The cook was look-out
- rnv178
- Jun 7, 2022
- 5 min read
Who would have thought that a simple drive south from Lucca of 450 kilometres would provide so much adventure? Yet it does, did, and no doubt will do should we try again.
It started ten minutes into our journey when we had to pay an autoroute toll. There is a well-practised drill, where I open the driver’s door and walk round to the passenger side to do what is needed with their magic autoroute machine. It worked brilliantly in France, but Italy? Not so clever. The car is righthand drive, which presumes the driver - me - leaves sufficient space to open the door. My first error was not to do that, so I had to shift back and forth until I had obtained room to swing open a large door. The one car behind had already become two and I could see several others headed in our direction. Pretty soon we would be at the front of a long line of Italian cars. Italian drivers are not best known for their patience.
The magic machine at the unmanned booth was churning out spoken Italian instructions so fast that all I could hear was garble. The only words of Italian I understand anyway are “ciaio” and “gelato”, neither of which is any use at a toll booth. I inserted a ticket which had been spat out by an earlier booth but accidentally placed it in the credit-card slot, not the one designed for tickets. My ticket disappeared and never returned, the machine sulked, gurgled Italian, so I thought I would try my credit card. It was my only credit card and the one that has paid for everything since leaving Blighty. Without it we are stuck. I glanced over my shoulder. The two-car line-up had become six. I had to work fast but now the machine had swallowed my only means of payment, which had not remerged, and a distant voice was spurting incomprehensible Italian as fast as they could go from a loudspeaker.
Can I ‘elp you?” said a voice, making me turn. It was a shorthaired Italian man, perhaps mid-forties, who had climbed from a car behind to assist. Over his shoulder I could see the line-up had grown to 20 while the barrier to my front remained down. It had not even twitched.
“Please,” I replied, which was followed by an expressive conversation between shorthaired Italian and overtalkative machine. Thank Heavens autoroute machines do not have arms. It was enough to see the Italian, who was waving his arms so wildly that at times I had to duck. Moments later, there was a whirr, buzz, crunch and scratch and my credit card appeared, the bar swung upwards, and the Italian smacked hard on my shoulder.
“Go!” he yelled. The air behind was filled with car horns as angry locals made their feelings known.
“Thank you!” I shouted and moments later we were away. I pottered in the slow lane, trying to recover, and to allow the now more than 20 Italian cars to pass us, each hooting, flashing, or making fingered signs. There are plenty of toll booths in Italy, many more ahead, and my experience had not been fantastic.
I needed a rest, as well as a pee, so a few kilometres further I stopped at a service station. The loos were locked, it sometimes happens in Italy, so I asked a garage shop assistant for the key. She squirrelled through a drawer, retrieved the key, handed it across and I went to the back of the building to do what men do. Save the key did not work, so I returned to the shop assistant to declare my woes. Full of optimism, while tut-tutting about the English and Brexit, she joined me and had a go. No luck. Determined it was still my fault, which it most likely was, she asked a passing soldier. It is something you can do in Italy, as soldiers seem to be in frequent supply. A military convoy had stopped at the service station for a refill and took the locked door as a military challenge. One soldier tried, then another. Both failed, too.
Meanwhile I hopped from leg-to-leg pretending to be in control but realising there was not long before disaster. With the shop assistant aghast and the soldiers frustrated, there was a crowd gathering around the locked door. Drivers went past, gave nodding winks through open windows, but none stopped to help. Next came the petrol-pump technician-cum-mechanic as by now the full service-station community was involved. With bulgy biceps, unquestionably the largest I had seen for a long time, the technician gave the key a half turn in the wrong direction, yanked forcefully on the door handle and within moments the job was done. I smiled, and watched him squeeze his biceps, as he implied that Italian strength was clearly superior. All I could do was agree so looked impressed and completed the task I had begun. The petrol-pump technician-cum-mechanic walked away with a smile and swagger.
It took a further three hours to reach Anzio, a former fishing village, and once the home of Cicero, Nero, and several Popes. It was also the site of a major battle in the Second World War and has the war graves to prove it. We did not see them all but shed a tear over the names and inscriptions. There were plenty of folk in their 20s and 30s whose lives were unexpectedly caught short. The Commonwealth War Graves Commission, unsung heroes in my view, are doing a brilliant job at keeping these places tidy, and the Anzio graves are no exception. Should they read this, keep it up, you are doing good.
Italy is going through a heatwave at the moment, which even the locals see as odd. It was baking hot, easily mid-30s Celsius, when we pulled up at the Cincinnato Wine Resort near the village of Cori. It was the only place we could find to stay but believe me when I say we struck it lucky. And no, you do not need to be an alcoholic to stay there. The place is an organic vineyard and has been active for nearly 75 years. More than 100 families farm the place, which boasts 550 hectares of land, and is seriously green. Cincinnato declares that it has produced sufficient green energy to power more than 200 houses for a year or has saved 1.2 million pounds of burned coal. Those are impressive statements.
I am not sure about dinner, as the Cincinnato Wine Resort only has a restaurant that functions at weekends, so we had to forage in the village of Cori. We ended up in La Taverna Dei Golosi and I downed a ton of fettuccine and two doses of tiramisu. I am no eater of olives but, in this case, they were impressive, fresh, local, and scrumptious. Reaching the restaurant was a challenge, which at one point had me driving the wrong way up a one-way street. I parked nearby while the cook, in between helpings of fettucine, doubled up as an early warning system for traffic cops. We got away with whatever we had done and left a hefty tip to prove it.
***
Stayed at:
Cincinnato Wine Resort, Via Stoza 3, 04010 Cori LT
Tel: +39 333 589 5118
Email: wineresort@cincinnato.it
Dinner at:
La Taverna Dei Golosi
Via dei Lavoratori 133, 04010 Cori LT
Tel: +393775345008; +393389388063
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