Wuppertal, Antwerp & Paris: October 2019

Wuppertal

Thirty five years ago in the Brooklyn Opera House we saw a dance company, Pina Bausch. Dance does not describe it.  One event was a dancer on a long roped swing on the edge of the stage.  She swung gently at first barely broaching the audience.  Then faster and farther until way out over the audience. It was scary. When the maximum span was reached she stopped her swinging motion and let gravity bring her back to stillness then walked off the stage.

For another event the dancers came onstage like furniture movers carrying a large rolled up carpet.  They unrolled it on stage.  One of them layed down on it.  The others rolled him up like a burrito and carried him off rolled up inside the carpet.

Pina Bausch died in 2009. In 2011 her friend, Wim Wenders, released a documentary about her company based in Wuppertal. In the film her company ventures out into the small community to use public spaces as their stages. And that is where we first saw the Schwebenbahn.  Erected in 1901 in Wuppertal.  It is an elevated electric train.  It runs only east and west on an 8-mile track. Most of the track is over the Wupper River. What is unusual is that the train hangs from an iron arm under the track, like a ski lift.  I cannot explain why, but it was exciting to ride. And the vistas swinging over the river are exhilarating. The whole thing is held up by iron bits similiar to the Eiffel Tower. It is old, yet feels modern. It carries two million people per year.

Wuppertal otherwise is grey and grim. I paid attention to the faces of the local people. They grimace.  Their mouths are in a frown.  I smiled at a few and for a split second their frown turned to smile then immediately back again.



Antwerp, Belgium

Antwerp is easy to love right from the start. People get around on bicycles and slender street cars. The streets curve. Around each bend is an eye catching historic building. It has an appearance of an appreciation of aesthetics. 

The home of Peter Paul Rubens is open for a visit. I expected historic furniture, maybe his desk, bed, easel, and those things were all there, but the rooms were full of paintings. Original paintings. Mostly by Rubens. Some by Anthony van Dyck and Pieter Breugel the Elder. The walls are covered in leather panels embossed with gold. The clocks and china are the finest of their day. He occupied the house from 1608 till his death in 1640.

Another Antwerp building of the same vintage, is the Plantin-Moretus Museum. Christophe Plantin, a commercial Antwerp printer in the 1550s fled Paris when printers began being burned at the stake. He flourished in Antwerp. The business lasted through the 1800s. His sons and their heirs took over the business one after another. When the business ceased the building became their residence. So walking around the building you see the seven old printing presses. Five still work. The two oldest do not; they were built in 1600. The family possessions include 17th-Century tapestries woven from Rubens’ designs. They display the oldest atlases, botanical prints and dictionaries.

The printing museum sits in a sweet small plaza. We sat in a coffee house. I ordered hot chocolote. It arrived in two parts: the hot milk and the dark chocolate bits in a small glass to add in and watch melt. I loved watching the melting chocolate transform the milk. We spent time with nieces. We joined them at a game bar. It was a special pleasure.  The bar has shelves full of boardgames.  For the price of a cappuccino or a beer we sat for a few hours playing games; us senior citizens and our young’uns who value the opportunity to put their phones down.




Paris
25 October 2019

From Antwerp we rode the train two hours south to Paris. While in Antwerp I thought it beautiful in a Parisian way. Once we arrived in Paris the scale of the beauty was grander, it all seemed so much “more”.  Haussmann’s plan still sings with logic, splendor, rhythm, elegance and balance.

On a chilly, rainy, gray Sunday we traveled 15 miles northwest of Paris for lunch at the Auberge Ravoux. The ground floor restaurant has been restored to its 1890 appearance. The menu is old fashioned classic french from that period. 

We begin with pumpkin soup and a terrine of rabbit with lentils on the side. Next we eat t-bone veal steaks and a large small chicken. We each slow sip a single glass of rosé. Last night we stayed up too late and drank too much champagne, bordeaux, Alsatian white, and a Perigord sweet white with our poached salmon, sautéed wild mushrooms, fois gras, oysters, prawns and assorted exotic seafood.

We are all a bit sleepy, but the cold outdoor air wakes us up. After lunch we take a walk up village lanes past a church, through cornfields. They have been harvested to the ground. What remains is a stubble of cut stalks and assorted decayed cobs. Crows caw in the near distance from tree to tree. Eventually we arrive at a cemetery. It is on high ground. The above ground grave sites are mostly bulky with lids and headstones in marble. Two grave markers stand out because they are simple. One belongs to Vincent Van Gogh the other to Theodore Van Gogh. They died at 37 and 34 years old. 

