TORINO

It's been hard to stay on top of all the three and four day weekend in May.  We have mostly ended up ding last minute (but fun!) things.  This weekend was the exception, and we had planned it out several months in advance.  The idea was to go to Annot with some other families from the gym, and spend the weekend bouldering with the kids.  Unfortunately, the weather was uncooperative and we had to cancel.  That's just the way it goes in France in Spring -- you have to be ready to change your plans if you want to do things outside.  Anyway, not only was it going to rain almost everywhere, but it was going to be COLD!  So we were faced with weather based last minute planning.  Monetier was out, since it would be cold *and* rainy.  The South was probably completely booked.  So then I had an idea:  Turin!  I sent out around ten emails and one place in the center of town responded that they had a vacancy.  I looked around tripadvisor and discovered quite a few interesting places to see -- more than enough for a weekend at least -- and booked the B+B for thursday and friday night.  We left early enough that there was not too much traffic, except at the entrance to the Frejus tunnel, where people were exhibiting the typical French lack of queuing discipline.  Eventually we made it through the tunnel, and with only a couple of wrong turns found where to park without paying (on the advice of the B+B owner).  From there it was a quick walk to the B+B where we met the lively and super friendly owner, and were shown to our lovely room

and got a peek at her place as well

Next: FOOD!  We went to a really nice place called Pastis a few blocks aways and in typical fashion ordered too much food:

The kids ate most of my fried and breaded ham and cheese cutlet.  No, I am not bitter.

Next:  a trip to the hot air balloon to look around the city.  This unfortunately involved taking a walk through a kind of grotty area.  My pro tip:  Corsa Regina Margherita is a good Northern limit to your explorations.  Anyway, the hot air bvalloon was kid of cool, but waaaay overpriced at 20 euros.

From there, we headed towards all the Piazza that I had seen in the photos.  This involved traversing the Piazza della Repubblica, which was awash in trash (literally, since the street sweepers were cleaning up by hosing the trash around with water cannons) and then past the Parco archeologico.  The latter sounds nice, but actually it was filled with a pretty rough crowd, including people taking turns helping eachother shooting up.  Rough.  But then things got a lot nicer as we entered the Piazza San Giovanni and then went through the delightful passage which opens up into the impressive Piazetta Reala.

The kids were starting to flag, so it was Gelati-recharge time

Which bought us some more time to walk around and see the Piazza San Carlo via the opulent marble sidewalks under the arcades.

We stopped at a suitably delicious looking cafe

And then peeked into the Congregazione Dell'Oratorio Di San Filippo Neri

We walked through the narrow passage next to the Egyptian museum

But by this point the kids were in meltdown mode, so it was a direct shot (or the most direct that we could manage anyway) back to the B+B

A quick scan of Tripadvisor again identified a nearby restaurant called Il Ristoro Dei Mercanti.  It was a lovely meal, with Piemontese specialties.  Our waiter was incredibly nice to the kids.  They really make it a lot easier to bring kids to restaurants in Italy!  Little things like bringing out the kids food early make a big difference in the survivability of a meal for parents (and fellow diners).  

At the end of the meal, our waiter asked me if I would like to try a special alcohol, but that it was "Only for hard men-- are you sure?"  I was in fact not sure, but what the hell.

I guess it was grappa mixed with mint.  Not bad, but I probably will not search out more.  Next up:  sleep!  Unfortunately, we were awoken at 5 in the morning by a sea of joggers in matching red shirts filling the street below and chattering like birds.  Finally, one of them yelled "ANDIAMO?!"  And the sea lurched forward.