Villa Reale

It was a 15-minute walk to the house where I was having dinner. Bob met me around the door and brought me upstairs. The other guests were his wife Sondra and their friends Rita and Massimo. Bob speaks English, but only a little better than my Italian. The rest only Italian.

It was a fun evening. They are all about my age. We started with crostini with tomatoes and olives, burrata, sheep milk ricotta, grilled zucchini, and stewed peppers. For the main course, we had pasta with scampi in a tomato sauce and some oil packed peppers on the side. The wine was rosè. Finally, for dessert, there were pastries and an amaro.

We spoke mostly in Italian, which was great. They helped me a lot. Bob drove me back to the old town, as close as he could get. It was after 12 and I was tired!Read more