Shopping, food and fun!

One of the benefits of staying with people who know the area is all the experiences they can share. Today was another amazing day full of new experiences.

First off this morning was a stop at Caltagirone, a town know for its unique hand painted pottery. Even the city streets are adorned with pottery and tiles.

It was Sunday so it was pretty quiet, but we found a ceramic store immediately. Then we found another ... and another. They just keep coming. Along the street we walked we probably stopped at 10-15 open pottery stores. Besides a few cafes, it’s the only kind of store I saw! Each store was amazing, with a bit of a unique pattern and colors. They were so gorgeous! We fell in love with a few things, like a really unique shaped serving platter and 4 matching dishes that went around the edges, so it would be an amazing serving set. There were so many things and it was a lot to take in. The one thing we knew we had to have was an ornament for our travel tree, so after looking in the stores we bought one. Then we fell in love with a set of house numbers that are just beautiful. They will be adorning the outside of our home after we return. We grabbed a few more trinkets as well, like painted stoppers for our olive oil bottles and an owl for Carissa (her school mascot).

I could have done so much more shopping! I left and sort of kicked myself for not buying a ceramic pinecone. The pinecones are something we just keep seeing again and again... they adorned the corner stones in walls and by lamp posts, people have them sitting on the posts of both sides of their driveways, and so much more. Who knows... we may have to go back!

The other really unique thing about Caltagirone is their steps. All along this street are a huge set of steps. Each step is decorated with a different set of tiles. None of our pictures can really show you the scale of the steps, but there 142 steps in all and as you’re walking up, they just keep coming. Gorgeous.

Right at the base of the steps was a cafe and Jimmy talked Brian into drinking coffee like the Italians do. They simply have a shot of espresso in a little tiny cup. Brian and I aren’t coffee drinkers but he manned up and drank it. He still shudders at the thought today. LOL I took a drink of it and it was so bitter! But we tried it.

After shopping and the steps, we headed towards the car but decided to make a detour as the town was having a Carnevale celebration. We didn’t go down into the mix but stood above and looked down at this big town square filled with people. They don’t celebrate Halloween in Italy so this is the day little kids get dressed up and have fun. It was adorable!

By now we had to head off to our next adventure - lunch at Borgo Antico Agritturismo. Jimmy explained it as a farm to table meal, but this was an experience like no other. We were just a little early so looked in the orchard right outside, where they grow different varieties of oranges and lemons.

Lunch took well over 3 hours and when you look at the pictures you will know why. We had 16 appetizers, 2 pastas, salad, 2 meats, dessert, fruit, coffee and limoncello. There is no menu. There are no choices. You get what they serve and you get a ton of it.

I did my best to be adventurous and ate something of almost every dish. There were only two dishes I missed - one of the mushroom dishes. I don’t like mushrooms so let Jimmy select one of the two mushroom dishes and I gave it a try. The other I missed was one of the later dishes that looked like chunks of meat in gelatin. When the owner came out later and chatted with us, he explained that it was the “not so good parts of the little black pig” and then went on to explain that it had snout and other choice pieces in it. Eeeeewwwww. It’s like the fancy Italian version of a hot dog. No thanks. Another dish came out and looked questionable but I gave it a try. I barely got that one down and when the owner came and told us what it was, I understood why. It was tripe. That’s a one and done for me. I don’t need tripe in my life. Lol

There were some great things. There was this fluffy egg appetizer that was served warm and it was delicious! There were some good cheeses and salami, and a beef with gravy that was good. One of my favorites was something called Involtini. It is cheese and some meat wrapped in a breaded piece of pork and tied with a lemon leaf around it. So good! We enjoyed blood oranges from the trees right outside the dining area and the most fluffy, delicate cake with lemon cream inside, I’m sure made from the lemon trees outside as well. Last up was a shot of limoncello. This is not to be sipped - it was good but so strong! Best bet was to get it all down at once.

Here's the full photo diary of foods, from start to finish. This doesn't include the unlimited bread, house wine and the coffee at the end.

One interesting this to note is that they wouldn't come pick up the dishes unless we had emptied out the food. The Italians at this experience were doing so with gusto, but we didn't empty any of the dishes (or very few of them). We had quite a full table at times!

We left here drowsy and so full! This meal filled us up for most of the day. What an amazing experience and we are so glad Jimmy and Gin took us.

By now the boys were ready to go home but when it came time to go out to Carnavale they just decided to stay home. This was something Brian and I really were looking forward to so we left the boys at home and headed out.

We had two choices for Carnevale and the one we most wanted to see was in Misterbianco. They are known for having the most ornate costumes in their parade. They did not disappoint! So many interesting and beautiful pieces. There were several segments to the parade and the first was Aladdin. 

Another segment was about dances.

And another theme we saw was on the America’s. It was very interesting to see how they stereotype American life. We have the Statue of Liberty, football (side note: the back of his jersey didn't say a team, it simply said "Super Bowl", fast food, aliens, showgirls and gambling.

Parades in Italy are quite different than back home. It was meant to start at 4pm but finally got underway at about 5:45pm. And they proceed at a glacial pace. We watched for maybe 2 hours and only got through the Aladdin segment and part of the dance segment. The parade probably took 4+ hours from start to finish, if you sat in one place and watched the whole thing. In the end we decided to move around a bit and saw a few pieces of the other segments to enjoy.

After that we headed back home to hit the sack. We have an early day tomorrow so we need to be well rested. Can’t wait!