Giro di Italia

This morning Kevin and I had the chance to watch the Giro di Italia! This is basically the Tour di France of Italy. It is a 22 day race and the riders go about 200km each day...it's crazy! Today was day 15 and the riders had to go into the mountains. They road rights past our town and then up the main road to Piancavallo. They then continued into the Dolomites and ended near Belluno. Kevin and I decided to get a stop in one of the switchbacks on the road up to Piancavallo. It was such a festival:) There were people everywhere, and I love Italy because I would say over half of them road up to watch the race! We hung out for about an hour before the riders got there (but they close the road early so we had to get our spot).

Some of the coolest things were seeing all the team cars with the spare bikes on top. The bikes are super nice, and cost way more than the car they are riding on, which is funny:) We had a great time, we really felt like we were taking advantage of Italy today! Here are some shots of the racers passing us. They were going about 20mph up this road...it was crazy!

Here is our spot, waiting for the racers:)




This is a shot over the side of the mountain, you can see the team cars coming up the road past our town.


This guys was awesome! As I said, most people road their bikes up to watch the race...well he didn't want to get tan lines, so this guys hiked up those spandex shorts and rocked it all day!


And finally the racers came through!

Paragliding

There is a group of Italians that go paragliding from Piancavallo. Some of our friends have joined the group and had their first big flight the other day. I did not fly, I just took the photos, but it was still a great time seeing them all launch. Kevin and I are thinking about trying it out...we'll see, we already have too many hobbies and not enough weekends! Here are some shots of the guys launching.

Family Reunion in Venice

We were lucky enough to meet up with Brian and Courtney for a day in Venice. They were on a week long tour of Italy, and sadly didn't have enough vacation time to hang out with us longer. We met up and saw the sites of Venice, and also took in Murano. After a week long trip in Italy they were happy to just hang out at a cafe and have a glass of Italian wine. I also got to introduce them to the Italian Spritz (my favorite summer cocktail).




I wish we had more time with them, they are such a fun couple...not to mention part of our family!

"Best Idea Ever"

I have a great friend here in Italy named Larissa. She is my running buddy, and a great friend I know I can talk to about anything. Well, this past Sunday we went out to dinner for her Birthday. At dinner I asked her what we should do Monday (her actual birthday) and she suggested we go on a run. That was normal, we went on a run on my birthday a few weeks ago, so I said sure, where should we go? Her answer almost made me fall off the chair. She says "well I know we've been talking about it, so I say we just do it...let's run to Piancavallo" WHAT?? First of all, WE have never talked about it! Piancavallo is a 30-45 minute drive UP the mountain, there is no way we are going to make it! But, it was her 30th birthday wish...what is a friend to do?

So, Monday morning we start out on the back road (we had intel that it was not as steep as the main road). Well, as soon as we lock the car and get going up some very steep terrain it starts to pour down rain! It is not super warm, probably in the 60s, and we are in shorts and long sleaves...we are now soaked and freezing...and the hill is so steep we can only run about 30 ft at a time. We huddle under a tree for a few minutes, and have the first of a series of discussions that could have lead to us freezing to death. We conclude that we are already wet, so we might as well push up to the church and reassess. At the church, I feel my heart might explode and it's still raining...so the only logical choice was to keep going. The road did level out a lot and we were able to push about 3 more miles uphill. At this point we were feeling really good. We decided that this was not going to be impossible afterall. But, we were not prepared to push on that day. We needed more water, and more food if we were going to get all the way to the top.

Yesterday (Thursday) we went for it again. We pushed all the way up to the antennas. For those who don't know Aviano that was 9 miles up hill, with an elevation gain of about 3,000ft. We then went down the main road (more direct, but steeper) and got back to the base 6.5 miles later. It was not fast, it was not pretty, but we finished it and it was awesome. The entire run, as things got really ugly, Larissa kept reminding me that this was the "best idea ever"...best idea ever:)

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/83673803

We did not bring a camera, but here is the link from my GPS watch...we had to prove we actually did it!

Buona Pasqua!

Happy Easter everyone:) Well, I'm a day late, but in Italy the Holiday is celebrated on the Monday...so today! We have a great Italian friend named Giorgio...anyone who has come to visit knows him well. For those who haven't, he is in his 70s and speaks NO english at all! I speak very little Italian, but understand a lot, so I can usually put together enough words to limp through conversation. Today however, I did not have the skills:)

Giorgio is very hard to talk to over the phone. When he is with you, you can use his facial expressions, hand gestures etc to figure out what he is talking about, and over the phone you don't have that. Also, being in his 70s, he's not very technologically savy...so he has a tendency to yell into the phone...which makes it muffled and hard to understand. I try to avoid to phone with Giorgio if I can, but sometimes it's not possible.