Vincent van Gogh moved from the asylum in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence to Auvers-sur-Oise two months before his death. He hoped Dr. Gachet would offer a cure from the noise in his head. Van Gogh took a tiny room for two months in the Auberge Ravoux. He made 70 canvases in two months while the family fed and took care of him till one day he limped in holding his abdomen.  He had a bullet wound. He died two days later.

His paintings in Auvers were of crows and fields of crops and the church and the doctor. While we ate in the Auberge busloads of tourists tromped upstairs through his room. The nails he hung his paintings on are still in the wall. Our own pilgrimage consisted of visiting the tabac across the street. At 11:30 in the morning it was filled with locals. Hellos and hugs and handshakes were exchanged. Children were kissed. The men had small glasses of white wine, pastis, whiskey the women milky cups of cappuccino. All as it might have been in his day. Small town life. The population smaller now than then. We walked around, into and past the church he made famous. Inside, the near collapsing stone arches are propped up with iron. Then up the hill through the wind and drizzle up to the crop fields with the crows and the cawing and finally to the two simple graves: Vincent van Gogh 1853-1890 and Theodore van Gogh 1857-1891. 

Bologna: 17-21 October 2019

Wes and Marlow
Bologna, Italy
17-21 October 2019

In Bologna the gelaterias are open from early till late. The best of them make small batches on-site. Cremeria Cavour, Cremeria di Santo Stefano, and Stefino are our go to places. Nocciola (hazelnut) is a favorite flavor; the nuts grow nearby. We like the pomegranate, the caramelized fig, the chestnut, too. Gelato is in the daily diet here. So are pasta, cheese (fresh parmigiano from nearby Parma),  sliced meats, pignoletto (local white wine), San Giovese (local red wine). It is a daily event to enjoy the aperitivo hour. Our go to bar, Zanarini, is elegant. The Bolognese clientele, some with their well behaved dogs, stand at the bar, occupy a stool or sit outside at a table. The staff is expert at classic cocktails. One pleasure is fresh strawberries pureed, poured into the flute then topped with prosecco. The drink is accompanied by finger sandwiches, chunks of cheese, chips olives on toothpicks, grilled vegetables. The food part of “aperitivo” varies. Zanarini is generous; enough food bites to make a meal of. The bolognese have many moments of leisure and pleasure built into their daily schedule.

We have been to Trattoria Casa Mia several times. The white truffle season begins this week.  Wes ordered pasatelli with white truffles and fried eggs with white truffles. In the U.S.A. restaurants white truffles are very expensive. The waiter weighs the truffle before and after. The cost is huge. In Italy, they simply hold the truffle over your dish then shave and shave and shave the truffle until they are satisfied you are satisfied. I had seafood and vegetables. A small trough of ciccoria (chicory); akin to the stalks of swiss chard. And a platter with a whole grilled branzino, two large prawns and scallops in the shell quick broiled with parmigiano bread crumbs and garlic. Wesley’s pasatelli is a unique pasta. We wish it would be available at home. It is an extruded noodle composed of grated parmigiano, bread crumbs, egg and lemon zest. Here it is served floating in a bowl of broth or in a manner called asciutti (ah-SHOO-tee)(dry) with more parmigiano, butter and mushrooms or in our case white truffles.

Restaurants serve wine two ways. You can buy a bottle or have a glass from the bottle. Or you can order “vino della casa” which they serve from a spigot. My pignoletto frizzante “vino della casa” cost €1.50 (1.75 U.S. dollars) versus Wes’s wine from a bottle at €4.  I remember on a previous visit we found a wine bar which sold vino della casa by the glass and you could buy a liter or a half-gallon. We saw people bring their own containers which made the low price even lower. That wine is not fancy, but it is from a real artisan winemaker, a local, who only makes enough to sell locally in bulk.

Another regular food spot for us is Tamburini. Tamburini has a corner location and is divided into different functions: a deli for fresh handmade pasta, for dozens of types of parmigiano, for locally cured hams, salamis and mortadellas; a wine bar with dozens of fine local wines by the glass; and a cafeteria. We push our trays past large balls of fresh mozzarella, small plates of vegetables roasted or steamed or baked, spigots of red and white wine, platters of risotto, or pasta with sausage or tomato or vegetable sauce, cutlets wrapped in prosciutto dredged in parmigiano bread crumbs and sauteed in butter with a squeeze of lemon. The cafeteria is jammed with locals. It is like an italian lesson to hear them speak. On each trip we comprehend more of what they say.

