We spent most of yesterday morning awaiting Lou's AS level results. This involved a fairly convoluted system that would have been the envy of MI5: Lou's friend and fellow Bilbraps (Bilborough College to the rest of us) student drove to the college under the cover of full daylight and the story that she was collecting her own results only to pull on a Mission Impossible style, latex Lou face mask and thereby retrieve Lou's results.
She then drove to a pre-arranged drop point (Rachel's sister's house, but keep that to yourself) to hand the package to an agent masquerading as Rachel's nephew (who I'll call 'Jonny'). Jonny then phoned through the results to Rachel's sister (who I'll refer to as 'Becca') for Becca to then call a secure number in Italy. The agent in Italy who received the call then transferred it via a secure hand to Lou for Lou to discover her fate.
As it turned out, Lou had nothing to worry about although it has been hanging over her during the first two weeks of the holiday Her results were much as she expected and reflected the hard work she put in during the first half of the year. We could then enjoy the rest of the day and decided to spend it by and in the pool.
Today is our last day here near Casasco and so we decided to set off 'early' (@ 10.15) to explore the area beyond San Sebastiano once we'd visited the nearby observatory.
Once we passed San Sebastiano, we started to test the Corsa once again as we climbed up in to the mountains and to 1000 metres and a temperature of 16 degrees. It was glorious and almost alpine. However, today is a public holiday therefore it was also popular with visitors on their extra day off. Parking was at a premium and we quickly turned tail and headed back down the valley, passing a significant amount of traffic heading in the opposite direction.
By this stage, it was approaching lunchtime and we'd decided to eat out. After much driving and indecision and as we got close to San Sebastiano, we spotted cars pulling up outside a restaurant by the side of the road called 'Belvedere'. By this time, it was close to 1 o'clock. Not ones to follow the crowd, we decided to join them.
As we climbed the stairs, we noticed an array of stickers on the door (including Michelin). Must be good we thought to ourselves although checked that we had plenty of cash with us (not enough as it turned out).
When we entered, the place was full with the exception of a single table for 6 in the middle of the restaurant. It seemed every one else had reservations but they squeezed us in, which was probably easier than explaining to us that we should sling our collective hook. Phew!
And then it dawned on us: nobody was eating anything, there were no menus and no orders were being taken. Had we crashed a wedding party? Or was it a special celebration for the saint after whom today's public holiday is named and we were going to be the sacrificial offering?
None of the above as it turned out because it all kicked off shortly after 1. We were brought a bottle of Barbera vino rosso (very nice btw) and a carafe each of still and carbonated water.
The food then started to arrive. And kept coming. Anti pasti x 5, primi x 2, secondi x 2 and dolce x 3 followed by coffee and accompanied by bread and foccacia. By the time we finished (and boy were we finished), it was approaching 4 o'clock but not before we found out what the damage was. I'll leave that to your imagination but suffice to say I'm glad they accepted credit cards. Having said that, it was a fantastic, gastronomic experience and well worth next week's spending money.
It's now evening and we're preparing to leave in the morning. I've hoovered the inside of the car in the hope of avoiding the cleaning charge and am trying my best (single handedly) to finish off a 1.5 litre bottle of Barbera red (cost less than 3 euros from Esalunga and bloody good).
Tomorrow we follow the coast road from Genoa to Nice. Should be fun although it's a busy weekend on the roads. Oh, and it's started to rain!
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