Maderno, Italy
Larry and I had a great night in Gianpietro's villa...peaceful and quiet. We got up this morning to a cloudy day, but we were ready for a cloudy day....just a day to relax and regroup after our full day of travel to get here.
Looking from the lake up the hill to where we are staying in Maderno
Church across from our villa
First we went to the local grocery to get some supplies. Wow...two plus aisles of pasta...Kathy would love this place. Two plus aisles of vino....Eggs are sold in sixes only. No cereal to be found....Great looking fresh fruits and vegetables...Had to get strawberries. They are in season here. Larry waited patiently to buy a roasted chicken for--- ever....Anyway we paid for everything with our credit card and there was no questions about it....We thought there would be a lot of ID requirements. Must be because this is a well traveled tourist area for Europeans.We enjoyed most of the day just catching up on the internet and reading. What a great relaxing day!
The next morning it was raining....we decided to go for a ride to the village of Salo. It turned out to be only a car ride because the rain was very heavy.
It was a joy to return and just relax at the villa. All this traveling has caused us to just want to download our brains and think about the places that we have been to. It is mind boggling to comprehend all the places that we have been in the past five weeks.
Trip Around Lake Garda Tuesday, April 30, 2013
Happy Birthday Kristy!!!!! We got up to a beautiful sunny day and headed north along Lake Garda, Italy's largest lake. Gianpietro loaned us a Ford Fiesta to use for the two weeks of our stay saying, "Italians love small roads and small cars". He is so right on that!!! My gosh the roads are tiny and narrow.... heart attack scary at times. The Italian are very emotional drivers...beeping their horns, waving their arms, passing when it is down right dangerous, shaking their hands out their windows, and splitlaning down a crazy curvy road. It has caused me to not want to drive. The combination of small roads, small cars, and emotional drivers can be quite exillerating.
Fig trees along the road are already forming their fruit
Anyway...north we head going through some of the most beautiful country that we have ever laid eyes on. The lake was to the right the whole way and the snow capped mountains laid just beyond the lake. What magnificent beauty! To the left of the road we saw straight up hill sides of mountains that were reinforced long ago with old, old stone and brick walls with Roman arch designs set into the wall. 
Above these layered reinforcements were lemon and olive groves. It was really an incredible drive going through small towns of Toscolano, Gargnano, Tignale. We went through over 30 tunnels that cut through the mountain side....some were very old with the rock from the mountain being the tunnel structure and others were very modern with concrete.
We went through the small town of Tremosine. Here the modern tunnel had the lake water views exposed. This particular tunnel was used in the 2008 James Bond Movie, ......Quantum of Solace. Double O7 drove his Aston Martin in a high speed car chase through this tunnel. We had missed seeing this movie while we were in East Timor so we rented it one night to enjoy in Maderno.
We stopped many times to take pictures. The lake had ferry boats, fishing boats, and sail boats all about in small numbers. We enjoyed watching a large group of wind surfers and parasail surfers. We have noticed a lot of extreme sport enthusiasts....bicycle riders (yes, these bike riders were extreme because you would be taking your life in your hands riding a bicycle on these narrow curvy roads), mountain climbers, and parachute gliders up in the high mountains. We also saw a downhill skate board tournament. There were loads of motorcycle enthusiasts. Bikers are everywhere because this is a bikers kind of ride...curvy road with gorgeous scenery.
We drove on to Limone, then Riva, (what a quaint little town)
and stopped in Torbole (another picturesque mountain viewed town).
We ate a picnic lunch on the lake and just enjoyed the drop dead gorgeous scenery all around. It took us about three hours to get about third of the way around the lake...but we did stop a lot along the way.
The beginning of the Dolomites are in the background
After lunch our car started south on the other side of Lake Garda. There were not as many tunnels and fewer views of the lake from the highway, but it was still a nice ride. We passed through Malcesine and Brenzone seeing an old castle...
and stopped in Torri to catch a car ferry back home.
We paid 19 Euros to board the ferry boat and took a half an hour trip right across the skinny part of the lake back to our villa arriving back around 5:00pm. We had traveled about half way around the lake. Days just don't get any better than this!
Sirmione, Italy May 1, 2013
Larry and I got up today to go to Venice....yes to Venice. We didn't leave the villa until around 8:30 and drove around the south end of the lake to the town of Desenzano. After a few stops to get directions...with no English speaking Italians....we finally found the train station and parked the car. We got to the train station at exactly 10:07....The train to Venice was pulling out. We had been told that the trains leave for Venice every hour so we thought, let's just catch the next one....WRONG! The next train left at 12:07 so we decided that we were not going to Venice today. It is a two hour train ride to get there and arriving at 2:00 in the afternoon was a little late to enjoy the whole city for our planned one day visit.
Plan B...We drove on to Verona...another hour down the highway...What a massive city of traffic, congestion, and Italian drivers. Just getting on the turnpike was like taking the German Autobon....cars were flying past us when we were going 70. After about an hour of Verona traffic, we decided to go to....
Plan C...Driving to Sirmione, a little village on a tiny peninsula on Lake Garda. After finding our way back to the lake (thank goodness we had bought a European Garman) we made it to Sirmione. There were loads of tourist buses in the parking lot. Having not read a thing about the town, we had wanted to come because it was just a remarkable little strip of land jetting out into the lake. We wondered, "What is the attraction?" We soon found out! There was a terrific medieval castle with a moat here on the end of the strip of land.