Our last Bologna meal was in Osteria Capello Rosso. It is hard to imagine, but it claims to have opened in 1375.  The Osteria began as a place to hang out and drink alcohol with a few snacks. Eventually they were more about the tasty simple home cooking. This osteria has an annex across the street where they make all the pastas by hand. We had a plate of cauliflower roasted with ricotta. Then a plate of pasatelli and a plate of small sausages covered with friggione. Friggione is a staple, an multi purpose dish. One recipe says to thinly slice 8 pounds of onions. Sprinkle them with a spoon of sugar and a spoon of salt; let them sit. After two hours put them with their juices in a pan on a low low flame. After two hours add one pound fresh peeled chopped tomatoes and two spoons of lard (maybe they mean sausage drippings) and slow cook for another 90 minutes. Onions cooked slowly till they melt transcend their aggressive raw selves. Though we were full we each had a raviolo (a ahortbread half-moon cookie stuffed with prune jam) and a tiny glass of Nocino Classico a wine made from walnuts. 

Yesterday, I walked through the narrow streets under the cover of the porticos to the park, Giardini Margherita, where a bel ragazzo, Wes, waited for me. It was so beautiful a day, I wished the whole world could be here.

Sorrento & Amalfi: 10-15 October 2019

Sorrento & Amalfi

From Naples we went to Amalfi with a stop for lunch in Sorrento.  From the dock in Sorrento, crane your neck upward to the top of a sheer cliff and you will see the Grand Hotel Excelsior Vittoria. The vistas from its perch are dramatic; of Naples Bay and Vesuvius. The hotel has been host to the two tenors of the past century, Enrico Caruso and Luciano Pavarotti.  (Caruso’s room can be seen in this music video by the late, Lucio Dalla: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=JqtSuL3H2xs ).   It is all old world elegance and luxury. The climate was perfect, also the food, and we are happy to be joined by two nieces for the Amalfi stay.

Back on the ferry to Amalfi. So there is no confusion: Amalfi has given its name to the Amalfi Coast and to a small seaside village called Amalfi. We are in the village of Amalfi. Our apartment has a view.  It should. There is a climb of 163 stairs to arrive to it.  The apartments beneath us are stacked one upon another as so many turtles in a pond. One afternoon we visited Ravello which is high on a hill. We took the bus up.  We walked down.  1,700 stairs.

Tonight. Just past sundown. We visit the cliffside terrace of the Convent Hotel. Facing east. The bay of Amalfi below with several jetties. The busy boat activity of the day has ebbed. The red, green, white, blue and yellow beach umbrellas have been lowered. The contour of the bay curves as a piano case does. Sinuous. The moon slowly rises in the distance over the hill. While we sit here it has progressed from barely seen to a semi circle to a fully visible orb. It casts golden light on the Tyrrhenian Sea. A marble plaque behind us is inscribed with a remembrance of Enrico Wadsworth Longfellow. Perhaps he wrote a masterpiece here. We have our own remembrance. 90 years ago Nana sat in this terrace.  More or less twenty years old. On a “grand tour” of Europe with her parents and brother. She wrote about it in her illustrated travel diary. We told our waiter her story.  He said his grandfather worked there at that time. He mused “what if he was her waiter.”

Napoli: 7-10 October 2019

Napoli
5 October 2019

Naples has a particular allure to me. When I was young, let’s say fourteen years old, I met a man, an old Italian man. He was sixty five years old. (On reflection, that no longer seems old to me.) He was a cellist.  Born in Naples in 1907.  I lived only a few streets from his house in Hollywood.  It was in a neighborhood known for its Italianate houses. His house was a gem, a place for a poor kid like me to dream about.  Polished terra cotta floors. Dark stained wooden ceilings with painted borders. Elegant velvet covered sofas. Wall sconces with ecru linen shades. French doors with long draperies. Hand made cabinets.  A piano with ornate legs. It was elegant old world. The man was Cesare Augustus Pascarella. He was the son of a conservatory master teacher who had the patronage of Queen Margherita in Naples. When Cesare’s sister was born the Queen presented her with a pearl necklace.

Cesare was an avid teacher.  He believed that music was creation the opposite of destruction.  That it was a noble calling. It was a fortunate day when I met him; when he accepted me into his youth program. Though he was a cellist and I a violist he gave me private lessons. I played with his amateur chamber music ensembles in his home and in his youth orchestra at a college. I carried the baskets of orchestral music folders.  I set up the orchestra acoustical shell and the chairs and music stands.  I saw him more than once a week for several years. I ate many meals at his dinner table.  Now, we are going to Naples and I can get a glimpse of the world that formed him. Though it is one hundred years later, many aspects of the “old world” remain constant.

