Torino, Italy

 June 21-23 2022

Torino was our final city on the grand tour of Italy and we got off on the wrong foot. Our GPS had done a remarkable job of getting us where we wanted to go, not an easy task in Italy with streets that change names three or four times and a maze of little alleyways in the old cities. We had done well getting out of Rapallo and then heading north just before Genoa. The roads weren’t too bad, and it being a Sunday there was very little truck traffic. We are still not sure what happened but as we approached the city we were directed into a tunnel a few miles long and halfway through the tunnel we were told, “You have arrived at your destination on the left.” Well we knew that was wrong so we exited the tunnel and tried again with no luck.  Fortunately Kent had an app that found us and the hotel and he became the first backseat driver to be cherished and appreciated, guiding us right to the front door of the hotel!

The hotel is located in the old Fiat factory built in the early 1900s and once the largest car manufacturing facility in the world. It now contains two hotels, two floors of mall, and two floors of offices for lots of different companies. For those of you who have seen the movie "The Italian Job," you will remember the escape scene involving driving out of the Fiat Building. The top of the five story building still has the track where every Fiat made was tested before going down the spiral ramp to the shipping area, and you can still walk on the ramp.  It is quite a piece of architecture and has been lovingly restored.

Our rooms had 18-foot ceilings with huge windows that allowed lots of light to enter unless you had the electric shades drawn. In a tribute to Fiat, each room has a floor lamp made from the headlight of a Fiat 550, which means they have very heavy transformers at their base.  We arrived at 1:00 pm and our rooms were ready, so we unpacked and then headed across the street to Eataly, a foodies paradise.  It was started in 2007 in an old vermouth factory in an effort to preserve all customs and traditions of Italian cooking. It showcases the best of all the regions of Italy with separate sections for produce, cheese, dried meats, fresh meats, pastas and fish. And oh yes, the entire basement is dedicated to wine.  Each food section also has a small area where you can order food and drink which makes it a delightful place to have lunch. We wandered each section getting ideas for lunch and then enjoyed marvelously prepared fresh food and wine. There was a table across from us with three men who had just finished eating and one of them had gone to the produce section and came back with two pints of fresh cherries, one from the north and the other from the south. They really enjoyed them and they noticed we noticed them so one came over with the box and insisted we all try them, which we did. Then another one came with the other box to share with us. They then wanted to know which was better and of course I told them the ones from the north, which gave them such great pleasure that as they left they gave us the remains of both boxes, which we in turn shared with our servers.  What a delightful experience!

That night we found a little trattoria in a sketchy part of town where we sat outside. It was beastly hot and there was no air but we also had not found anything around us that was open so we ate there and ordered from a chalkboard.  We ate well and cheaply, nothing fancy for sure, but freshly prepared and tasty. We relished getting back to the hotel and their air-conditioned bar where we had a nightcap to cool down before bed.

The next day we took the subway downtown. Our hotel was about three kilometers from the center of the city and the clean, efficient subway got us there quickly. From our stop we navigated - by "we" I mean Kent and Cindy - to the Egyptian Museum, which has the second largest collection in the world.  We spent two hours there and Kent and Valley just loved it and I must say they did a good job with the displays and timelines. We have been to the Cairo Museum so we had seen most of these things before but I was still quite impressed and learned a few new things during the visit.  When we came out the decision was made to head for the large park down at the Po River, with a short stop for refreshments in another stifling hot caffe.  For some reason we all thought it would be a good idea to walk home along the river which was about two and half mile hike. At the time there was shade and a breeze but after the first mile it became too hot, too sunny and the breeze had blown away.  We did see some cool things along the way, huge fountains with jets of water being blow twenty feet into the air. At one point we came across an old medieval castle - the Borgo Medieval - complete with a drawbridge. It was really fantastic and you can see it here.

We finally realized we were not going to make it back by foot so we climbed sixty or so steps up to a hospital, which I thought we were going to need, and over to the Metro where we hopped on for the last leg home. It was now two thirty and we were hungry and thirsty so we stopped in a little place in the mall for cold beer and snacks, both of which were well received and well deserved.  That night we decided we would find someplace in the mall to eat since it was now clearly too hot to eat outside, even after eight, and we did not want to eat in the sterile hotel dining room. We scouted out some possible locations, there were MANY, and decided on a place called RossoPomodoro (red tomato) that featured the food from Naples. We chose wisely. The food really was good, the pizzas made fresh, the  buffalo mozzarella was fresh and their tomatoes were the best we had on the trip. We all ordered different things and shared, in true Italian fashion, and decided that one can eat quite well in an Italian Mall.

For our last night in Torino we decided to eat at a restaurant we spotted from the top of the Fiat  Factory. Unfortunately it was closed so we wandered around looking for something open. We rejected a Greek Taverna, despite the fact that the smells coming from the kitchen were lovely. We happened upon a little place called La Mina and from the windows we could see white linen tablecloths and napkins so we went in. We were greeted by a lovely, petite owner of a certain age who showed us to our table, which wasn’t hard to do since we were the only patrons! We ordered water and house wine and she turned the lights on just for us.  The food and service were stellar and I had one of the finest pastas I’ve ever enjoyed anywhere.  It was a most fitting end to a remarkable trip to Torino.