Stefano needed to go to Milan for work so I stayed back with the kids. We did more homework and games and watched t.v. In the afternoon when they returned we went back to Voghera because Bea realsied she had bought the wrong shoes. She meant to get the low nike air force and she took the high ones. So I went with them and decided to take the Vans! I got red ones and they are very comfortable.

Thursday:

We went to the Lake of Garda to visit the sister of Alessandra and her family. Also Alessandra's father and wife were there and her brother and his wife and her aunt so it was a little family get together. It was a beautiful place and the weather was good. We ate dinner at a restaurant, walked round the lake and spent the afternoon in their large outdoor swimming pool which though unheated was still warm nice. Me and Fede had races and a competition to see who could hold their breath the longest. 

Lago di Garda

Meal at the restaurant

At the Lake

The outdoor pool. I'm in red at the front. 

Friday:

A sleepless night led to a trying day. I managed to coax Fede into completing four pages of homework and the reading of two pages of the English book. I also read some more of Alice in Wonderland with Bea. I played monopoly with Fede, twice. The first time I was winning until he swept the board clear of all the houses and figures. He wanted to play again and this time he won with 562,500 lira. We spent the afternoon in the pool. And it began to thunder in the evening. 

Saturday:

Today Bea went horse riding and Alessandra dropped me of at McDonalds so I could use the wifi to update my blog and email people hooray! I bought a chocolate frappe it was very nice.

In the evening a family, friends of Alessandra came for dinner. We had a barbecue it was very nice. And the smoke kept the mosquitos away from us. 

Week 7: Tuscany

Sunday:

Beach day! We arrived at the beach at around 10.30 then Alessandra Stefano and Bea went grocery shopping whilst me and Fede stayed on the beach. They got back around 12.30 and we had a picnic. The sea is wonderful, not clear but warm and the waves are huge and powerful it's great fun to swim in. We stayed until 4.30pm and then went to see a friend of theirs who they had met in the supermarket. 

The beach

Cucumber for the sun burn!

Monday:

Another day on the beach. By this point I have rather bad sunburn on my shoulders and back, despite wearing factor 50 sun cream. The sea is nice huge waves to jump over and when it is calm it is great to swim in. 

Tuesday:

It threw it down with rain so we went to visit some mines. Il Parco archeominerario di San Silvestro. It was good fun. We got a guides walk through tour through one mine and then on a train through the second. It was very interesting. We also went to look round the village of Bolgheri and found an olive tree planted in 1720. 

The mine train

Inside the mine

The guide

The olive tree

Wednesday:

Still raining. We stayed in the house all morning it rained so much and then in the afternoon went round Marina Castagneto. Took ice creams and ate them inside the restaurant because it began raining heavily again. Went to the beach on the evening to watch the sun set. 

Thursday:

Went to an archaeological park in Baratti on the gulf. It was very interesting all roman remains of temples and streets and Etruscan houses. We also went to Necropolis to see some burial tombs of the Etruscan tribes (pre roman) that were dug up. Then we spent the afternoon on the beach. 

Pirate ship in the gulf

Foundations of temple A had a secret underground passage 

Remains of the baths

On the Roman road

Me and Fede on too of an Etruscan but

The castle

Etruscan burial tomb

Sarcophagi

Friday:

Last full day in Tuscany so we spent it on the beach. We stayed for the morning then spent the noon hours back at the house because the sun gets too hot and then went back for the afternoon. We made friends with the adjacent people who have a cute little dog called Pino! Went our for dinner at a pizzeria. 

Saturday: 

Packed up to come back to Rovescala. Went home via a terracotta shop - Tuscany is known for making terracotta. They bought a sundial and Fede chose a beware the cat sign. I picked up some little starfish. Hopefully they will make it back in one piece. As soon as we got home it started raining. Also thunder and lightning. 

Week 6: Countryside

Tuesday:

Spent the morning playing with Fede and reading in English. Then for lunch came Alessadra's friend and her two daughters Laura and Carola. Carola had private English lessons and can speak it perfectly but was shy and didn't really talk to me which was a shame. It was a nice day though although too windy to make use of the pool. Later on it started raining too. 

Wednesday: 

We made out to Broni the village past Stradella to go to the market. Unfortunately we found out when we got there that the market was on Friday not Wednesday. We went to McDonald's and set up the wifi to the laptop and phones so hopefully I can use it to google hangout my family when we are near one again. The weather was very windy again so no pool, we played ludo and badminton and read. In the afternoon two girls children of a neighbour came by to play. Bea had an argument about whether she knows more English than I Italian or not. Alessadra thinks I know more Italian. And still she refuses to learn. Me and Alessandra made a cheesecake this afternoon it was very nice with honey in the cheese bit to sweeten it with less sugar and stewed blended plums as a top juicy section. Did some drawing with Fede. My picture:

I thought it came out quite well! 

Thursday:

I slept in, oops but luckily so did everyone else I think the cold weather made us all stick to our beds a little longer. In the morning Bea went horseriding I skipped it this week and stayed back with Fede. More drawing and English and Ludo. 

The work. Pretty pleased apart from the face, hate drawing faces. 

