Fall Update and a Trip to Palinuro

lunedi, 30 ottobre

I have heard that winter has arrived early for my Minnesota friends.  I am truly sorry as I sit on my porch and admire my rose bush that is blooming again - in late October.  No I am not rubbing it in but just confirmation that I love the southern Italian climate.  I do hope winter is kind to you.  

You can tell the seasons are changing as there are some trees that change color - but not many here in the south.  The temperatures are now in the 60's during the day and cooler at night.  But not too cold where you can't sit outside for dinner.  Last night Angela, Luigi and I ate at the Rosticceria and sat outside under the stars.  Layering and a scarf around your neck and you are all set.  It was heaven.  

So now how about an update on a few of my house projects? I thought you might also enjoy a little site seeing from southern Italy.  A few Minnesota friends visited for a week and I took them on a boat excursion to Palinuro.  More on that in a minute.  But first the house projects.

My fireplace is almost ready to use.  My new screen is here - now just waiting for the grate for the logs.  I am holding off as long as I can to put a fire in the fireplace - similar to the urge to turn on the furnace back in MN - you want to wait as long as you can.   Oscar's ready!

Also I hired my cousin Antonio, the carpenter, to build closets (armadi) for me in the office/spare room.  This will provide some much needed storage for clothes, Christmas decorations, luggage, etc.  It will be a full wall of storage.  I got a sneak peak of the progress on Saturday as I needed to pick out the handles for the doors/drawers.  His workmanship is amazing.  Check out the pictures.  Installation is scheduled for next Monday and I can't wait.  I am so excited.  They are solid wood!  I will send another picture when they are installed.  

The two closets without the doors. Notice the closet
on the right will have 4 drawers.

These are the cabinets that will be on top of the closets
They will also have doors and will go all the way to the ceiling.
I am using every bit of space.

The drawers with a sample of the handles I picked out.

I was excited to have two Minnesota friends visit recently.  One day we took a boat excursion to Palinuro.

From Wikipedia "Palinuro is part of the Cilento and Vallo di Diano National Park, an area of "shrubland" typical of Mediterranean countries.

It is popular with tourists, especially in summer, due to the cleanliness of its waters and beautiful beaches; and is regularly awarded five stars Blue Flag^[2]
The town is also famous for the caves along its coast,^[3] which are regularly visited, especially by frogmen."

The boat leaves the port of Marina di Casal Velino in the morning and takes a slow ride down the beautiful coast. It takes a few hours.  Once we get close to Palinuro the boat stops and then starts to off load everyone into smaller boats.  Some people will go relax on a beach/or go swimming as many of the young Germans on holiday did that were on the boat.  Or some people chose to go snorkeling - the boat provides all the wetsuits as the water has cooled over the past month.  My friends and I chose to relax on the beach.  We also took a hike up the mountain trail that takes you to a hotel.  The path is supposedly to be used only by hotel patrons but the hotel is closed for the winter so we chose to ignore the signs telling us to stay out.  As in Italy - rules are made to be broken.  HAHA!!

Carol and Susan enjoying the small boat ride to the beach

Enjoying the beach while the younger tourists enjoy the water 

A view as we start to climb the 444 steps to the hotel at the top

Picturesque coastline

A view down to the beach

Many are surprised by the rocky coastline

Bellissimo mare

The color is amazing

The smaller boats pick us up after a few hours and on the way back to the large boat we explore the grottoes that are famous in this area.  There are three that we visited.  The Sulfur Grotto - there is a smell of sulfur and an underwater sulfuric flow - notice the movement in the water in the video.

https://youtu.be/tFwS751A1QM

Next is the Blood Grotto - due to the redish color on the outside and inside of the grotto.  The color comes from the iron deposits on the rock formations.

https://youtu.be/C74z9sSHxwg

The third Grotto is the most beautiful and of course I had a phone/camera malfunction when I was trying to video so I only got a still photo of it.  The name comes from the effect from the sunlight penetrating into the grotto from an opening that is 100 feet deep in the water.  The color is so beautiful!

Inside the Blue Grotto

Small boat ride along the coast as we tour the grottoes

Beautiful rock formations

The large excursion boat waiting for its passengers to return

Palinuro is a must see for anyone visiting southern Italy!  

Fino alla prossima volta!!

My First Olive Harvest

martedi, 10 ottobre

Today's adventure was my first day of olive harvest season.  I just returned last night from a 5 day trip to Tuscany with my cousin Angela and Oscar.  I will blog on that later but I have posted some things on Facebook for those following me there.

I have been looking forward to today for years. I have always wanted to experience the olive harvest from start to finish.  Today I did and what a great experience it was.  I will try to explain as best I can in words, pictures and videos.  

Angela, Luigi and I left around 9 a.m. and headed to the country land.  There are many areas of olive groves that need to be harvested. Today we will work on land that was owned by Angela's father.  While we were gone this past weekend Luigi and Francesco (Angela's brother and my cousin) started to work this part.  They did about half of the trees so today we will finish.  There is also land that Luigi owns that needs to be harvested, as well as the land behind my house - about 10 trees.  Angela's land, which is the old Gentile family land, will not be harvested.  She lost 40 trees in the fires of this past summer.  Many Gentile cousins lost trees in this area - it is so sad.  Angela can't bring herself to even visit the land to see the damage.  Another cousin lost over 100 trees.  Luckily the trees we are harvesting are nice and full.  What I don't know is if the damaged trees will ever produce fruit again.  