He came over the other day and invited Kevin and me to eat Easter lunch with his family today. I gladly excepted, but Kevin had to work, so I would be going solo. Well, this morning, I went on a run with the girls. Giorgio had said to meet at his house at 12 and we would drive out to his other house (in the country) and have lunch with his family. I was literally running when my phone rang (I had it in the little pocket of my shorts). I saw it was Giorgio so I answered it, thinking there would be some kind of change to the plans for the day. He just wanted to confirm I was still coming, which I said I was and I would be at his house at 1200. About 10 minutes later he calls again...I am still running... He asks to meet at "undici e mezzo". Well, I am totally out of breath and trying to keep up with the girls who are still running, so I say "si, si, no problema" and I hang up. I finish my run (7 miles by the way) at around 1100 and head home. I get home around 1130 and check my email, thinking I have until 130 to meet Giorgio...well at 1140 he calls to ask where I am. It occurs to me then (an only then) that undici e mezzo means 1130!! NOT 1:30!! I am totally late, and I smell awful from the run!

So, I tell him I'm so sorry, and I will be there in 10 minutes. I run upstairs and take the fastest shower of my life and start drying my hair. I get my hair mostly dry, throw on some clothes and run downstairs. As I'm putting my shoes on, Giorgio rings my doorbell. He says it's no problem and we head out to meet his family...I officially got totally ready in 16 minutes!!

Lunch was fabulous and huge! I love hanging out with Giorgio's family, we are very lucky to have Italian friends to teach us about the culture and feed us awesome food:) I ran out so fast I didn't have time to grab the camera, so there are not photos of our Easter, but it was still great!

Spring in Italia

It is possible I am the worst blogger ever. It has been forever, but I guess that's just because I feel like there hasn't really been anything exciting going on. We have just been hanging out enjoying the wonderful spring weather, taking walks around the neighborhood and exploring the mountains. Here are some photos from the past few weeks.

The first one is our favorite neighbor:) This goat is on my running loop, and he is always standing up on these rocks. He climbs down and head butts the fence if you stop and try to talk to him:)



This is on an evening stroll Kevin and I took around our house. This old church was built in the 1400s. It one of my favorite things.



Bo is also enjoying the warmer weather. He and Rocky are getting along much better, I think the winter just made them both stir crazy in the house.



This is a flower on a shrub in our front yard. I think it's a tulip magnolia, but I'm not really sure. I love the colors!



One weekend we took as hike up at Lake Barcis. It was still a little chilly that day, and we thought it might rain on us, but there was some cool mist over the lake, and there were lots of wild flowers on the trail (though none of my photos of them came out that great).



This is the plum tree in our front yard. This was a few weeks ago, the flowers are all gone now, and it is totally covered with leaves, but when it was blooming it was COVERED in bees! It was so cool, and it smelled amazing!



I was trying to get Rocky to smell the flowers too, but I'm not sure he gets it:)



Yesterday we took a hike up into Dardago and went rock climbing with some friends from the squadron. The weather was great, and we had a much bigger group show up than we usually do, so it was fun to spend the day outdoors!



So, while I don't really have anything particularly exciting going on, we have been enjoying a beautiful Italian spring:)

My first macro photographs...and learning to edit them

Now that we have a nice new camera, I feel it is my duty to learn to use it. I signed up for photography classes at the base arts and crafts center, and last week was the class on macro photography. For those who don't know, macro is taking very close up photos, usually of totally normal things. It's very strange how you start to look at the world in an entirely new way even after just a few days of focusing on macro photos.

Sunday the weather here was gorgeous...you can feel spring trying to sneak in, but it just can't quit make it yet. To enjoy the sunny weather I went out into the front yard and starting messing around with the camera looking for macro subject matter...and here is what I came up with.

We have a pear tree in the front yard that is just starting to get buds. There was one bud that had already bloomed into a flower. It was random because it was just this single bud growing straight out of the trunk. Here is the original photo...




The I played with it in photoshop and got these two...






Nothing spectacular, but it was really fun to manipulate them, and I think they look pretty good:)

Then I found this random shell in our yard. We are nowhere near the ocean, but for some reason there are little shells all over our yard. I have this theory that the kids that lived in the house before us had some shell collection that just migrated outside at some point...I have no other explanation for it. So here is the original shot of the shell sitting on one of the big rocks in the yard...



And then the photoshopped version. This one looks a little grainy to me, but I think I just compressed it too far to download to the blog because it doesn't look like that on the original.



And just for fun, here's Bo caught mid yawn...he looks like a ferocious beast:)...well maybe not...