Arrival in Naples is not for the faint hearted. The central train station is in a challenging neighborhood.  Its squalor and traffic and chaos and sense of menace are overwhelming. There is a bustling taxi stand at curbside.  The taxis have meters and set prices for particular zones. It means nothing to the drivers. They charge what they want, what they can squeeze out of you.

Our hotel is elegant. It is the stuff of Cesare’s house. As we venture more into the city on foot it becomes clear that Naples is a mash up of high and low, elegant and peasant; by peasant I mean to say “dog eat dog”, survival of the fittest. I came to feel that Naples does not simmer, it boils. The women walk heads high like runway models.  The men are unsmiling, macho and slow to warm.  But after a day we settle in and come to terms with how to navigate the challenges.

Preliminary online sleuthing produced a photo from 1912 of the Liceo Musicale di Napoli where Cesare’s father, Ignazio, taught. Though not its name it was was referred to as the royal conservatory. With the San Carlo Opera across the street it had royal patronage from Queen Margherita.

Our first adventure in the city was a tour of the San Carlo Opera House. The Italians love opera and the San Carlo is a gem. Across the street is a Galleria like the one in Milan. Cross shaped. Glass covered. Marble floored. Elegant.  As we enter it it is clear this is the location of the 1912 photo of the Pascarella Liceo Musicale.  This is where Ignazio taught.  This is where little Cesare ran and played and had gelato as a child.

The Liceo still exists, though no longer in its former prominent second floor location.  Now, it is a small office in the back of the building.  I sent emails and texts, I made phone calls and left messages, I visited and knocked on the locked door all without a response. These pursuits move slowly, but they are off to a good start.

Another Naples connection is my viola. Vittorio Bellarosa made it in Naples in 1957.  His address is handwritten on the label inside the instrument.

We found Bellarosa’s workshop. It is now a gambling shop for lottery tickets and slot machines. He used to live above the store. It is interesting that he remained in Naples during the 1950s. After the war, Naples was challenged. Life was hard. Photos show people’s beds on sidewalks because their apartment buildings had been bombed beyond use. We found a few people who remembered him and one man to me addressed him as Maestro Bellarosa. Another spoke about Bellarosa’s “figlia” (daughter) in New York.

Naples is a pizza mecca. In Naples pizza is not simply crust with sauce and cheese.  It is a palette for an artist. The medium is dough and sauce and cheese, but the end results are like comparing Da Vinci to Picasso. Two examples stood out.  I thought I would hate “fried pizza”, but I loved it. The dough is rolled out about fifteen inches across.  It is dressed with sauce, cheese and filling, but only to the center.  Then folded over like ravioli and dunked into boiling oil. It puffs up and rises; in a few seconds it is done. Before it gets to us it is patted down for excess oil.  The shop is tiny.  The proprietors are part of the Sorbillo family. Two generations ago the Sorbillos had 21 children.  Today, Sorbillos are making pizzas all over Naples.

Another pizza, at da Attilio’s, was free form.  After dressing the center of the pizza the edges of the dough were stretched at six points. The stretched dough at each point was folded over a little pillow of ricotta.

Isola di Procida, Napoli: 15-17 October 2019

Wes and Marlow
Isola di Procida, Napoli, Italia
15-17 October 2019

We are twenty days into this voyage. I say voyage rather than “vacation” because we have become quite good at immersing ourselves in our varying locales. In Italy, we have become able to express ourselves in the local language. We have had meaningful late night conversations with locals, without a word of english. We value the “old world”. After all, our American culture grew from the seeds of old world culture.

Today, we are in Isola di Procida, a small island (1.6 square miles), 14 miles beyond the bay of Naples. Of the many places we have been, Procida ranks high. Last night we had eight o’clock dinner at the waterfront. Da Maria alla Corricella quickly became a favorite ristorante. But, before walking from the hotel, down the hill, 150 stairs to Da Maria we went to our hotel’s garden for an aperitivo. The evening lights made the water shine. The boats moved gently. The dwellings climbing the steep cliffs were yellow and red and blue and green, but faded by the sun. In the garden we met a man and woman from Berlin. The man asked if I had earlier been playing Bach. In our room I been, but so softly so no one could be bothered. But he heard it. It pleased him.  In the garden I happened to have my viola with me. I offered to play a few minutes for him. He was interested, so I did. The garden had a few lights, but it was mostly dark.  The air was moist, the viola damp. Our sparkling wine was poured. I sipped then began to play. Softly at first. Then louder. After the first piece, I sensed more was appropriate so I played more; and drank more prosecco. Mr. Berlin was smartly dressed with pointy shoes and a neck scarf; a generically international artsy style. He knew music peripherally. Then we heard the eight o’clock church bells. We were late for dinner. I told him I would play more down the hill at Maria’s.

