This morning I landed in Turin. Big city! Nearly 2 million. Once the capital of the Duchy of Savoy (think: 1561), then the capital of the Kingdom of Sardinia, then very briefly, the capital of the United Kingdom of Italy (from 1861, for four years!), Turin is no small potato! Well you might ask -- then how come so few people travel to see it? This includes me -- I've never been here before.
And it's not that I feel the need to now, in my older years, check off all the big and beautiful cities of Italy. There are quiet a few that I'll never visit, of that I am sure. Nonetheless, I'd always been curious about Turin. Some call it Parisian in appearance. Stately buildings. The architecture spans all important periods: the Renaissance, Baroque, Rococo, Art Nouveau -- it's all here. (I will dispute the comparison to Paris, since to me it feels totally northern Italian, but the comparisons have been made.) Others sing praises about its foods. This, after all, is where the Slow Food movement originated. It's where chocolate got its foothold. But none of this is what drew me here right now. I'm heading for Turin because this is where I needed to land in order to head up to the Aosta Valley and the mountains. In the end, I moved the mountain trip to January (and to Chamonix), because something else came up: I'm to meet up my Polish friends this coming week in Rome. Turin -- a town completely unknown to me, remained in place as the gateway to that more familiar, eternally seductive city of Rome.
And so here I am, in Turin, the fourth largest Italian city (after Rome, Milan, and Naples).
You probably know a few random things about it: it's in Piedmont -- the northwestern corner of Italy. It supposedly houses the shroud of Turin, though if you come here for that, you'll be disappointed. They dont display the real thing. For one, there have been lingering questions about whether the shroud actually dates back to the time of the crucifixion of Christ -- not helped by the fact that the Catholic Church has not sanctioned further testing of the material and so analyses are going to be fragmented and not necessarily accurate. But, too, even if you date it correctly and would like to believe that it once covered the body of Christ, even if you bypass the further speculation that its remarkable imaging is there due to the resurrection, even if all that is in your head, you still will be disappointed because the actual shroud is not on display for public viewing. You can see a copy of it, nothing more. Which, to me, is a really odd reason then to go to Turin -- to see a copy of something that may or may not be real in the first place.
Other things to note about Turin: I said it's a chocolate city. This is where you would order (because everyone else does!) a bicerin -- a coffee, laced with drinking chocolate, milk and topped with cream. And this is where Gianduja comes from -- a chocolate blended with hazelnut paste. No, not Nutella -- that's a commercial product with other stuff thrown in to make it into a spread. Gianduja is all about chocolate, milk and nuts, a combination dating back to the time when Napoleon was in charge (Turin was annexed to the French Empire in 1802 -- for a while anyway).
Boulevards, piazzas, cafes. A very tall museum. The River Po (which then flows through Milan, Parma, Mantua, Ferrara... all the way to the Adriatic). The Alps, framing it to the north. That's what I'm sure you'll find in the Turin photos here, on Ocean.
But not right away.
A review of the trip itself comes first here, because in short vacations (and this one necessarily has to be short, because of a commitment I made to be back for the kids' special school International Day), the travel takes out a chunk of the trip days. You shouldn't pretend they didn't happen. They're part of the experience. And this time, everything was easy, which should be noted, just like when there are crazy delays and broken seats and re-routings and mix ups, and we cant wait to tell everyone about our misery.
I will say that in terms of planning, were I unconstrained financially (I always pick the cheaper connections), I would not have taken the trans-Atlantic flight that I did. When you fly to Europe from the Midwest, your overseas segment is always overnight. Mine was from Detroit to Amsterdam and it was indeed overnight, but it left Detroit at 4:20. There is no hope in hell that I'm going to fall asleep on a flight that lasts 7 hours and arrives in Europe before your own midnight. (This one landed at 5:20am Amsterdam time, which is 10:20pm Madison time. Just when you're getting sleepy, you're told to put your chair in an upright position and be prepared to disembark.)
The winds were strong over the Atlantic and we actually arrived nearly an hour ahead of schedule. That means I had close to a four hour layover at this airport:
... plenty of time to eat this breakfast:
... and to catch up on my writing.
Okay, now the equally trouble-free flight to Turin, over the Alps of course. Stunning view, though as we come down toward the Turin valley, you can see how little snow there is on the lower elevations. This is February?! Note, too, that the valley itself is hidden under a mist.
Here's the rub: my week away will have warm and dry weather today and tomorrow, marginally good weather for the two days after, and then pouring rain for the remainder. Normally, I wouldn't mind. Rain has its charm. But despite knowing that the weather will be turning very wet, I chose this time to wear my lace up Allbird treetops. For the uninitiated -- these are eucalyptus fiber (i.e. highly permeable) sneaker type shoes (these). Why? Because for the past 385 trips I have worn the same old beat-up leather Mary Janes, and Rome (where I am heading on Wednesday) demands closer attention to fashion: you need to feel happy about the way you present yourself to the world or else! And by the way, I made a point of staring at people's feet on the plane and 98% of those traveling to Amsterdam at least, wore lace up sneaker type shoes. I'll report if this is also a trend in Rome itself!