The first video is our short drive down the "country road" to the land.  This is maybe 5-10 minutes from my house.  Note as the car slows the road is washed out on the right side.  I always hold my breath when driving on this road.  I am always a passenger - I will never drive it!

https://youtu.be/PPYWCYmcb7A


Once there I thought - gee not a bad view from my "office" for today's work.  :)

The first step is to lay nets down under the trees that you will be working.  Note this land is not flat so attention is needed to make sure you are on solid footing.  

Once the nets are in place the work begins.  Angela and I work on the lower branches - literally picking the olives by hand - pulling them off the branches and letting them fall into the netting.  Luigi and Francesco use a machine that is like hands that grabs the branches and shakes and loosen the olives.  I did try my hand at the machine as well.

But Luigi and Francesco are the pros.  

https://youtu.be/dhg1-jdPXO4

https://youtu.be/ovCkkPp-xak


When a tree is done you need to gather the olives so you pull the netting so the olives gather in one spot.  You empty the olives from the netting into buckets and shake the buckets so the leaves, twigs, sticks will rise to the top. You want to pull out as much of this type of material before bagging the olives.  The remainder will be separated at the pressing plant but doing an initial pass is necessary.  Once cleaned you then empty the bucket into bags.  

While we were harvesting many others are doing the same thing - you can hear the sounds of voices and machines across the land.  Right next to us were friends of the family.  Interesting as they did not have the modern machine but were using the old fashion method of a long stick.  You take the stick and literally beat it in the tree to get the olives to fall.  Now THAT is a lot of work.

Once the olives are picked and bagged it is on to the press company.  It is a busy place these days.  Everyone is bringing their harvest for pressing.  And of course we run into cousin Antonio who is harvesting today too.

Upon arriving the workers take your olives - either from containers or bags and empty them into large square plastic bins.  These bins can then be lifted with a fork lift so they are weighed before the pressing starts.  They are also labeled with your name. 

When your turn arrives the olives are dumped into the machine for washing and separating the leaves, twigs, etc.  See the video below.

https://youtu.be/Y6-So5OLTHw


Once cleaned and separated they enter the press machine which is inside the building.  I am not quite sure how it works but this machine holds multiple peoples olives as they are processed. 

 As they are pressed they turn into a paste - see the short video - part 5

https://youtu.be/0UhzOK4vulk

When your batch is ready the oil is pulled from the machine into the containers that are then used to fill your smaller containers. 

https://youtu.be/RSP1d7ufVEg

 The whole thing is quite amazing and I am so curious as to how the large machines work.  I am going to see if someone can take the time to explain it to me with our next batch.  Today it was so busy I did not want to bother anyone.  Another amazing bit of information - check out the list of the different types of olives just grown in the region of Campania.  66 different types - who knew?

Today we harvested 7 trees, in about 6 hours.  We gathered 140 kilograms of olives - which equals 308+ pounds.  That then turned into 30 liters of extra virgin olive oil or 7.4 gallons.  

There are more days ahead of olive harvest.  I will say it is a lot of work but it truly is a labor of love for the people of southern Italy.  I can't wait to taste it!!

Furnace Preparations

mercoledì, 27 settembre

With the arrival of fall comes cooler temperatures.  The mornings and evenings are cool and crisp while the mid day can still be on the warm side - but no humidity.  I know going forward the temperatures will continue to drop but I know it won't come close to the cold and snow of Minnesota.  Hallelujah!!  In December and January it can be colder with a lot of rain.  I know I have told most of you my house does not have a furnace so how will I keep warm in the winter????? I will have to build a fire in my fireplace. Thank goodness I was a girl scout!!

Again, this house is older and no one has lived in it for any length or time and never in the winter.  Angela was unsure about the flue and chimney.  Her concern was there could be construction debris still in the chimney.  So we called on my cousin Antonio (who can fix anything) to come over and help get it ready for winter.

Sure enough on opening the flue all sorts of junk came pouring out and it took a bit of work to get the chimney cleared.  Once cleared he wanted to make sure it was drawing air correctly so he and Angela built a small fire - check out the pictures below.  It was wonderful and now my "furnace" is all ready for winter.  I still need to buy a grate for the wood and a screen for the front of the fireplace.  Another item I will buy is a "treppiedi per camino" - a tripod for the fireplace.  This is put over the fire and then you can cook in your fireplace!!!  I will make sure to post pictures when I take on that adventure.  

I also learned that after the fire is out and you need to clean the ash from the fireplace you don't throw it away.  They told me to take it outside and mix it into the dirt around trees - fig, olive, whatever.  The trees love it.  Plus a lot easier than filling garbage bags. 
 

Fireplace all ready for a fire!!  

Team work by my cousins Angela and Antonio

The man can fix anything!!  