Fifteen minutes later we arrived at dinner. Da Maria’s is nestled into a courtyard rectangle between three buildings at the edge of the water. Long ago (or maybe still) the boats would be pulled onto the dry land where the ristorante sits. Her place steadily descends right into the water. We got used to our wine glasses at a tilt and things rolling off the slanted table. Two nights earlier while walking that spot we saw a man. Smallish, compact, barrel-chested with a smooth worn wooden crutch under one arm. Somehow, I am not certain how, we became acquainted. Maria was his cousin. He (Francesco) and Maria were native to Procida. He was kind to us. He spoke slowly and clearly and with patience. Whether it was intended or not he was a perfect conversation companion. That first night we made a date to see him again two days later at Maria’s. He implied he would have something special for us to eat.

So there we were. Two days later. There were a few people in Maria’s tiny piazza. Not too many because the busy season has wound down. Wes and I said quick hellos. I right away opened the viola case and began to play. It was a natural theater for optimal sound. I faced the boats. The listeners faced the surrounding buildings behind me. The light was warm and amber. Passers by stopped to listen. Upstairs neighbors leaned out windows. Maria, the chef, came out from the kitchen. It might have been the most comfortable I have ever felt playing. The listeners were kind and generous. It seemed meaningful to them. A platter arrived to the table. Of course I stopped and sat.

On the platter were the special things promised by Francesco. Tiny sea creatures as sweet as could be. Calamari (squid) fully grown and the size of our pinky finger. Tiny crustaceans (canocchie) with two black spots. The spots look like cartoon eyes, but they are just spots. The taste was clean and sweet. Everything was caught a few hours earlier. We cleaned the plates with bread; here that is called “making the little shoe,” (fare la scarpetta.)

When the plate was clean I took up the viola again and played more. I hoped I was not overstaying my welcome, but they seemed happy and I was, too. In tiny Procida life is simple. You do not go to the movies. Locals do not go to the restaurant; not when the locals are fabulous cooks. We were making our own entertainment: food, wine, music, conversation, friendship.

This morning, our last in Procida, we woke early, just before daylight. I was glad to watch our tiny harbor slowly illuminate.

The day we arrived it was to the busy side of the island where the ferries arrive. We had earlier had a challenging taxi experience leaving Naples. Interesting enough to make want walk next time. So I was more interested in walking to the Procida inn. It seemed easy enough. About a half a mile. But it was to the summit of the island. The pavement was black lava slabs lain diagonally. Rolling luggage must roll slowly. But we made it.

The building seemed to have been a former three story residence divided into individual rooms. Each room has a terrace. The view down is steeply vertical to the water of the quaint bay. The bay is a former volcanic crater. The beaches have black sand. The vertical cliffs are filled with dwellings stacked about seven high from the dock. It is plain to see how menacing earthquakes are here. The residences are entirely interconnected on these slopes.

We have visited Sorrento, Amalfi, Bellaggio, Portofino, Taormina; exquisitely sited places, overrun with tourists, glitz and souvenirs.  Procida strikes us as an equally alluring destination, perhaps like other popular Italian villages were before they were “discovered.”

So on that first night when we slowly rolled bags up the hill to the splendid vista, we wandered the waterfront on our quiet side of the island. We had dinner at Da Maria alla Corricella. I recognize that what to me seems like random wonderful discovery is actually the splendid thorough work of Wes. It has been arranged like a outstanding feast. Each course leads perfectly to the next. Many things have been considered. The lodgings are optimal for comfort and vistas.

