6/19 – After our outing at the Trabocco last Saturday, Gabriella told us to move into the apartment in Monteferrante, where we would have a lot more room and the rest of the family is there. Jim and I figured she was right because the apartment in Chieti was really small and we had seen all we wanted to see in that area so on Monday we made the move. Once here in Monteferrante, we took some time to just relax and get reorganized.

We went to Ortona on Tuesday and Wednesday. We planned to see Gabriella and Antonino in town on Tuesday and then go to their house for lunch. While I was in the panificio picking up some bread and cookies, Jim found a barber shop around the corner and took advantage of it. When he finished up and we were walking around the town, I found a hair salon and asked if I could get my roots done. One of the parrucchiere (hair dressers) said sure, but not until Wednesday so that meant another trip into Ortona.

We walked around the town which spreads out along the seacoast and is so beautiful. We stopped in one of the piazza’s where the theater is located.

We continued our walk along the promenade and found an area called ZooArt! This area is where folks crocheted items that covered the tree trunks, railings and several other items in the landscape. If you look at the tree trunk, this one actually looks like a leg with a long sock on it. Sometimes I do wonder where people get their ideas but this really was very creative.

We then returned to the Main Street in the center of town and headed back to the car as it was time to head over to Gabriella’s for lunch. We of course checked out the stores to give us an idea of what we might “need” to do the next day before or after my hair appointment. The multi-course meal with Gabriella and Antonino was again marvelous yet simple. And they are so much fun to be with. Adding to our pleasure in visiting them is the fact that the front porch overlooks the Adriatic Sea — really nice, especially with the fantastic weather we’ve been having.

We headed back down to Ortona Wednesday a little early to ensure we’d not be late for the hair dresser. We arrived early enough so were able to look at a few more sights around town before I had to get in the chair. As we had preplanned some of this, we parked right next to our first stop, Castello Aragonese. This structure goes back to the mid-1300s. It was defensive in nature until the 1600s when it was bought by the Baglioni family and a palace residence was built inside the walls. About 200 years later, the palace was abandoned and the structure came into use as a workshop and gunpowder storage facility. German bombs and American hand grenades in WW II blew out the interior and then a landslide destroyed the outer walls on the sea side. We walked all around the outside and up the stairs to enjoy the beautiful view. From the fort we had a good view of the breakwaters and the pier. You can also see where the trains go into a tunnel along the shoreline and where the bike/pedestrian path, La pista ciclopedonale, runs even closer to the water line. That path (teal color in the photo, right of the tunnels) runs 40 miles along the coast.

Next we came to the Basilica di San Tommaso Apostolo, the Ortona cathedral. We were running a little late so we did not go inside but I imagine the interior is as magnificent as so many other churches we have visited.

In line with that thought, while I was at the parruchiere and after a caffè and cornetto, Jim visited a church, one associated with both a school and a convent, Chiesa di Santa Maria delle Grazie. While there was a lot of gold in the trim, the interior just seemed to fit a young person, school environment without being too heavy with statuary or old world oil paintings. Or, maybe it is just the window behind the altar that gives the entire building that feeling.

After getting my hair colored, we went back to Gabriella’s for lunch and then on the way back up to Monteferrante, we took a side detour to visit Lake Bomba which we had not been down to since 2014. The lake is relatively close to Monteferrante and can be seen in many of the photos we have taken from up the mountain in Monteferrante.

Thursday our cousin Angela and her son Simone invited us to Atessa to have dinner with them. We left Monteferrante around 4pm and drove to Atessa, back roads, winding and winding, up and down, narrow roads. Atessa is a beautiful city and Angela walked us all around it. I was amazed at how large it is with the different streets and many shops. The condition of some of these streets is truly amazing. Many are done in stone or in stone bricks. Asphalt seems to be in the minority and used primarily for patching.

Once again, while we have tried not to overdo the church content in this blog, each church door we look through reveals something significantly different and seemingly more beautiful than the last. We just feel obligated to record these unexpected splashes of skill and beauty, especially in these relatively small and agricultural towns.