Anyway, I'm qualifying my weather report for Turin because even though we will hit a high of 63F (17C) and the sun seems to be throwing shadows on the ground, don't get too jealous -- Italy will not be as warm going forward. And, too, there is that haze. I would call it a smoggy haze. Or a foggy shroud (!). Or something. You cant really admire the mountains because they are hidden in this blanket of... something.
There is a train that runs from the airport to the city center, but it goes only every half hour and the car trip is a scant 25 minutes (and thus cheap), so I take a taxi to my hotel. Wow. That guy drove fast! 150 kph (which has to be over 90 mph). I am in Italy alright.
I'm staying at the Principi di Piemonte and this highlights one important detail of a visit to this city: it's perhaps half the price of such biggies as Florence or Rome or Milan, to say nothing of Venice, which outpaces all hotels anywhere. Principi di Piemonte is a very nice hotel! I asked for a room with a view and at first you could see nothing much at all (that haze!), but in the late afternoon I could finally decipher the mountains to the north.
I would have liked to do very little today, but the weather is so good, as judged by the warmth factor, that I spend no time at the hotel. As soon as my room was ready, I wash up and go out.
There are museums galore here, but none of the big ones sparked my curiosity. Except for one. Please don't laugh: I bought an advance ticket to visit the National Museum of Cinema. Bizarre? Well yes, especially since the special exhibit is all about Tim Burton -- a director of creepy goth movies. The thing is, I want to see the museum building! It's a tall brick tower of a structure, visible from most point in the city. A ticket buys me an ascent in the elevator to the tippy top. (And these tickets sell out! Lots of the goth movie lovers also want to climb to see the hazy views.) I save all this for the late afternoon.
I begin my exploration with a walk toward a pastry shop. Up and down mostly pedestrian streets.
There are a number of cafes and pastry shops that are rather well known, if only for their age (dating back to the 19th century), but in the end, I reject those and go instead to this square:
I think you'd do the same. The square has a number of cafes and they open up onto the sunny expanse of sidewalk. It's definitely warm enough to eat outside! And as I sit down in this place...
... and i watch the people order plates of good food, I realize I'm hungry for something more than just a pastry. I ask for this dish of veggies -- not for the cauliflower or red cabbage, but for the fresh, raw artichokes. You cannot get such good artichokes back home. The grocery store ones are too old to use raw in a salad. Right away I send a message to Ed -- we need to grow artichokes at the farmette this year!
(the people around me are Italian; let me pan the camera, as I sip a drink called Torino-Milano, because it is heavy on Torino Vermouth, with a dash of Milano Campari; stunning and delicious!)
x 
(my food)
(and of course, the chocolaty creamy coffee for dessert, with a cookie assortment at the side)
I may be tired, but all that food makes me want to extend the walk some more.
(The River Po)
(pretty, but not Parisian...)
(chocolate shopping)
Now for the Mole Antonelliana -- named after the 19th century architect who designed it. And no, it did not start out with a focus on the cinema. It was to be a synagogue, but very quickly the structure was handed over to the government and now you can go there to immerse yourself in the technical aspects of movie-making.
Close up:
And the view, which on a hazy day is just mildly good. You can see the mountains slowly coming into focus, but just barely.
So, this is my afternoon: A walk, a pause for food, and an ascent up the Mole Antonelliana.
(school pick up time; no, not for me, for this Torino mom...)
In the evening, I go to dinner at Madama Piola. Choosing where to eat here is hard! Yes, I want Piedmont food! Simple authenticity is always a goal for me and this time too I wanted a dinner that presented Turin simply, but well. (And as always, I look for places that are no more than a 15 minute walk away. Madama Piola is just at 15 mins!)
(I was the oldest one in the room...)
The food at Madama's is great. I mean, predictably so. As you probably know, Italian menus can lead you to overeat: they offer "appetizers" and "first courses" (typically pasta) and "second courses" (meats and seafood) and desserts. You want to try it all, but you soon learn the golden rule: just two will do. You have to skip courses or else you best have a supply of antacids on your night table. But at Madama Piola's, you could opt for a sort of tasting menu, in that for fixed price, you could pick any four dishes you want, but in smaller portions. Plus dessert. You do still get stuffed silly, but it's worth it. I was offered a place at the counter, facing the cooks. After some consultation and a lot of staring, I asked for the pumpkin veggie flan, the agnelotti stuffed with meat and smothered in a sauce, and Torino's most famous dish -- the Tonnato. Thinly sliced veal over tuna mousse. Sounds weird, doesn't it? But done well, it is exquisite!
And of course, the pasta is equally sublime.
I walk back to my hotel with eyes half closed. At long last it is time to rest. That is the hope at least. First night rests in Europe are always hit or miss for me. The excitement level is high. I think back, I think forward, I sleep, I wake up, I (maybe) sleep some more. Familiar pattern in this old but new for me city. Oh, but it is wonderful to be out exploring again!