Our first Da Maria meal unfolded at sundown. We sat at 7:53 at our slanty table. We began with a platter of seafood appetizers (antipasti):

Da Maria appetizer plate.  WOW.

fresh anchovy meatballs, tuna (fresh caught small tuna) bruschetta, marinated baby octopus in radicchhio leaves, tomato bruschetta, fresh and sweet anchovies lightly dressed. The table clothes are printed with vivid enhanced color photos of the cluster of buildings behind us. Maria’s daughter is a photographer and features her work on the fashion runways of Milan. We made our first contact with Francesco. He told us he was 78 years old. He showed us videos on his large Samsung phone of Maria featured in television shows of celebrity chefs.  Maria is also an expert fish catcher. Her boat sits in the water, feet from her dinner tables. Maria and Francesco are cousins. Their mothers were sisters. Maria’s young granddaughter comes over talking to her pet parrot, her best friend, on her shoulder. American jazz plays softly: Sarah Vaughn, then Dinah Washington, (What a difference a day makes; Cry me a river; Is you is or is you ain’t my baby.) The lamps cast a golden glow ... Fishing boats are feet away reflections in the still water ... The ristorante patio descends to the water ... The antipasti are wildly good ... It is difficult to choose a favorite: the tuna on toast, the stuffed squid, the chopped octopus in radicchio leaf? ... The pastas have arrived ... One is a local noodle, scialletelli, with shellfish, but the sauce is garlic, olive oil and pureed chickpeas .... Another is spaghetti with seppia ..... Seppia is squid-like and calamari-like .... It has black ink ... It always presents as a plate of blackness ... That does not bother our blind friends ... Especially when your palate is so happy ... Tonight, all is right with the world.

With Francesco at Da Maria alla Corricella.

Wes and Marlow
Isola di Procida, Napoli, Italia
15 October 2019

Francesco's Crudo plate.

Down to the restaurant at Chiara Beach where
we swam before lunch.
Vesuvius in the distance.

Menaggio, Lago di Como: 25 Sept to 2 October 2019

Wes and Marlow
Menaggio, Lago di Como, Italia
25 September to 2 October, 2019

I read this week Qantas Airlines will make a twenty hour non-stop flight. A commercial non-stop of that length has never been made. The jet will have a few dozen passengers. There will be various research specialists on board to study how the flight crew, pilots and passengers respond to the twenty hour experience.

Our flight from Los Angeles to Milan was eleven hours. That was plenty long. We had good seats. We wore pajamas. We had amusements and blankets. Still, it was plenty long.

From the airport, we rode a train to the small city of Como. Como is probably an interesting destination of it’s own. Several famous standard repertoire operas were conducted, by their composers, there. But mostly, Como is a point of departure for visitors to Menaggio, Varenna and Bellaggio, the three famous villages at the center of three-pronged Lago di Como.

We were a bit sleepy looking as we sat for a snack in Como waiting for our boat to Menaggio. The ride was 45 minutes. On the way we passed fairy tale villas on points of land which jut into the lake. The moment we arrived in Menaggio we were energized. It is a great feeling to return to a place you loved and find you love it even more. This is our third visit to Lago di Como and we are as enthralled as ever.

Menaggio Waterfront

It was a perfect day. Blue sky. Puffy white clouds. 75 degrees. Our apartment on the top floor (the third) of a medieval era building had a small round Juliet balcony overlooking the piazza; perfect for serenading the people below with viola melodies or an impromptu opera aria.

Menaggio Apartment View

The main piazza in Menaggio is a triangle. The long side of the triangle is Lake Como. Directly across the water are Varenna in one direction and Bellaggio in another. In this area we expect to spend time on the water. The villages are connected by daily ferry service. The ferries are little boats though some carry a half-dozen motor vehicles. Beyond the ferries you can rent a motorboat by the hour. Years ago we did that. It was indescribable. This time we did it again.

We revisited the same boat vendor. I showed him a photo I made of him seven years ago when he was a teenager. He laughed, “that was a dozen kilos ago,” he said. He walked us down the dock. In the water we saw hefty three pound fish, lunch, swimming in groups. (Lavarello they are called. A simple white fish. They are grilled and served with chopped almonds or butter and sage.) At the end of the dock was our boat. Our clerk gave Wes a quick tutorial (most of which he remembered from seven years earlier) and off we went.

There are three directions you can go from Menaggio. (Perhaps I am repeating myself: Lake Como is composed of three finger lakes which meet in the center where the three villages I mentioned sit on opposing shores.) We headed north toward the Valtellina region. It was forty minutes at moderate speed to the end of the lake. We could have parked the boat to go ashore anywhere, but did not. The scenery is calming. The mountains rise from the lake. Eventually they become the Alps. The villages each have a castle, scenic villa (by scenic, I mean, we see them and feel “wow!!”) , churches, bell towers, ancient monasteries, etc.

