An hour outside of Turin is the Barolo wine region, where we will spend the next 4 days. We can’t check in to our hotel there until the afternoon, so we take our time enjoying some last bits of Turin.

We try to recreate the breakfast from yesterday at a local coffee bar, but this time we take Oly and my dad along. We sit on the square and enjoy seriously good coffee. We linger and eventually Stefan joins us. He really doesn’t like to be rushed in the morning.

We walk the long way home, passing a cute hair salon. I can barely see, so I ask if they have time for a bang trim. While everyone else goes home and start packing up, I get my hair cut! What a luxury.

We pack up the rest of our things and say goodbye to this lovely apartment. But first, we want to have lunch where Stefan and I ate dinner last night. We find it bustling again and grab a table on the patio. This time I notice the street traffic much more, but it’s still very nice. The pasta is delicious again.

As we drive out of Turin, we are again reminded of how expansive this city is. We only saw a portion. Then the city quickly turns to beautiful countryside. Grapevines on all sides, it’s immediately calming. On the smaller roads toward Barolo, the views are magnificent. There are so many rolling hills, all covered in neat rows of vines.

We meet my parents to check in to the hotel. This town is very small and cute, but there seem to be several places to eat and drink. Perfect. Our hotel is nice. The room with two beds has a huge balcony overlooking the vineyard. My parents offer to sleep with the kids. This way my dad can enjoy the large balcony in the evenings too. So Stefan and I luckily have a room to ourselves. It’s so quiet and calm!

Almost 5pm, we walk around the town, up to the Faletti Castle, which now hosts a Wine Museum. We are expecting a museum about wine making. I suppose that’s what it is, but it’s more of an interpretive art museum. It’s very interesting, but much more amusing than educational. My favorite room is the one with metronomes flying through the sky to represent the role time plays in the making of wine. So funny.

Grandpa notes> Stefan and Kimberly were much more amused than I was.  It was such a bizarre waste of time…and there wasn’t even any wine to drink.

There’s a tasting room downstairs, but of course today is it’s weekly closure. As we walk back toward the main road in town, which is still very narrow and cobble-stoned, we find the corkscrew museum! Who knew there was such a thing?! We don’t spend the 4 Euros to see it, but we enjoy buying some silly swag in the gift shop.

Grandpa notes> I would not call my Musee de Cavatappi cap “silly swag”.

Up the street, we stop for our first Barolo tasting at Cantina Boschis. It’s very expensive at 5 Euros a taste! And, granted it may have been due to the language barrier, we don’t learn very much about the wines. They taste okay. 

Grandpa notes> Having never tasted wine in Italy we were a little worried that this was how they were all going to be.  Fortunately this was our least favorite wine tasting.  Most were experiences to be savored.

Then we find Simone. A lovely shop up the street sells wine from the region, and Simone guides us through them. It’s the perfect introduction to the region, and just a really nice tasting experience. I recommend everyone come here first when visiting Barolo, and ask for Simone. We sat for at least an hour, learning about the region, the grapes grown here, how they label the wines (more confusing than I thought it’d be) and how delicious Barolo wine is. And the tasting is free! Of course we end up buying some wine, and we will probably come back. What a great experience.

//Stefan Note: Some young guys ran the place and they got so excited about there shop they put a sign up that did not get it approved by the 17 local bodies, so its taped up, finished, untill 2018 when the application is done.

Grandpa notes> Simone studied wine making in college and was the best educator.

We walk back to our hotel, where we have dinner reservations tonight. The large patio overlooking the valley is dotted with white cloth-covered tables. It’s very beautiful.

Grandpa notes> The village of Barolo really is beautiful and special.

We eat pasta and pasta. And some weird desserts. They weren’t very good, but I’m glad we tried them.

It’s really nice walking 2 minutes to bed. And leaving my kids in my parent’s room feels like cheating, but I’ll take it!

Grandpa and Grandma notes>  WE GOT THE BABIES!!