Frascati

The same day that Shelly and I attended the Carnevale party, we also took a day trip 30 minutes south of Rome to a town called, Frascati. I had spent a few hours the night before googling different cities near Rome that would be fun to go to.  This town sits in the Castalli Romani hills and people raved about the white wine that is produced here.

We got on the first train in the afternoon and once we arrived, we searched for a place to have lunch.  We walked up the main road, only learning later that we were walking away from the city center, but found a great cafe that had a stellar lunch.  A piece of bread, bottle of water, lasgna and grilled vegetables for only 5.50euros and it was really good!! We wandered about the town for a while walking up and down the hilly streets, taking pictures.

We found ourselves lost most of the day and unable to read the googlemap I had pulled up on my iPod.  It was fantastic though because we had no agenda and no specific time we had to be back. Of course we had to try some Frascati wine, so we bought a bottle and shared it on our afternoon stroll.

The center of town was very cute with a beautiful church, carousel and children running in the square with their Carnevale costumes on, throwing confetti all around. We sat on the stairs of the church for a bit basking in the sun and enjoying the "small town atmosphere."

It was in Frascati that Shelly had her FIRST gelato since arriving in Italy. We were sitting on a ledge overlooking the hills when a group of guys started talking to us in Italian and told us that they were policeman there.  I love the bold Italian men who just strike up a conversation! We then found a shop that sold used clothes, antiques, used books, etc.  Shelly found a Japanese costume which she wore to the disco that evening. The store clerk asked us where we were from and when we told her Ohio, she said, "don't tell me Cleveland, because I lived there for 7 years when I was younger!" Such a small world that we would meet someone in Frascati, Italy who had lived in Cleveland.  She spoke great english and we fully enjoyed hearing  a few of her stories.

As the sun was setting, we stopped in an Antica, where there were only men over the age of 65.  An older man smoking a cigar with an Obama hat greeted us as we walked in. He asked us what we wanted and we told him to surprise us.  We enjoyed a sparkling red wine that is made in Frascati. Another older man kept walking past our table, smiling at me.  Finally, after walking past about 4 times, he stopped and said hello, nice to meet you and kissed our hands.  I talked to him for about 15 minutes in Italian.  He was very sweet; I heard him go back to his table of friends and tell them everything we had talked about.  He came back to offer us some of his wine, but we politely declined as we had to get back to Rome for our Carnevale party.