The Valtellina region figured largely in our Menaggio eating. Aside from eating and being on the water and admiring scenery there is little else to do. It is a place to leave behind the concerns of the city, to decompress. Aside from the historic presence here of ancient Roman philosophers, composers and writers a landmark event was that here Benito Mussolini was brought to justice. He took refuge while on the run. Then was rounded up unrecognized in a group arrest. Once recognized he and his lady-friend were stood against a wall and shot. Justice was served. Then the public in Milan had their way with his corpse which hung in the public Piazalle Loreto. It is a dark tale, but because we like justice it is a happy ending.

There were several outstanding meals in Menaggio. Ristorante Il Vapore sits on a piazza adjacent to ours. It is the ground floor of a small inn, run by the mamma and her son. The fish from Lake Como is simple: grilled and lightly dressed. They prepare the classic Valtellina pasta, pizzoccheri (pronounced pete-SAW-ked-dee). Pizzoccheri is made with buckwheat flour, oil, water and potato; more or less. It is served like a casserole baked with potato cubes, chopped cabbage, butter and Valtellina’s casera cheese. It is hearty, filling comfort food, good for a cold winter. Our appetizer was a plate of Lake Como fish (a trout type and a salmon colored fish) pulled into flakes and lightly dressed with olive oil and lemon juice. I complimented the owner. She waved off my comments and said, “no, we serve only simple food.”

Another meal at Trattoria La Vecchia Magnolia similarly was “simple food”.  Here they make Sciatt della Valtellina: an unusual fried ball, like a falafel ball, but made from buckwheat flour, casera cheese and beer.

We ate again after seven years at Pizza Lugano. The pizza maker (pizzaiolo, probounced Peets-eye-oh-lo) worked near our table on a porcini mushroom pizza. We ordered carrot salad and tomato salad. The carrots arrived shredded in a bowl and the tomatoes sliced in another bowl ready for us to dress with the olive oil and vinegar on the table.

We had several meals at a restaurant a ferry ride away. In miles it was nearby. But the ferry, as a bus does, made several stops crisscrossing the lake. We arrived after one hour. The boat was our favorite, The Milano. Over one-hundred years old with a cute single smokestack, it is the first boat we rode on Lake Como seven years ago. Trattoria Santo Stefano, already one of our favorites, won us over all over again. Everything was remarkably tasty. I asked if nonna (grandmother) was in the kitchen. No. The chef looked like a skinny teenager and was from Sicily. We ate carpaccio di ricciola fresca (amberjack) marinata agli agrumi di Sicilia and zenzero (Sicilian citrus and ginger.)  Caponata siciliana: delicate tender pink cubes of eggplant marinated in citrus and mild vinegar and oil and tomato with capers. Spaghetti al pesto Trapanese: Trapanese pesto uses almonds in place of pine nuts. Finally, Mixta Griglia, which as it sounds is mixed grill, an assortment of grilled objects (seafood) from the lake.

On Sunday there was an exciting airshow. Ten jets flew in precise formations. Like a school of fish they turned this way and that always in perfect alignment. Now and then one peeled off from the group, flew straight up, did a fake stall, then made a spiraling nose dive straight toward the water. At the end the emitted, out their jets’ rear ends the colors of the Italian flag which made the crowd squeal. 

One morning in Menaggio, I wrote this .... As I stand with my back to the water on this small piazza at the shore of Lago di Como the sun shines on my balding head and after a perfect brioche con marmellata, all is well. The piazza is picture perfect. The surrounding buildings, each three stories, are in excellent state of repair. Their colors are varying shades of salmon, cantaloupe, mocha and sunshine. Wrought iron balconies enable one to step out for air, for the vista or to say hello to your friends and neighbors on the street. The 10:30 AM sunlight on the lake is brilliant glittering gold.

Wes and Marlow
Menaggio, Lago di Como, Italia
25 September to 2 October, 2019

Peru, Part Two: 4 May 2018

We enjoyed our stay in tiny Ollantaytambo. Once, long ago, Ollantaytambo was probably a sweet village. Though the Spanish clobbered it in the 1500’s, it remained more Inca than Spanish. The layout of the town, it’s stone roads and paths are all Incan. Today, as a point of departure for Machu Picchu, it’s tiny stone streets are jammed with a steady stream of cars and busses. They enter through one end, make a loop through town, and arrive at the train station. Our inn, the El Albergue, as I mentioned, was ten feet from the train station tracks. On the tracks, the air stifled with diesel exhaust. Remarkably, the inn was an oasis with almost zero evidence of train noise or smell. Inside, we stepped out from our rooms into an over-planted garden of fragrant flowers and shrubs. If we heard anything, it came from the dining room where a harpist played. I was seduced by his melody. It seemed he played only one song, but in so many different ways that it seemed ever different.   Later, I learned it was a huayno, which is an ancient Incan dance form. A huayno intends to express human emotion. It is celebrates triumphs and joy. And it expresses profound sadness. I read about the huayno, but without having read a thing that is how it made me feel. Our harpist moved gracefully. When he stood his motions were gracefully, as they would be underwater. When he played his closed eyes were raised upward. He never looked at his strings. His touch was gentle. His voice was, too. It was the last thing we heard in Ollantaytambo.

