Oltre Finale day 2

An early start:  the cliffs were calling.  

One cliff in particular was calling, which we had seen pictures of and looked amazing:  Rocca di Basura.  Not even the cake.cookie place was open, but I wandered around anyway.

So now... the guide.  The guide is unexpectedly imprecise and we ended up stomping through the woods for entirely too long.  It also very helpfully rates each cliff for child friendliness.  This one had a clean bill of health.  However, getting there involved getting the kids down some fixed ropes.  Nice.  I was about ready to give up entirely until I found the telltale signs of climbers:  a turd under a rock!

FINALLY we got onto the rock

and it was disappointing.  Slippery, short, and a different planet from Kalymnos.  It looks cool though.  We warmed up on this horrible greasy 6a+ (Sabba), then did Melusina (6c), then I did Aleppe (7a) on sight with some difficulty, and we ended on another slippery piece of crap called Nocciola (6c) .  I enjoyed Aleppe and Melusina but the cliff in general was nothing special.  Zoe and Alex played on it though.

Next it was time to hike back up the fixed ropes to the car.  At least it was through some beautifully terraced hills!

We got back to the bar for some late panini (delicious!) and then I hopped on my bike for a quick ride to the beautiful seaside town of Alassio.

Getting to the water was a little harrowing, as was getting back though.

I mainly wanted to experience part of the route of the famous Spring cycling classic: Milan San Remo, but mostly ended up sucking diesel.  The seaside part was wonderful though.  One very nice thing about bringing a bike along on vacation is it allows you to scope out which places might be worth a visit later with the family.  Alassio was a good example of this.  As soon as  I got back, I leafed through the Osteria book and found a restaurant there called I Matetti.  Chloe called and got a reservation, and after a 15 drive, we were there!

I've seen a lot of Italian restaurants with tourist like us waiting out front for them to open, but I have to say that I have never seen Italians waiting for a restaurant to open at the ungodly hour of 7:30PM!  We were encouraged by this.  Alex had already decided that he wanted fried calamari, so we ordered two servings for him and Zoe.  I had the mixed fried delicious things, and chloe won, ordering a fantastic Vongole.  Dessert was ice cream and then apple fritters.  Perfection.