In the afternoon I went biking with Fede and then after taking a nap all of us went on a walk to the centre of Rovescala with the two girls Alice (Ah-lee-chay) and Sofia. Then homemade pizza for tea.  

Friday:

Packing day for Tuscany. Spent the morning playing and doing English and then in the afternoon we packed for Tuscany. It started raining again. There seems to be a pattern, sunny mornings and rainy afternoons. I just hope the weather is better in Tuscany than here otherwise we won't be able to go on the beach!

Saturday:

Up early to finish packing and then on the way to our Tuscan destination. Stopping at Pisa along the way! 

After Pisa we carried on to Marina Castagneto where we are staying in a holiday village. The sea is beautiful. Had tea at a pizzeria I had cipolla e salsiccia (onion and sausage) it was great. 

Day 33, 34, 35, 36: I've fallen behind

My perfect streak of blog entries is ruined!

Here is a quick summary:

Day 33 (friday): had a final ice cream at Massimo's and left for the hills

Day 34 (Saturday): really hot day, why horse riding again still painful but managed to trot better. Went to a superbike show in Carpi, called carpi night show. It was amazing! I liked the freestyle event best where they ride up a ramp and perform moves in the air. One of the three freestylers - Kevin Ferrari did a back flip! On a motorbike! I also got his autograph and one of the others too but I don't remember his name. We got back at like two in the morning!!

Apologies for the swear word! 

Day 35 (Sunday): trains were running so managed to get to church, they had friends round for dinner which was fun I played monopoly with their kids old fashioned set with Italian lira. 

Day 36 (today - Monday): First day of the first week in the hills. Bea isn't currently on speaking terms with me after a fun filled meal yesterday evening so I spent the day doing English with Fede. She currently only communicates to me with glares or a quick yes/no. Alessandra says it's normal and not to worry about it. I went on a bike ride with Fede but my legs and butt gave in two minutes into it, I couldn't sit on the seat because I was so achey from horse riding. We watched Cars 2 in English much to bea's disgust. Actually quite a nice movie. The weather wasn't so good today, very cold. I had an afternoon nap. 

Probably from now on I will just do a weekly update/summary. Probably I shall try and upload it every Saturday. As I have no wifi and am needing to conserve my 3G I may have to skimp on pictures! 

Day 32: 33 Degrees

Today was meltingly hot. As proved by the increased melting of the ice creams me and Fede got from Massimo's as soon as we stepped out of the cool interior of the store. Today was my last ice cream from Massimo's. It was the best ice cream shop ever!

This morning the same routine English, homework, clean and tidy. I went to the post office to stamp my post cards. Instead of giving you stamps they put them through a machine which printed a coded stamp on them. 

Fede and Stefano went out to a motorcross shop in the north of Milan to pick up some gear - helmet trousers and gloves. So me and Bea spent t rest of the morning doing some English work. 

After lunch me and Fede went to get ice creams and Bea went to visit her friend Valeria who is going on holiday tomorrow. 

We also packed up for the hills as tomorrow afternoon we leave. Thankfully I managed to get everything back into my suitcases! 

Two jam packed ones! 

We will spend a week in the hills and then we go to Tuscany. It has come round so fast. 

It was so hot we had the air conditioning on all day. It's a cool machine it sucks all the water out of the air and condenses it into a bucket outside. We had to empty the bucket like three times already. 

Day 31: Art Museum

Normal schedule in the morning.

Then after lunch we went out. We went back to the old art gallery museum - The Brera. They have a huge painting gallery and we went to look around them. There were thousands of paintings and of many famous artists going right back to the 1400s. 

This was my favourite painting called 'il baccio' (the kiss) by Hayez. 

A state of Atalanta

This Tritta was very cool the paintings looked 3D. 

These were some frescoes taken from a church 

On the way back we stopped at Massimo's for ice cream. This could potentially be my last ice from Massimo's as we go to the hills on Friday and they close in August. 

I took passion fruit and apricot. It was so nice!

As we were in the centre we stopped off at a few shops. I picked up some more postcards, a tshirt and a ring and some jewellery for my sisters. 

My blue infinity ring

Initialled necklace for Louisa

They didn't have an 'R' necklace so I got a bracelet for Rebekah. 

Also from The Brera I got a phone case. 

Guess what picture was on it?

You guessed it. I was tempted to get a canvas but probably not an easy item to transport back to England. 

Day 30: Switzerland

This morning was as normal, homework, English practice, tidy up. Played Mario kart. I lost.

After lunch we drove to Switzerland. It was only a 50 minute drive to a city called Lugano. It's at the southern end of Switzerland. It got up to 30 degrees and it was lovely. The town is very quaint and old fashioned and they have a huge lake like almost five or six times bigger than any other I've seen. 

Lago Lugano

Me

Water Fountain

View from the top of the hill

Butchers that had giant salami

Statue of William Tell in a park

We had a nice walk around and a relaxing afternoon before hitting the traffic on the way back. 

Now I can say I've been to Switzerland! Incidentally although they use the Swiss francs you can still buy things in euros you just get francs as change not cents. I bought some postcards.