The Allisons

Weekend Visitors

Our high school friend Michelle (Ford) Dawson and her husband Henry came up to visit several weekends ago. They are living in Florence for a year doing missions. We decided to stick around the area and just take it easy. We took them to some castle ruins you can see from our house. We had never actually been there either, so it was a new experience for all. We had to drive up a very narrow, semi-paved road, with a steep drop off on one side. We then walked a short way to the castle and explored. We think someone is rebuilding or trying to preserve what's left because there were some parts that were clearly new. On the way back down the mountain, this black beast was coming toward us from another trail. We all thought it was a bear at first, but as it continued to approach, we decided it was a very big dog (except for Michelle who was still convinced it was a bear :) ).
Then we went to the BX to get some lunch. This may have been the highlight of the weekend for Henry and Michelle being that they don't have access to any American food.
Then we made the 20 minute drive up the mountain to Piancavallo ski resort. We didn't do a whole lot. We just walked around and enjoyed seeing the snow.
On the way back to our house, we took them to an enchanting mountain village called Poffabro. This particular afternoon it was especially enchanting. It was eerily desolate and still. As we walked through the town, we could hear bells in the distance through the woods. The one man we did see seemed to be walking into the woods toward the sound of the bells. It was kind of creepy. This is a gypsy sign on a door in the town. It's code to tell other gypsies what kind of hand out they got at that house.
For dinner we went to Bierangel. It's a German restaurant we had heard of but never been to. It was pretty good. Henry loves German food and got a 3 meat plate with sauerkraut. Mike had some ribs, and 1 liter of Coke. Michelle had a salad, and I had some weird cheese stuff.