Then we boarded the train to move onward to Machu Picchu. Our train followed the Urubamba River. At times, it seemed a placid river. Then huge boulders appeared and the water was a powerful eroding force. The train cars were the panoramic type with windows that curve up and over the roof. The terrain transformed from dry to tropical. As it did, the trees began to show signs of wild orchids. Eventually, the trees were dense with orchids whose spores landed on the branches and made a home. The area was home to many animals. We did not see them in the wild, but they would have been pumas, condors, and snakes. After two hours, we arrived into Aguas Calientes. It was my impression it is built on the confluence of powerful rivers. Once, it must have been a village in it’s own right. Now, since about 1920, it is entirely a transit point. We disembarked the train and boarded a Mercedes Benz 30-seat passenger bus.

In the early 1900’s, an expedition from Yale University and National Geographic, lead by Hiram Bingham, arrived at Machu Picchu. Machu Picchu was never really lost, so it did not need discovering. It was a specific residential compound built for a king and the intellectuals. It began far down at the river with terraces. The stone work of the terraces is extremely precise. The terraces climb the mountain like stairs for giants. At the top they spread into stone apartments with pitched-roofs of reeds. The apartments are mostly inter-connected and form something akin to an ascending hill-top condominium project. And overlooking the dwellings are two peaks, ??? Picchu and ??? Picchu. The area is one where everywhere your eyes falls are hundreds of peaks. But these two rise from the stone apartments and overlook them. Atop the two peaks are more terraces.

The Machu Picchu compound was built over one hundred years. It was then occupied for less than one hundred years, concluding around 1540. From then until Hiram Bingham’s arrival it became a squatter’s paradise. The squatters, though, did not maintain it well. The local guides credit Hiram Bingham with the preservation of Machu Picchu. Bingham made many photographs. They show the site was fairly well intact. Now, UNESCO is involved. Preservation, conservation, improvements and site management are dictated by their rules.

Throughout the Andes, everywhere you look there are terraces on the mountains. They are remarkable for the precision of the stone work. It turns out, what lays behind the facade of the stonework is wildly sophisticated. To begin building a terrace, push back the earth, build your stone wall, then push the dirt back up to the wall. You could simply pile stones, squirt mortar in the spaces and hope for the best. The Incas ground the intersecting stones so the sides which would touch were perfectly smooth and flush. To make them more secure they interlocked the stones by carving them into mortise and tenon formations. That element is not at all visible to us. When it came time to push the earth back up to the new wall, the new fill was put in in layers. From the bottom up, it was big stones, gravel, sand then rich black earth with grass and crops on top. The rich black earth was imported from the Amazon jungle. Barefoot Incan runners carried it in in sacks on their backs. The sophisticated, labor intensive, brilliantly designed end result looks to our eyes like “a nice terrace”.

We stayed overnight at the Machu Picchu site. There is one hotel, only one. It is the Belmond Sanctuary Lodge. It is outstanding. Outside it’s main doors the Mercedes Benz 30-seat busses arrive continuously. The make the thirty minute drive, from Aguas Calientes, up the narrow zig-zag road. The bus is not the only way to arrive in Machu Picchu. Some people walk for four-days on a narrow stony trail to arrive. Some carry their possessions in a back pack. Others hire Incans to carry their heavy load. We huff and puff. The Incans glide like floating on air while carrying someone’s deckchair, air mattress, Evian and Pelligrino water and Egyptian cotton towel. It felt very “elite” to not hike in and to stay on-site in luxury, but I was never, since childhood, a trekker. As a little boy, everyone walked faster than I. I always stopped to look at a flower, an interesting group of clouds, or to close my eyes and listen to the wind. Also I was unsure footed. I was the kid who would fall up the stairs. Elite suits me fine.

From our room, we walked almost directly into the park. Everything is uphill, but after only a few dozen stairs, you can be at a magnificent vista point where if that is all you were to see you would feel you had seen the enduring magnificence which humans are capable of.