That should keep Oscar and I toasty warm this winter!

Another benefit to cooler temperatures is I can take Oscar on longer walks in the evening.  He did not do well this summer with the heat and I had to be very careful.  Just short walks in the morning and at night so I missed my walks through the village that we were doing when I first moved here.  But Oscar was a pretty sick little dog there for awhile.   Walking through the village is just so cool.  Everyone is out at night, usually after 5 p.m. and before 8 p.m., no matter the temperature.  They are visiting with neighbors and getting a walk in before dinner.  

On a recent walk I took some pics I thought you might enjoy along with a video of the young boys playing soccer after school and before dinner.  There are three young boys who have befriended me - due to Oscar.  They now always greet me by name and ask how I am doing.  They are just the cutest.  They are part of this video playing soccer.    As I was walking home (up the 132 steps) I stops and watched for a bit.  

The "132 Steps"

The soccer field is right along the steps

https://youtu.be/27QPczDWrQM

Pomegranate tree at my cousin Rosalina's house

The main bar in town - along the Main Street.
All the men hang out here in the morning and in the evening

Just like in the movies

A small playground that gets a lot of use

Fino alla prossima volta!

A First for Oscar and More on Life in Southern Italy

martedi, 12 settembre


Oscar had a first for his life in Italy.  I needed to find a groomer for him.  His nails were getting too long and he desperately needed a bath - oh my.   But finding a groomer in southern Italy was not so easy.  What I am finding, not just with groomers, but with many small businesses, is they do not have websites so finding them must be done the old fashion way - through word of mouth.  Once you get a few names of businesses you can then do a web search and many times they have Facebook pages but not knowing the business name can present challenges.  Sooooo, my resourceful cousin asked at the pet food store and of course we find out there are quite a few pet groomers in our area.  Thank goodness - so I made an appointment for Oscar.  I am happy to report I was very impressed with the service and cost.  Oscar came out a happy dog, all clean and ready to go!!!  Thanks to Hobby Pet in Vallo della Lucania!!

The front of the pet groomer in Vallo della Lucania

Oscar all clean and happy

And what would my blog post be without news about ANOTHER festival!  haha!!  Saturday afternoon I was going with Antonio to look for fireplace grates and screens.  With winter approaching and no furnace in my house, I need to prepare.  Again the house has not been lived in during the winter so the fireplace has never been used.  Antonio knows someone who will come and clean the flue first.  But in discussions he also mentioned he knew where we could find fireplace equipment.  Well that is what I thought the discussion was about - my other cousin was discussing as well so the Italian was flowing fast and free (translation - I was only getting about 50% of the conversation - which can be deceiving).  So Saturday afternoon, after Oscar's grooming, Angela and I met Antonio and Anna and off we went.  We ended up at a festival.  More on that in a minute but I realized pretty quick he must know a vendor or two that sold iron works that would be at the festival.  Unfortunately not what I was expecting or looking for (another lost in translation moment).  So the search for fireplace equipment continues - the vendors work was just ok - and not a lot to pick from.  But the festival - another OMG!!

This festival was in Cannalonga and as the poster below shows it was the festival of the goat.

Frecagnola is dialect for Goat.  And just in case you were wondering this isn't necessarily celebrating goat cheese but GOAT!!!  Yes - goat meat - boiled and grilled.  Needless to say I did not taste any.  

Cannalonga is very old - 9th/10th century AD.  Apparently it was know for the large herds of goats that were raised here and then sold.  The village has a great piazza that is central to a Palace.  This festival was the largest I had been to so far.  There were vendors typical for a Saturday morning market but then additional vendors as well, selling crafts as well as food items.  There were numerous eating areas where each had a separate menu but each one for sure had goat.  I even saw some menus with coniglio (rabbit) - :(.    We didn't stay long but I saw enough that said - add this to next year's list of festivals to attend.

Poster for the Festival - the teeshirts were cool too
but none for sale.

Palace in the town square

Town Square

Metal sculpture of the celebrated Goat

On Sunday and Monday we had terrible weather - very bad rain storms.  You may have seen some news footage on flooding in Italy - this was farther north in Tuscany (the city of Livorno) but the bad weather traveled south as well.  It was awful and seemed to go on forever - windy and rainy.  Being high up in the mountain made it worse I am sure.  So Oscar and I just hunkered down and streamed coverage of Hurricane Irma.  That is oh so sad.  But here I even lost power.  On Monday morning I awoke to no electricity.  Apparently water got into one of the exterior light fixtures and shorted everything out.  Instead of sitting and waiting at the house for the "tecnico" - technician, Angela invited me to her house to learn how to make Melanzane RIpiene (stuffed eggplant).  But her recipe is really different than those online.  These are little circles of eggplant stuffed with a cheese mixture, then fried (no batter) and then cooked in a tomato sauce.  It is one of my favorite dishes that she makes and I had wanted to watch how she makes it.  The cool thing is all the ingredients she used were local - nothing was bought from a grocery store - how sweet is that!!!  So now it will be my turn to try - later this week.  

All I can say is YUM!!!

Time for dinner and leftovers from Angela! Buon appetito!