Friday, July 16, 2010

Bertolotto Cova, Levanto
1955 EET 

Another sound night of sleep and this morning I was out of bed and showering by 0800. Breakfast was simply toast with jam and most of of the morning was spent reading, writing, and other odds and ends. As we agreed to join Zia Michela on her parents' morning walk, when we joined them and was when we received presents for myself, Amber, Andrew, and Kienan. While they remained in the park, mom and I were first shown their preferred grocery store, before venturing to purchase our first groceries for €19.95[$27.1608]. On our way back, we visited the butcher shop, Marious, that Nichola always visits to say ciao. Before the walk I spent some time with Marco and was shown the entrance to his bed and breakfast which is on the bottom floor of the building. Shortly after Mom appeared, he mounted a Canadian flag above the B&B doors.

Marious's butcher shop.

Apartment building with Mom and Canadian  flag, far door on the left is the entrance.

Lunch was simply perscuitto (purchased from the butcher for €5.10[$6.9434]), spinach, and cheese sandwich. Afterwards we rested and I nearly feel sound asleep until a quarter to 1500 when we had agreed to the twenty minute walk to Bonassola for the beach. The tunnels were deliciously cool and it is quite easy to understand why joggers preform their exercise within. We settled into a spot of the pebble beach, which interestingly had purple and grey stones compared to the white-lined-grey stones of Levanto's. We spent quite a bit of time there, I was more on my towel then in the sea because I disliked retaining my footing and standing against the surf.

Alanna on Bonassola's beach.

World War II gun bunker on coast.

Levanto from one of the tunnel coves returning from Bonassola.

Zio James kindly bought us lemon popsicles which were not as strongly lemon flavored as some of the lemon flavored things I have tasted in Italia. While on the topic of food, Nichola related a traditional Italiano fruit dish of sliced peaches in a cup with sugar. In Zio James opinion, the sugar ruins it, as also they tend to put sugar on many things here. And while sounding out the sign for Ristorante di Rino [short ways up the street from our apartment], there was a reference to this region, Liguria. So Firenze is within Toscana and Roma within Lazin, and when we visit on Monday Veneto is the region where Venezia is.

While on the beach besides all the beach goers like ourselves, there were people hawking wares and in regard to them, Italia now fines them and the buyer unless licensed. Another character of the beach is the coconut seller who travels the beach with a bucket of coconuts and pail of water to dip the pieces in when sold to a costumer. Zia Michela says she can always remember the seller being on the Levanto beach and has been the same man since her childhood.

Retiring from the beach and returning through the tunnels was delightful. One of the topics of conversation with Nichola began with the Percy Jackson novels, about Greek mythology and I believe up my return to Canada I am going to start up an email dialogue with Nichola on the topic if he is interested in learning more and with more clarity than I can give off the top of my head. [Did that actually happen? No, of course not. Scusi cogino!]

Mom eating one of our self prepared meals.

Supper, like lunch was prepared by Mom, ham tortellini, ham slice, chunk of Swiss cheese, and a slice of bread. Afterwards I finish up my journalling while Mom did dishes, and I will cook from now on because at the moment we have not located gloves to protect my hands from the dish soap.