Tuesday's walk in Alme and my birthday dinner

Yesterday I felt sufficiently over my cold to go out and walk around the village, taking some pictures. This is the main side street which leads to the downtown area, cars can drive on this too.
This is the walking only path leading back the the house, old walls, new walkway.
I invited Sandro, Antonella, Filippo and Vanda to have dinner with me at the local restaurant, which I knew was good because David and Claudia and I went there about 10 days ago. I had a steak with green peppercorn sauce, yum. It was a way for me to reciprocate all their hospitality AND celebrate turning SIXTY FOUR!!!!
Mother and daughter, both stylish and beautiful!
Filippo had a steak too. He's off to Rome this evening to take his carabinieri test tomorrow.

Near Bergamo

My friend Jane who is living my house suggested that I take pictures of where I am......the local scene. Since I'm now into my fifth day of a nagging cold, each morning being a bit more difficult to get myself together, I decided to oblige her. This is in the hallway from the kitchen to the living area, the walls are lined with cork, a very pretty and nice touch. David and Claudia have all kinds of artwork from around the world here including the ceramic pieces they have made themselves.
My bedroom, looking out onto the balcony which can be entered from the dining room. The lamp is from Santa Fe! They planted the big cedar tree when they moved here in 1978.
This is where I do most of my hanging out, reading, writing, cooking and I told Claudia I wanted to take a picture of the excellent design of her dish drying cabinet over the sink, the next picture......

Well, there I am! Having worked hard to put myself together...in my bathroom, I like all the chocolate brown tiles, very pretty.

Third post on Venice

I do want to thank Lisa and Pilar for coming up with this idea that we meet in Venice, without their invitation I would not have gone, it just wasn't something or somewhere I want to go by myself. As brief as it was, the awful beauty of Venice will stick with me. This picture was from inside the Peggy Guggenheim Collection Museum, I liked the blue glass, the iron work, the canal and the buildings across the water.
Hope they like this picture, an unforgettable and cold morning......
That the sun shone on this early and foggy morning felt like amazing luck, we liked the color on the water
This was just after we were "lost" and now we knew that we could find our way back to the guesthouse.
Probably the oddest chandelier we saw, and we saw HUNDREDS!

The up close contrasts in Venice

The artistic guesthouse Al Portico, and in my room the lampshade decorated with safety pins

On the way to the Peggy Guggenheim Collection Museum......couldn't resist this Venetian bag
A scuplture gallery, still along the canal to the PG Museum.....................and we saw this woman
She was still there after we spent an hour looking at the fantastic collection, this woman was still there, so we dropped some coins into her cup, but she didn't move
This is for all the dog lovers, they were so cute, but so very cold, I could not capture their shivers

Twenty five hours in Venice

Lisa and Pilar met me at the Venice station when I arrived at 1pm on Sunday. We immediately went to our cute guest house just a short walk away. After meeting Stacy the American guest house hostess and artist, we had a warming and delicious lunch at her husband's darling restaurant. We then headed out to Murano, the island with all the glass shops. How to do Venice justice in such a short time? Oh well, we just did it. When it got dark, and very cold and sort of wet we decided to head back from Murano. Preposterously the boat driver stopped not even remotely near where we had gotton on and said (in italian) everybody OFF! So, we had that quintessential Venice experience, we got lost and then had to find our way, which we managed to do with a lot of map consultation, and direction guessing we got back to where we came from! It was 7pm and we were totally exhausted. After a rest, we went out for dinner (late of course) and came up with the plan for today: get up early, take the Vaporetto up the Grand Canal, go to San Marco Square, then find the Peggy Guggenheim Collection Museum. The joke is that Lisa and Pilar are the most directionally challenged people I know, but I had decided from the beginning they were in charge, they would find the way, and guess what, they did and I followed! It was fun and I'm still feeling the rock of the boats, the tremble of the train, and I'm so glad to be back in Alme in David and Claudia's home flat. Oh so fortunately for me Antonella graciously picked me up at the Bergamo station. More pictures on tomorow's post. I'm whooped!

Yesterday morning I took pictures of my paintings

Can't say the pictures really do justice to the paintings, but one can get an IDEA of my approach so far. I left them all in San Ginesio. But David and Claudia plan to bring a few of them up on their next trip here Dec 20th.
This Machereto, the ancient pilgrimage place.
More mountains, what can I say? The Sibillinis are inspiring. It's amazing because before I left Portland, I was thinking that I would paing with BLUE, didn't realize it would be the mountains!
This is just a really little painting.
The dish like curve was what got me.

Leaving San Ginesio

Tomorrow I'll finish packing up, clean up my room although I am leaving half my clothes here, and some Chinese medicine, other incidentals. David and I will pack the car, go pick up Claudia at school a little after noon. Then we'll start driving to Alme, the suburb of Bergamo, about a six hours drive from here. I've never been there, but I do know that the flat is one third of a three family building, Claudia's brother Sandro, his wife Antonella and their son Filippo live in the upstairs apartment. Vanda, Antonella's mother lives below them on one side and David and Claudia have their place across a hall from Vanda. I have been told that there are shops, coffee bars, etc. right across the street! Oh glory be, I'll be able to walk out when I want to, and I am assuming there will be sidewalks, how nice! Anyway, after a few days David and Claudia will return to San Ginesio. I plan to meet Lisa and Pilar in Venice on Sunday & Monday, which is a holiday here in Italy. Most likely I will stay there until it's time to go to Paris on Jan 15th. I am not sure exactly when I will return, I'm keeping my plans loose for now.