Santuario Della Madonna Dell'Ambro

These are all pictures of the Santuario.  Ambro is the name of the stream which runs by and joins the Tenno River not too far away.  In May 1000 the virgin supposedly appeared to Santina, "a humble young shepardess who had been dumb from birth.  Santina was endowed with the gift of speech as a reward for her devotion to an image of the Virgin placed in the hallow of a beech."  From the leaflet given out at the church.  People come from all over the world.

Amandola

Amandola is a much larger city than Monte San Martino, and is located in the foothills of the Apennines about 30 miles or so west-southwest of our villa.  It originally was a hilltop town, but has grown and spread down to the valley.  It seems to be a tourist destination both during summer for people touring the Parco Nazionale dei Monti Sibillini, and in the winter for winter sports.  

The top picture is of the city gate and city square.  Next is the view from the city looking west into the mountains.  Third is an intersection in the oldest part of town.  Next picture is looking up the steps to the city square.  I'm standing in front of the doors to the church.

Bottom picture is at lunch at the Paradiso Hotel restaurant.

Monte San Martino III

These pictures are all from Monte San Martino.  Taylor in the phone booth and Cindy and Taylor by the chartreuse SmartCar.  They think SmartCars are so cute.  

The old road up to the city is not used any more so the grass is growing in it.  It has elevated pavers every few rows so donkeys/horses/people can get traction.

I don't know if this cat is as big as Winifred's cat Langston, but he's fat and lazy.

Election News

The only television from America we get is via Armed Forces TV, which has one news channel.  The news channel has many Fox programs, which means little news.  They may have CNN for an hour, Fox an hour, ABC an hour, back to Fox for two hours, and so on.  I very seldom turn it on.

The only other way of keeping up with politics is via the internet.  So thanks to you, Al Gore, for inventing it, because now I can find out things like John McCain created the BlackBerry.   Who knew?  

I thought ever since March Obama was going to lose, because I thought his campaign was a little lackluster and unfocussed.  Sort of warmed-over John Kerry, except for their determination to retaliate for all attacks, real and imagined, which I thought took some of the sheen off the postpartisan candidate image.

But Sarah Quaylin has changed my mind.  She's like Katherine Harris without the eyeshadow, only worse.  I just have to believe that the 10% of voters in the middle who decide who our president is going to be would not vote for Palin for President, and the more confused and addled and clueless McCain sounds, the more likely it is that she would be president within four years.  The obvious willingness of this pair to say and do anything to get elected is making Mitt Romney seem like a pillar of consistency.  

But we'll see -- it's hard to get a clear picture of what is going on from here.

 

Monte San Martino II

Two scenes from Monte San Martino -- the far right is the church in the little town square, and near right is one of the streets leading off the square.

Below are two pictures from the same spot looking down from the city.  Many fields had been plowed, which you can see in the background.  They don't use a lot of rubber-tired tractors because of the steep hills -- mostly tracked.


The bottom picture is from almost the same spot, but is looking more southwesterly toward the Apennines.

Swimming

Taylor in the swimming pool at the villa.  We were the only ones there.  They had one large apartment that would sleep ten-twelve, and another that would sleep six, plus ours that had our bedroom and a dbl. sofa in the living room for Taylor.  She wanted an action shot, and this one came out pretty good.

The middle picture is from the pool level looking down the valley toward the Adriatic, which is about 25 miles away, if you're a crow.

The bottom two pictures are fully zoomed in.  The fourth one is of the next hilltop town across the valley.  You can see it way in the backgroud of picture three.

And the last one is straight across the valley, a house way on the top of the hill.

Monte San Martino

Monte San Martino on top of the hill.  Le Marche Region is full of little hilltop towns.  About 500 live in this one.  Second photo is the place where we stayed.  I took the picture down in the valley about a kilometer away.  

The middle picture is in Monte San Martino looking out over the countryside.  The next picture is from our villa looking west to the Apennines just before sunset.  The last picture is looking almost the same direction, but from higher up in Monte San Martino.

We were in the southern-most province of Marche, Ascoli Piceno, whose capital city is Ascoli Piceno.  Marche is bordered on the east by the Adriatic and on the west by the Appenines.  It is mostly agricultural, wine, olives, grains, but has some industry.  Several shoe factories and outlet stores, at which Cindy and I were both able to find some nice Italian shoes.  Went to the Dezi winery in Servigliano and bought half a case of wine.  We actually brought about three dozen bottles home with us.  Wine buying here is sort of iffy for both quantity and quality, so I mostly only buy inexpensive everyday type wine, like that I mentioned yesterday.  Marche is home to Rosso Piceno and Verdicchio, I guess their two most well-known DOC red and white wines.  I like them both.  The lack of steady electricity is one of the culprits of iffy wine quality here -- electricity goes out and the bottles heat up.  Of course many restaurants don't have air conditioning so their wine stays hot.  I quit ordering red wine out because a lot of times it was so hot.  Everyone stores their wine standing up, even the two good wine stores that import directly from Italy.