This next series of photos is of the Cathedral of Saint Leucio and we need to apologize. These stops at churches and other locales are really somewhat random and we usually have not performed diligent research ahead of time. This church was built to honor Bishop (later saint) Leucio who came up from Brindisi to rid the two towns of Ate and Tixa of a dragon. He did, the towns joined together since the dragon could no longer keep them apart and created Atessa. Our failure? A rib of the dragon is encased in glass within the church but we did not know about it until after we left town, hence no photo. (A theory is that the rib could be from a mammoth.)

Angela kept us moving though as there is a lot to see and we still had to head out for supper. We really didn’t figure out a story behind this next photo although Jim, after doing some research on Corpus Christi which is coming up a little later, has a theory. On Corpus Christi or in Italy, Corpus Domini, flowers are often strewn in the streets ahead of the religious procession. This flowery carpet could be connected somehow and is serving as a path of flowers. We’ve asked Angela for the true story.

Turns out, Jim’s theory was incorrect. Angela advised that it is a cascade of rosebuds on a carpet flowing out of an amphora. A group of Atessa ladies created the colorful carpet for Mothers’ Day, May 8th, using a bundle of small hooks “native” to Atessa. By the way, we see a lot of artistic talent in these towns. We highlighted the mosaics of Guardiagrele in an earlier blog, Atessa here, and we will visit another very artistic town in the next day or two, Agnone.

We stopped at Angela’s apartment for an aperitivo before leaving for the restaurant which is outside of town a little. Her apartment is just to the right of the Porta di San Giuseppe o delle fonti. It’s narrow and a couple of stories high but has two windows and balconies overlooking nearby farmland and the Adriatic Sea beyond. That side of her apartment is in fact, the external face of the wall surrounding the city.

Dinner was at a very cute restaurant and we each ordered something different but very light. It was nice just being together and being able to talk with each other.

Today, Sunday, began with a trek up the hill for church. Today is the Solemnity of Corpus Domini, or in the English and Spanish speaking world, Corpus Christi. I’ll leave the purpose and practices to you and your Sunday School teachers. For us, we learned another new tradition (we had not been in Italy for Corpus Domini previously.) After the Mass or service, the congregation and the priest participate in a procession through the primary streets of the town. One of the parishioners leads the “flock” carrying the processional cross and the priest brings up the rear carrying the host or Corpus Domini in the monstrance. In some towns, flowers or flower pedals are strewn along the streets. Here, with so few people, we had only a few flowers but there were candles lit at some houses. 

The new tradition we learned though was about hanging precious blankets or drapes over balcony railings as the procession passes by. Actually, you can put those blankets out the night before because after all, you are supposed to be in church for the Mass and then walking in the procession afterwards! So, cousin Gabriella sent us a message about the tradition late last night (we read it this morning) and we hung one of her father’s crocheted blankets which had been a wedding gift and which was passed down to Gabriella. The deal is that the blanket or drape used is supposed to be of important value to the family like a special or inherited gift passed down thru generations (lot of that here in Italy!) In this way, the relative or friend who passed along the blanket is blessed and honored on Corpus Domini Sunday.

About the flowers I mentioned, some towns really build up that aspect. These two photos were taken in two of the towns near here. This concept is called “Infiorata,” fiori being flowers.

After the procession, I went across the street to make pallotte and spaghetti with Angela and Silvana. What a fun couple of hours. They are both delightful and laugh easily. Anyway, this was to be a lesson for me so they started me with the pallotte, mixing the cheese, eggs, parsley and teeny bread crumbs, forming the mixture into the elongated rolls and then cooking them.

Next came mixing, kneading, rolling out and cutting of the pasta dough for the spaghetti. It’s not that I had not done this before but it was so much more fun cooking with the cousins.

No big plans for tomorrow. We are going to L’Aquila on Tuesday. Cousin Vincenzo works there, a professor of hostelry, cuisine and of course, wines. He’s also president of the international culinary arts organization, Maitre D’Hotel. He has carved out some time to show us around the school and the town. Not sure what the rest of the week holds as it’s getting close to the time we will be moving North out of Abruzzo, ultimately reaching Basel, Switzerland and our river cruise.

A presto,