Italy Day 15, Dorf Tirol: A Birthday in the Clouds

Tuesday, October 8

Tirolo, Bolzano, Trentino-Alto Adige / Dorf Tirol, Bozen, Südtirol

Highlight: A surprise from our host

Lowlight: Another day rained out

In this post, I am really trying hard to find something positive about what was a crappy day that had us ready to fly home immediately. Doesn't the title "A Birthday in the Clouds" sound much more positive than "A Shitty Birthday on Another Shitty Rainy Day?"

True to the weather forecast, I heard it raining lightly through the night. And it was obvious during the night from the lack of lights from the towns below us that we were socked in. During the coming day, it would rain harder and less hard on and off all day, with 38 mm predicted, an inch and a half, about a tenth of our yearly rainfall in Bend. Europe has been blasted with insane amounts of rain this year.

Birthday Surprise: Franziska was so Thoughtful

Today was Ann’s birthday and we had planned to go out and celebrate with a nice dinner, but the rain put a damper on that. When we woke up, it was socked in, raining, and miserable. That would not change all day.

In anticipation of a rain-out, yesterday at the store, I wanted to get something nice for dinner and a small cake for Ann. The tiny grocery store in Dorf Tirol did not have any cakes, but I managed to find two tiny Linzer tortes, a short crust pastry topped with jam, raspberry in this case. I planned to serve a torte with her breakfast coffee.

Because I wanted Ann to experience things from this region, I also got a small bottle of Austrian obst Schnaps to go with her coffee. Obst means “fruit” and indicates a mix of fruits in the ferment, in this case apple and pear. The nose was more mixed than the flavor which was largely apple. This brand was very smooth. It turns out that Ann dislikes schnaps (and grappa, and marc, and all straight liquor). I tried. I should have known. Good thing I bought a tiny bottle (which I left for the next occupants of our room).

Linzer Torte and Schnaps for Special Birthday Coffee

Some time later in the morning, Ann opened the door to our apartment, for what reason I cannot fathom for if there were ever a day to stay in and not venture out, it would be today. Waiting for her outside the door was a bottle of Prosecco, a birthday card, and a beautiful hydrangea bloom in a vase. How sweet of Franziska, who spotted Ann's birthday on her passport when we checked in. We were both touched by this gesture on what was a gloomy, sad excuse for a birthday.

We read; we watched it rain; we played games on our phones; we were bored; we watched it rain; we looked at photos on my cameras; and in the afternoon, we watched it rain some more. Finally, we watched a movie on Ann's iPad and opened the bottle of Prosecco. Every now and again, we'd look up from the movie and watch it rain.  

Afternoon Movie and Prosecco

For dinner, I bought some fresh pasta and other supplies from the grocery store yesterday. This long thick pasta was labeled troccoli, a cut from Foggia in the south on the Adriatic opposite Napoli, which would be called pici in Toscana and bigoli in the Veneto. In the late afternoon, the birthday girl asked, "Will you do just a simple tomato sauce for the pasta?" I was already three steps ahead on this request. "I'm planning on making a fake Amatriciana with speck and tomato paste," I replied. The birthday girl said, "Perfect!"

To accompany our pasta birthday dinner, I had bought a Lagrein, the signature red of this region, figuring it was also something else that Ann should try. I have had a handful of decent bottlings in the US, wines that feel and act like a Syrah in many respects. This wine, however, was just a no. We tried to like it, but it was very ripe, plummy, fat, flabby, and a disappointment by all measures. I poured it down the drain, another low point in a low day.

Lights of Meran Through the Cloud Cover

Being bored nearly out of our skulls, we went to bed listening to the sound of rain hitting the deck just outside our room and fully cognizant of the forecast of several days more rain to come. I am truly sorry that Ann's birthday was such a bust and the lowest point among many lows of our trip to Italy.