9/07/11 Touring Le Marche – Rally Car Style

My sleep was wholly insufficient and it was my own fault.  I had set my alarm to go off at an ungodly hour so I could work on my journal; it’s not easy keeping up with this thing.  It turned out to be a waste of time since the words weren’t coming to me.  Worse still, now I was awake and could fall back asleep.

Maurizio had planned a drive through the rolling hills of Le Marche.  Here they call them dolce colline or sweet hills (Marco offering the literal translation).  My parents rode with Maurizio in his car; Marco and I in the abused Ford Focus.  Without the weight of the baggage and a third passenger, the Focus was noticeably peppier…nimbler without actually being nimble.  I used this to my advantage as Marco and I hung back from Maurizio.  We would stop to take pictures and then blast through the corners to catch up.  I asked Marco if my driving was scaring him and I believed him as he calmly said “no”.  I didn’t know it yet but he had his own mean driving streak hidden away behind his unassuming exterior.

We made our way through a number of small towns and eventually reached our isolated destination: an abandoned and decaying house in the middle of nowhere reached by a dusty gravel road.  This was the birthplace of Lisa’s mother.  My mom had heard much about it over the years and had promised to visit.  The property is now owned by an English couple who have renovated the house next door to spend the summers in; but the birthplace of Lisa’s mother remains ignored, its only residents being  a few stray cats that scrambled through a rotting wooden door as we approached.  We didn’t stay long; there wasn’t much to see from behind the fence.  Instead, we drove to the town of Sarnano a short distance away.  Like many picturesque towns in the area Sarnano is perched high on a hill with a town centre composed of steep and narrow pedestrian walkways.  I can’t imagine anyone who lives here being fat, the very act of walking out of your house is exercise, especially given today’s unrelenting heat.



Lisa's mother's house



The narrow streets of Sarnano

Not just narrow...steep too!

We stopped for a quick and much needed coffee before proceeding to our next stop, the top of the mountain.  At first I thought that we were just going to a lookout point, but Maurizio liked driving on the mountain roads as much as I did; it was a race to the top.  These were some of the best roads I had ever driven on: smooth, twisty, steep and relatively empty.  Taroko park in Taiwan last year was more impressive, but that was Space (Ryan) doing the driving and not me.

Reaching the top, we stopped to take in some air.  The sky was quite clear and Maurizio pulled out his binoculars to show us the sea which could just barely be made out over the sweet hills.  We drove over and down the other side of the mountain on a road much narrower than the first stopping to see birds of prey floating on wind currents and then diving quickly to make a kill.  Another stop to drink from a mountain spring: our parting refreshment to go along with the cool air.

  

Our two-car convoy returned to the house just in time to eat lunch.  The only thing I remember about it was the pasta Antonietta had made.  Egg noodles with a simple olive oil, pancetta and mushroom sauce with some garlic and parsley.  Marco offered some criticism on his mother’s cooking and I smiled widely as I told him that he had to be crazy to criticize an almost perfect dish.  The reason for my smile?  I could see myself saying the exact same thing to my mother; offering my take on what others would see as a perfect dish.  It’s a game we play with each other, only that my mother’s criticisms of my food are vicious to say the very least.  She’s just upset that I won’t let her cook in my house…she has a tendency to rearrange everything to the point that you can’t find anything.  This messes with my mind and undiagnosed obsessive compulsive disorder; I can’t have that.  This nervousness of mine is a constant source of laughter for mom…how cruel.