Today was one of the best Italy days, for me. I just love doing the quotidian stuff, moving through this world and feeling its rhythms.

Our plan was to meet Roy at the little farmers market behind the Arsenale.  We walked through the incredible castellovecchio (meaning old castle–we must go back!) and over the Ponte Scagliero, built in 1355.

Castle interior

the bridge

We walked straight through the Arsenale building.

We tasted a few goat cheeses from a very friendly guy who recognized Roy.  We bought his oldest one which tastes kind of like parmigiano and his ricotta.  Also got some tomatoes, zucchini arugula and a melon.  We hung around there talking with Roy a good while and we walked off in search of the bicycle shop to get the tires pumped up in the wheelchair.  We walked a block or two and saw a bakery and got some fresh focaccia and ciabatta bread.  Then we passed a nice looking wine store–I got 2 bottles of Valpoicella and one Lugana.  I asked in the wine shop if they knew any where to buy fresh pasta and we went on to find that place.  There we bought some gnocchi.  So now we are so loaded down with stuff hanging off the wheelchair and the wine stashed behind my back, it was really comical.  We parted ways with Roy and found our was home, over the Ponte Vittoria.

Lunch at home–simple.

Ken took a really long nap and I was out in the living room, reading about Verona and I heard someone playing a violin.  I opened the windows and could listen to beautiful live music from another apartment, maybe in this building–I couldn’t tell but it was lovely.

After nap time we went downstairs to Locanda Dolce and had some coffee and shared a wonderful pistachio bar cookie–hard and crumbly not too sweet. We set off for the 16th century Giardino Giusti which is over a bridge on the other side of our little peninsula, Ponte Nuovo.  The walk was through a very diverse neighborhood–lots of cute babies and kids to see.  At the Giandino we stashed the wheel chair and explored.  They have beautiful tall cypress trees and a small hedge labyrinth.  We were both walking in the labyritnth and the church bells started.  We just looked at each other over the hedges–another magic Italy moment.  There were very few other people there although a young Russian woman offered to take our picture while we were trying to do our first selfie.  The gardens are not very well kept, IMHO, but it was nice to be in the peaceful presence of majestic trees.

view from the entrance

We walked back and I said to Ken “It would be nice to have some sausage with our dinner” and the next little store front was a butcher shop.  I went in and realized it was primarily horse meat which Ken would NOT be willing to eat.  But he did have a bunch of different pancetta (basically bacon)  and I got a nice piece of pancetta picante for 1.50 euro.  After we came back over the bridge we got a little lost and sat for a while in a park.  A young boy had climbed a tree and his mom could not get hime to come down.  It was a funny little scene.

Came home, drank some sparking wine left for us by the apartment owner.  Hung out in cyber space for a while.  Ate our dinner–the pancetta was a bit spicy so we put some of the ricotta on top.  While there were too many ingredients to be really Italian, and I let the gnocchi get a little too mushy, we loved every mouthful.

Watched more Grace and Frankie and to bed.