Once you crossed over the moat, inside the castle walls were quaint little shops and cafes to enjoy. After passing through one road of shops, we walked the outside of the castle area. Gorgeous walkways with some fantastic water views lead us away from all the people. We soon found out that this was a wonderful place to spend the day.
The scenery was awesome and we wondered where all the people were that had come on the mountain of buses. We never found out because we enjoyed walking around most of the peninsula and enjoying the parts of the islands away from all the shops and tourist traps.
The day turned out to be another fantastic day in Italy...with Venice still in our future. After driving back to the villa, we fixed a couple of glasses of ice tea and just relaxed on the deck admiring our million dollar view of Lake Garda. Are we two lucky ducks or what?
Maderno, Italy Thursday, May 2, 2013
It is cloudy today...and we had planned to go to Venice...again. Because the weather was not looking at its best we decided to just enjoy the town of Mederno...where were are staying. Larry and I parked the car after paying the Euro for parking for an hour and took off walking along the waterfront. It had a beautiful paved walkway as well as another paved bike path.
Outside cafes, restaurants, and gelato stands dotted the pathway along our walk. We passed a camper's paradise with nice looking camping trailers parked having fabulous views. Locals strolled the waterside, many pushing strollers. Many were eating gelato and sitting on the benches along the path. One older gentleman gave Larry the thumbs down for not having caught any fish today. We walked for a half an hour along the paved path and did not come to the end. We decided to turn back so that our car would not have a traffic ticket waiting for us when we got back.
The lake is misty at times....cloudy at others. One morning it was so foggy that we could not see the lake or the mountain. Often you see the snowcapped mountains covered with clouds and other times it is clear as a bell. One evening the snowcaps looked pink due to the sun setting on them around 9:00pm. Isn't it amazing how the view can be so different each day?
Friday, May 3, 2013
Happy Birthday to Linda, Larry's sister!
Hooray, we made it to Venice!
Saturday, May 4, 2013 and Sunday, May 5, 2013
We went for a walk....and just relaxed the rest of both days. It was nice to just enjoy the villa!
We spotted on pink blooming Dogwood while walking in Maderno
It was a rainy day and we decided to do some errands. Go to the library. Went to the bank to get more euros (US dollars don't go too far here)...that was interesting. The teller had to punch a button to allow you to enter two times threw two different doors. Went to the grocery store....then we drove to Salo...a half an hour south on the lake.
We had been through Salo a couple of times on the way to the train station but had never stopped to enjoy this scenic Italian town with red roof buildings. We parked the car...paying for 1.5 Euros for parking....and headed for the lake. Unbelievably the sun came out in full force! Oh my gosh....it was just a fabulous picture.
Church steeples and sidewalk cafes all along the way. We walked about an hour and half and still did not reach the end of the walkway. We passed a statue of a gentleman named Gasparo da Salo (who the town was named for)who invented the the violin. How cool is that?
We spotted fish in the lake and fishermen catching them. Nice! We saw unusual ducks and the regular mallards and swans. The scene toward the mountains across the lake was so awesome that Larry kept snapping pictures from different angles as we reached different view points. Fabulous clouds in the blue sky, flat lake, and snowcapped mountains...what a feast for the eyes!
Upon returning home, we enjoyed sitting on the deck and watching the ferry boats go back and forth across the lake. That evening the lake was unusually clear and the lights twinkled along the shore on the opposite side of the lake! How romantic is that?
Journey to the Dolimites Thursday, May 9, 2013
Larry and I were out the door and heading north along the lake side drive around 8:30. Traffic was heavy but we enjoyed the drive with the sun shining and the lake just sparkling. Splendido! We passed the northern most town on the lake, Riva at 9:30 and started heading toward Trento another 40 kilometers north. The scenery was just spectacular with mountains all around us and a glacier fed river, the most beautiful green color, roaring south. Acres of vineyards were on both sides of the road as we traveled this two lane highway. Loads of motorcyclist and bicyclist were heading up and down the highway! Tunnels galore. By the time we arrived back at our villa in Maderno we had gone through 77 tunnels total.
As we traveled north we passed a tremendous amount of orchards with blooming trees that were trellised. Apparently the fruit trees produce sooner and with more fruit when they are raised closer together and trellised up.
We thought the trees that were blooming were apple trees. We found out that this can be done with cherry trees as well but not with peach. Anyway, there were lots of trellised fruit trees in this region. We enjoyed the gorgeous snow capped mountian views (Alps to the west and Dolomites to the east) as we drove on past Trento into a little village where Larry was able to purchase a new micophone/video camera for our computer. Our had gone caput a few nights before.
Here we turned around and headed down some small country roads following some motorycyle groups who were touring the Dolomites. Along the way we had stupendous views of the vally that show cases all the little farm villages dotting the mountainsides with the most awesome mountain views all around us.
After a picnic lunch at a gorgeous little park, we headed south and arrived back in Riva around 3:00pm. We had decided to stop and enjoy a little sidewalk cafe, but could not find a parking place anywhere. So after looking passed up Reva and drove further south on the lake to Lemone and stopped at a hotel/cafe right on the lake and had a refreshing glass of ice tea.
The lake was dotted with about 40-50 small sailboats that were racing around the point and back several times. We skyped Kristy here to try out our new mic/camera attachment and had a great chat! It was a simply gorgeous view and so much fun to have a conversation with our oldest daughter.
We arrived back home around 6:00pm. After warming up some dinner we enjoyed watching the movie, "Millinium"....based on the book called The Girl with the Dragon Tatoo. The movie followed the book very well and we enjoyed watching it.
What a great day in Italy!
Arrivaderci to our sweet little villa in Maderno
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