Wednesday 5th June - Happy Birthday Helen

Wednesday 5th June - Helen’s Birthday

We got up at around 7 and went up at 8 a.m. to help Stefania only to find she had already gone out to get groceries for the children’s school visit this morning and afternoon.

She returned and we managed to help for a while before she shooed us out on a mission to visit Rocascalegna where there is an impressive fort or castle.

The GPS routed us around a very windy, hilly and narrow way. T one point a very tight right turn was called for and this led up a very narrow, rough road with an ARMCO barrier on the right hand side of the road. There was a protruding piece of this barrier which punctured the front tire of the car and also tore off some trim from around the rear right hand side door.

We stopped at the top of the hill on a wider road and changed the tire for the ‘donut’ spare tire.

The results of our argument with the road barrier on the way to Roccascalegna

Then we drove on towards Roccasalegna but soon found the route that we had been following closed off by a wire fence. We decided that this was enough for today and retraced our steps back to Chieti where we bought some tape to hold up the loose trim and also wen to the Post Office to try to change some euro 50 notes into euro 100 notes but the Post Office refused to do so and so MAC tried a bank which also did not have cashier facilities. So we returned to the car and drove back to Cugnoli where we had lunch at a local Trattoria.(!!!).

We arrived home while the children were still active at their school outing so we kept out of the way and rested for a while.

Then we came up to the porch where Stefania was sitting looking very tired. She wanted to know all about our adventure in the car and told us, of course, if we had taken the route that she recommended to Rocasalegna, we would have had no trouble at all!! The GPS often shows the shortest route but, in Italy, that can mean small roads and a lot of twists and turns. It was our fault not to have taken her advice.

Stefania has a sort of audit tomorrow where she has to show all of her purchases and sales. She hates this part of the ‘office side’ of the job and I wish we could help her with it but I am sure that we would have to learn a lot of book-keeping and a lot of Italian before we could be of much use. It is hard to see her so tired and we have foregone dinner tonight so that she can rest. Tomorrow morning she has the audit and then in the afternoon a huge shopping trip to cater for the large groups of 100 on Saturday and about 70+ on Sunday. This was soon interrupted by a call saying that the environmental inspector was coming at 3 p.m. tomorrow, so shopping will have to wait until Friday. Luckily, the weather forecast is good for both days so the events can be held outside as these numbers are hard to fit into the party room.

Meanwhile, I decided to brave the swimming pool which felt cool but OK to the hand. I quickly donned my swimming shorts before I changed my mind and made my way into the cool but refreshing water. After the initial shock of entering it was very pleasant and i stayed in for quite a while, being the first person in the pool in 2019!! Stefania came out and exclaimed that this year the first person in the pool was not a German!! MAC has not yet plucked up the courage but will I think go in before we leave as the temperature this week has risen quite a lot during the day and the water is now very bearable.

Despite our protestations, Stefania drove into Cugnoli to pick up some Porchetta for our dinner which we ate on the porch with tomatoes, cucumber and peperoncino salad a lovely Italian meal in the warm evening with the sun just having set.

Stefania talked of the troubles of putting on these events she holds and that even her children and grandchildren ask for parties for their friends, often at short notice. She talked of the difficulty of complying with both the EU and Italian reporting rules which she had to prepare for after dinner. There are special rules for ‘agriturismo’ operations involving the use of local produce, the number of guests and meals that can be served. Tomorrow, she also has to deliver the ‘marmalade’ she has made to the craft shop in Pescara. One very busy woman.

Even with all this activity, she sometimes seems a lonely person as Bruno is often absent and the guests are transient. I think that once of our main ‘uses’ for this month has been as a sort or moral support. We, in turn have very much enjoyed her company and hospitality.

We were all tired and soon retired to bed.